Photo copyright 2001 by Michael Foran. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License.
On this day twelve years ago, my daughter was in kindergarten. Today, she is a senior in high school.
Our world changed that bright, sunny day in 2001. My daughter cannot remember a time when we were not at war in the Middle East.
I’m sad for all the people who died that day. I’m sad for all the people who have died fighting the people who were responsible for the attack and for the people who were sent to a second war that we had no business starting. I’m sad for all the people who have been deployed again and again and again, and for all the people who have returned home injured, only to face a bureaucracy that cannot seem to get its act together to give them the services that they have earned.
I miss my grandpa. Our last conversation was about the attacks – two days later, he suffered the stroke that killed him, just weeks before what would have been his 91st birthday.
I miss our old way of life. I long for a nation that was busy doing business, where there were plenty of jobs for anyone who wanted one, where the future seemed bright. When we all had a reasonable expectation that Big Brother wasn’t watching us. The one where reasonable people could disagree without getting ugly. The nation we lived in when our daughter was born.
My daughter knows no other world but this one. And that makes me sad.
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