OT: Sad day

M1

Today would have been my father's 98th birthday.  I was glad he didn't live to see 2001.  I can hardly bear to watch any of the remembrances, still too close.  Any one else feel this way too?  I know I can be seasonal, and the light is going down--but it's hard to feel like there is anything to look forward to right now.  Maybe I'll feel different after a booster shot in a couple of weeks, right now we're pretty isolated, not comfortable out and about in our vaccine-flaunting community and it's telling I think. I have to remind myself to keep my courage up and my expectations down.  I'm missing non-demented adult interaction too.

Rick4407

Yes M1 it is a sad day.   The events in the past as well as the divided country we have become.  Adult conversation is indeed rare for me.   Hearing problems, covid isolation, and no family to speak of makes for no distractions from caregiving, but it also makes for feeling like I am losing contact with reality.  I've become a "news junkie" and watch the stock market obsessively.  Well, those and read the messages here at least once or twice a day.  Take care M1.  Rick

Paris20

I watched most of the observances this morning. I think about what happened twenty years ago. It’s probably inevitable for most of us. My husband had to be reminded just a few times about what we were watching. His memory of twenty years ago is mostly intact but I certainly see cracks developing. One of his former students lost her husband in the attack. He used to talk about the loss but I think it’s no longer in his memory bank, which Alzheimer’s has consistently   depleted.

jfkoc

It is  hard day. I watched the names being read as I do every year. 

My personal story that relates to 9/11 is the fact that my husband, an aviation attorney, was alerted to the fat that there were people learning to fly here at an aviation school. The students were noted as overstaying their "visas" and that they were focused on flying...taking off and landing not so important.

My husband reported this to our state Senator several times. Always the same response..."we have important things to consider". 

My husband never forgot this....same for me.

DrinaJGB

Yes, too many losses and lonliness.

 Last night I could not sleep. Not because of DH, but because I just learned I had lost 2 very old and dear friends; one of whom was my very first love at the ripe old age of 14. You know--that ago when anything seems possible and love is so strong it takes your breath away. DO you remember?

  It was almost too much to take. I know it sounds silly because I have not seen either one since high school, but they were both so dear to me. I did get a message from the one who had been a best friend 2 years ago. He said he would get in touch with me again, but then the pandemic hit and he never did.

  The other one was the first love of my life and I have never forgotten him, but oddly enough I just had a dream about him 2 weeks ago---we were dancing to a song and we were very young. Then yesterday I heard the song on the radio, and I actually spoke his name out loud.

  Last night out of curiosity I looked him up---he had died. Two weeks ago. I cried most of the night. 

I just don't know how anyone is supposed to function with all of this grief. it feels like I'm drowning.

DrinaJGB

Just in my car and heard Neil Young--"This much sadness is too much sorrow; it's impossible to make it today."..

Pretty much sums it all up.

LadyTexan

Hello M1.

It is a hard day and has been a hard week leading up to today. There are many memorials and remembrances. It is hard for me to watch so I choose not to. My memories of that day are so vivid, difficult and raw.

-LT

Ed1937

Yes, it's a sad day that we all remember vividly. We all know where we were when we heard the news. You just don't forget something like that.

Iris L.

jfkoc wrote:

. The students were noted as overstaying their "visas" and that they were focused on flying...taking off and landing not so important.

My neighbor used to live in Minneapolis and tells the story of a flight instructor who noted the same focus from one he later learned was one of the hijackers.  Although he thought it was odd, he did not report at the time.  He since had a lot of guilt.

No one could conceive of anything so heinous before it happened.

Iris

abc123

M1, I’m sorry your having a rough time. So am I, I remember it like it was yesterday.

DrinaJGB

All day I have turned off coverage of the attacks. I'm sick of all the tragedy coverage about everything. Can't watch anymore depressing things--too much to deal with.My own life is depressing enough.

DrinaJGB

I agree with Willie Nelson and his son Luke's song "TURN OFF THE F***ing NEWS"!!!

M1

As always, it helps so to know I'm not alone in my feelings. Like Rick, I want to watch the news to not feel so isolated, and yet it can just mix in more grief for the world on top of my personal grief.  Thank you all for responding. Courage to all of us. On a brighter note, I had eleven baby wood ducks on the pond tonight, made me feel a touch better. We take our comforts where we can find them, yes?

Battlebuddy

    I couldn’t watch the coverage either. I think we carry so much grief, that adding more grief to it is hard. 

    I remember it all . I remember the terror filled hours when we were trying to get word from our loved one who was missing.  My brother worked in Tower One. When the plane hit the building , he headed for the exit. Hit the street , and kept running. He got out but it effected him for a long time.     

Donr

I chose to watch some of the coverage so I Will Not Forget.

White Crane

M1, thank you for telling about the baby wood ducks.  That brought a smile.  Yesterday was very sad for me, too.  Like some have said, I didn't turn on the news nor did I watch the memorials.  Just thinking about that day brings me to tears.  DH does not remember 9/11 so I could not talk to him about it.  We could not share our memories about it.  So sad.

Crushed

My lecture on 9/11/2001 in Building Safety Regulation was to be "The 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and the problem of designing for terrorism"

It still gives me the willeys

DrinaJGB

M1--

 The thought of those glorious baby ducks brought me joy. How marvelous!!Thank you for that image.

  I take so much comfort in the nature around me now. From the red-tailed hawks to the little wrens who nest in my front hedge and sing on my front porch daily, to the dragonflies in my water lilies, the 2 does who visit every evening with their fawns (to which I had to train my GSD- "SHHH! Don't scare the babies"--and she sits quietly and watches them, too)--to the tiniest little toads who greet me early every morning when I let my dog out before daylight. I sit on the back breezeway, and if they are not there, I call out and they hop out on the porch --lol!!I have observed their growing from barely visible to bigger each day.

Lately it has been the blue jay nearby. My grandmother proclaimed the blue jay to be a sign that the Great Spirit was near. I certainly hope so--we need all the help we can get. I always found that statement to be a bit curious, seeing that that loud, obnoxious, bossy and boisterous bird should be a profoud spiritual sign, and not the tranquil dove or other gentle kind. But there you are. How utterly and beautifully ironic. It makes me feel not so guilty about my loud and boisterous yawps from sheer frustration at times of complete desperation and complete lonliness. Carry on and be brave.

Ed1937

I love all the talk about nature's creatures. It brought this to mind. 'MAN WALKS AMONG US' MARTY ROBBINS 

Jeff86

I remember 9/11 like it was yesterday.  DW and I both were both working in Manhattan on that clear bright day.  I was desperate to reunite with my DW and walked 9 miles uptown to join her.

Today, my DW has no idea that the attacks occurred, never mind what our personal experience of that day was.  Like so many things, I have to do—or am doomed to do—the remembering for both of us.