On this day in 2001.

So, 18 years ago today, I was working nights for a company that was owned by a company that had just got bought by a company. I was working 6 pm to 2 am shifts. I got home about 2:30, Sat down, had a cup of decaf and logged into a chat room on AIM. We had a regular crowd there that moved to aim when the community left AOL. We were chatting about this and that, when around 5 45 my time I turned on CNN. They had interrupted their usual AM chat show to talk about what appeared to be an aircraft accident involving the World Trade Center. I told everyone in the chat immediately to turn on the news. about a half hour later I got an IM from a friend : "We're at war, aren't we?" I replied back "I hope not, but I don't see how we can avoid it. " I didn't sleep that day, and most of the next two days nobody did much of anything except stay awake and stay by the news. On the evening of that first day, my Mom, Stepfather, Brother and I all went outside. It was just getting dark, with light still in the western sky. We all looked up and saw the F-16s from Luke AFB flying overhead on armed patrols. I knew people who worked at Luke. They said to me that the pilots were all of them pissed off. I knew guys in the special forces community. Usually they talk back and forth about shit, sometimes ribbing each other about things, but on the 12th and after, they simply stopped talking. One of those who would talk told me, though I didn't need to be told, "Dude, they're going to work now. " I just said "Yeah. I know." Afghanistan was the target. Everybody knew it. All I could do was sit around and wait to hear. I didn't know it would be the better part of a decade before Bin Laden got his, largely because George Effin W Bush was all hot to go into Iraq. Iraq, which had nothing to do with 9/11, and which would have summarily executed bin Laden had they gotten a hold of him. Iraq, source of oil though it may be, turned out to be a goddamn tar baby. (excuse the racist reference just this once.) We needed to get Bin Laden, not because of revenge, but justice. As a point of national Pride. As a point of "nobody messes with the USA and gets away with it." A Child born in 2001 is now old enough to serve in the army that has not known peace in that child's entire lifetime. Meanwhile, Donald Goddamn Trump is telling jokes about how he has the tallest building in Manhattan now. or had. Whatever. This is not the day for Politics, but for remembering those who died, those who gave of themselves, and those who bravely got up, got a drinks cart to use as a battering ram and said "Let's Roll."