For some reason, the seventh anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks struck me in a profound way this year. I'm not entirely sure why, except that last year, I was having bone graft surgery and the year before officiating my great-uncle's funeral and finding out that the baby I was carrying who turned out to be Daniel had a high risk for a genetic disease. My mind was elsewhere. This year, I've had some time to think about Sept. 11.
Today, I drove up to Rock Falls to officiate a funeral and got to spend lots of time listening to NPR and thinking about the past seven years. I arrived at my church in July before the Sept. 11 attacks. After the second tower collapsed, I went to work and spent the late morning and early afternoon calling people to let them know we were having an impromptu prayer service. I remember very clearly trying to put some words to the shock all of us were feeling and failing miserably. Luckily, everyone else was also failing miserably at processing it all. At least we could fail miserably together.
Remembering that day now, I see the events through the lens of a wife and parent, and my heart feels broken in new ways. And today, again, I fail miserably at putting words to my thoughts. I have a feeling I'm not the only one. So if you still fail miserably at being able to process all that happened and has happened since then, know I'm sitting in solidarity with you tonight. At least we're failing miserably together.
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