Still singing

I was sitting on my couch in a little condominium in Madison, Wisconsin nursing my three month old baby girl. I was watching the Today show and trying to make sense of the news break. Before I saw what I saw, I was ignorant and uninformed and a tad too into my own life. I yelled to Big Man, "Hey! Come look at this! A plane just flew into the World Trade Center!" I watched and couldn't believe the coincidence- another plane into another tower. I was dumb and Big Man was grave. I didn't get it then, and in my heart of hearts I don't want to get it now.

As I relive that day with everyone else this weekend, I am trying desperately to recall what life was like before in order to make sense of our after. Ten years have passed and I alternate between scouring the news headlines and burying my head in the sand.

The courage and valor of the firefighters who lived and died is something that stays with me. At one of my son's preschool field trips, they toured a little fire house and all the little kids wanted to know, "Do you do what they do in New York?"

So many lives altered in one day, a thriving, pulsing city stopped on a dime and forced to turn inward and channel the kindness they are renowned for hiding, but they rose to the unbelievable nightmare and from grief and horror, stories, always it is the stories, emerge of hope...and our humanity.

There is much talk of getting over it and indeed we have and must move forward....but how can we get over it when so many were lost to us? Try telling the countless children who lost their moms or dads to get over it. Try telling those who lost their best friends, the loves of their lives to get over it. Try telling the strangers who saw people risk their lives for them to get over it. It's ridiculous. I think it's ok to carry little bits of grief with us. In doing so, we are carrying a constant melody with us, a song that says I love you, I miss you everyday, I am grateful for the time you were here, I am sorry for your loss, I am appreciative of everything you tried to do for us, I miss you, I love you.

Maybe I'm crazy, but I don't think that is song we should never stop singing.