AM~Erica Hears the Bells

So anyway...

I have thought process today. And the process surrounds the events of 12 years ago.

I'm not going to completely go back into where I was at during that fateful day, but you can read about it HERE. It's when I posted about it last year. But there's something about this day that rings a bell...

Maybe I shouldn't be, but I am a fan of the works of Edgar Allen Poe. I'm not the only one, but the ones that know & get his work has got to have something not quite right with them. It's one thing to appreciate the work & try to understand it...and then it's the understanding it &/or having it have some meaning to you is another...

A few months ago, I had the privilege to take in a one man show (well...2-man show counting the music) at the Coterie Theater. An incredible actor, Hughston Walkinshaw, played Edgar Allen Poe in the reciting & interpretation of a few of Poe's works while trying to give a view of what might have been happening inside EAP's head. It was amazing, bone-chilling, terrifying & mesmerizing. It was called "Tell Tale Electric Poe", and there was haunting electric guitar sounds as background & filler music, as well as used as sound effects. It was 50 minutes of psychotic weirdness with only the rhythms & rhymes of the words taming the chaos. (read about when Teen Girl & I saw it in March HERE)

Hughston Walkinshaw as Edgar Allan Poe

One of the pieces done was "The Bells". If you have never experienced the poem of "The Bells"...you should. This poem brilliantly shows the chaotic mindset of Poe. It really shows that he really was all over the place in his head. And he tells it thru the different forms of bells.

He focuses on happy jingly bells, mellow ringing of wedding bells...then moves into frightening alarum bells...and then the toll of funeral bells.

I got thinking that these bells that EAP wrote about are telling of different parts in his life. They tell time...like chimes on a clock or in a bell tower.

As I witnessed hearing tolling of bells today, it made me think about this poem.

Twelve years ago, today, there were frantic bells being rung!

Hear the loud alarum bells,
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now—now to sit or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,—
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells,
Of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!

I can only imagine the fire alarms, the emergency sounds, the bells at fire stations, the dispatching sounds, and the sirens coming thru on radios all thru New York. It breaks my heart & leaves me near claustrophobically breathless. The fright in the eyes of dust-covered people of all walks of life running or frozen in shock. The horror of the clanging & twanging of the bells that tell of danger is horrifying. Watching it on TV, keeping up on the computer, listening to the radio...the horror, the crying, the shock...it resonated so loudly over the country & the world.

Then, it hit me this morning during some coverage of live memorial events going on:

Hear the tolling of the bells,
Iron bells!
What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!
In the silence of the night
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people—ah, the people,
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone—
They are neither man nor woman,
They are neither brute nor human,
They are Ghouls:
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A pæan from the bells;
And his merry bosom swells
With the pæan of the bells,
And he dances, and he yells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the pæan of the bells,
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells—
To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells:
To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.

It was breaking my heart, as it should, to hear these slow, methodical bells. They are there for remembering particular times &/or people. They are often used during Memorial Day or All Saints Day in remembering those who have gone before us. And then, today, they strike a large iron-sounding brass bell at particular times of the morning:

*CLANG* 

at the exact time when the 1st of the Twin Towers was hit

*CLANG* 

at the exact time when the 2nd of the Twin Towers was hit

*CLANG* 

at the exact time when the Pentagon was hit

*CLANG* 

at the exact time the plane crashed in Pennsylvania

*CLANG* 

at the exact time of the collapse of the 1st Tower

*CLANG* 

at the exact time of the collapse of the 2nd Tower

Each and every one of these tolls is gut-wrenching.
Each and every one of these tolls breaks a thick, somber silence.

It's the telling of time in a clock that seemed to stop a long, long moment that didn't seem to have an end to it.

Each of those bells still chokes me up & gives me chills. As I know it does throughout an entire nation.

As we hear these bells at significant points of time in our lives, they wake up those memories...like an alarm clock that just goes off annually.

My hope for these tolling bells now is that it wakes us up as to how we felt toward each other right after the alarm bells went off initially. Because we could not be further from those times than we are now. Like a face ringing a bell, we need to think back to our patriotism that came after that. We've lost it. We need a wake-up call...but hopefully without the turbulence of sirens & emergency bells to do it. Because it happened on our own emergency number of 911 when it happened 12 years ago.

I have pointed it out before that on September 11, 2001, the terrorists changed the course of how we live. In that sense, they succeeded. And in the midst of it, we have turned against each other.

In this moment, a toll of a large, iron bell clangs in the memory of shared patriotism. The good news is that patriotism can be resurrected...if we allow it.

Are you doing your part to bring it back in togetherness...or crashing it in your own ideals?

Do you hear the bell?

Never, ever, ever forget, fellow Americans...ever.

Stay tuned...

God Bless, AM~Erica (<<<=== still meant wholeheartedly)

AM~Erica Remembers

So anyway...

As I continue to urge everyone to support SUICIDE AWARENESS WEEK (thank you to everyone who showed their support yesterday...it was beautiful), I pause today for a very important remembrance: the 11th anniversary of September 11th.

Many of us will remember where we were when we heard about it & remember what played out the rest of that day & weeks to come. My heart still sinks & I still get so emotional seeing the images. It's like it just happened all over again.

Do you remember for that moment in time when we all came together as one nation? Side by side with each other? For that moment, it had everything to do with being an American, in the melting pot...not a divided political nation.

Today, 9-11, is unofficially known as Patriots Day. Not sure why it's still unofficial. We all know it will eventually become a federal holiday. It's all a matter of time. As it should be.

And as we do remember, as in Alan Jackson's song, where were you when the world stopped turning that September day? I was on my way to work. News had come on saying that a plane had hit one of the towers, but word outside of New York figured it was a private prop plane & that "it happens". Then...just a few moments later, the news came across that the other tower was hit by a plane & the information began to unfold that they were much larger aircraft than thought...and there were passengers involved. It may very well be a terrorist attack.

I remember getting to work & joining in the shock that had fallen over everyone. Where I worked, at the time, had a travel agency involved since we had a lot of travel that happened within the company. I remember the obliviousness of the head of the travel department...he came off the elevators...whistling. He had no idea what had happened. We turned on radios to keep up with what was going on. I remember standing around a coworker's cubicle as things developed...and the Pentagon had been hit. There were about 6 of us stand around. We all about collapsed from what we'd just heard.

My hubby was on a business trip & was scheduled to come back that day. I had already been on the phone with his job to figure out how we were going to get him back home with the near-simultaneous shutdown of airports nation-wide. My hubby saw what was happening on TV...in California...excited to get home while being shocked by what he saw on the screen. He had no thought process that it might actually effect his travel plans back home. I was so relieved to talk to him on the phone, but expressed my concern about travel. I told him I'd already been on the phone with his boss' wife to figure something out. We discussed taking a train, but didn't know how that would work. Good thing...a couple of trains were taken over & derailed, too. So...rental car places had to do something they don't like to do...allow travelers to use the rentals as the main transportation to get them home. It took my hubby 2 days, but he drove to Missouri from California in a rental car. I had never been so relieved to have him back home.

It was a scary time. As parents, it was difficult to explain to young children what was happening. Teen Boy was almost 4; Teen Girl was 5 & in school. Since the internet was still very new in it's uses...it was baffling to see the images. And horrifying. So to see the video of everything when I got home to watch TV...with the kids...without my hubby...was devastating. I could just hug my kids & cry. It's all I could do. And remembering hearing on the radio when the towers began to collapse.

The lives lost...the city that was in total apocalyptic devastation...awful.

Not just the pictures of police & firefighters that had to step up that took my heart out of my chest...I think back to Teen Boy at that time. He was this adorable little guy with big glasses & a speech impediment wanting to be a firefighter. We needed to find firefighter gear & stuff for his birthday...but you couldn't find anything with firemen. Until 9/11...then (and still) you could find firefighter gear EVERYWHERE!!! Figures. But that was a positive that came out of it.

I also remember the pictures of people standing on ledges of the towers, just instantly giving up...and jumping...just plummeting to their death that they figured was coming anyway.

It because of the above paragraph that I am in awe that 9/11 is during Suicide Awareness Week. We saw it happening on TV...even live. There are people who made it out...so it's sad to think these people, in that moment, figuring it was all over & took care of what they thought was the inevitable on their own. That is tragic. It's tragic all of the lives that were lost because they were trapped, or hit. I cannot even imagine that...or what their families still go thru. But the jumpers could have made it out & told their story of what happened. We will never get their side of it. They didn't take the chance of the thought they might still have a chance at life. With the thousands that were killed during & because of the attacks...many, MANY made it. We get to hear their stories. That's what helps us attempt to understand what went on during such a horrific act. Civilians, police & firefighters became soldiers in their own right during that situation...and then heros. There were those who died heros, too. But to take your own life in the midst of the spontaneous [to the public] crisis is so disheartening. I can't even imagine their families witnessing what's going on & then realizing your loved one just jumped off the World Trade Center.

People, it was thru all of this that we came together. We were patriotic together. It didn't matter what color, religion, sexuality, size, nationality...or political party we were...we stood as true Americans, side-by-side, cheering each other on to fight for the good of our country.

The mastermind behind it, bin Laden, was determined to tear down our economy & our country. It's 11 years later. Guess what...is the fear that he succeeded? HE'S DEAD NOW & still reaping the benefits of his horrendous & cowardice act...and we are allowing it. How divided are we? How are we economically? The worst part is that we are having a near civil war about it. What happened to flying our flags & being patriotic? Poo flinging of politics because it's an election year? This is what we've come to.

As we focus on today...the meaning behind it...what happened with the bonding between Americans...what good has come of it as we live right now?

The nastiness ensuing during the political war...who's really ahead? I'm concerned it's the terrorists. When you make your pouty right-wing/left-wing posts just trying to tear down other American ideals...think about the divisiveness that bin Laden had hoped for stemming from the 9/11 attacks. Are we better country now?

*WHEW*

Stay tuned...

God Bless, AM~Erica (<= and I mean this whole-heartedly)

AM~Erica Bids bin Laden Adieu

So anyway...

After a very hectic weekend, our family was T.I.R.E.D.! We went to bed early last night...like BEFORE 10:00 last night! Wow!

My hubby turned on the TV last night to catch the weather...and then we heard it: Osama bin Laden is dead! We didn't react much out of mere shock!

As so many of you know, this name has been so prominent in our lives for the past decade. [We] have been looking for this man for so long after being the mastermind behind one of our nation's greatest tragedies; certainly a defining one in several of our lifetimes. It has definitely changed how we live in our nation & how things are done.

Nearly 10 years ago, the horrific nature of terrorism was brought to light when the planes hit each of the towers of the World Trade Center on Tuesday, September 11, 2001, followed by the hit on the Pentagon. I still well up with tears & my heart breaks when I see ANY of the images from that day. Watching the towers fall, seeing the dust & wondering how life in New York & our nation would continue.

There was also an amazing sense of brotherhood (all encompassing) & pride toward each other & our nation for quite some time afterward. American flags flew everywhere. People were wearing flag pins & clothing in support. We were kinder to each other & listened to each other in our time of hurt & need. We all had opinions to share & didn't know how soon was considered safe enough to laugh & joke again.

We all have memories of how that day played out for us & it still evokes emotions thinking about where we were when we heard what happened & saw the first images...and memories of how our lives were effected.

In the time since, patriotism has faded, we have raised our voices & opinions against each other, and we have lost a lot of pride in our nations & ourselves. We have been through hard times since then, and still continue. So, who won? Does pointing fingers at each other & blaming each other really help anything?

Our troops are certainly to be commended for what they have done in these last few years since the surge after 9/11/01. We should always be thanking our troops for their tireless hours, days & years put into making sure we stay a free country. Yesterday was no different. We played the most intense game of hide-and-seek EVER! We won that part of the game!

So now with the amazing scenes from the crowds outside the White House & the scenes from New York upon the news of the death of bin Laden are so moving! With spontaneous outbursts of our national anthem & flags waving...it was joyful patriotism again. This time, not brought on by grief.

The death news brought on so many different emotions. I think it is more of an appropriate sense of relief. But our work is not done.

If you think that Osama being out of the equation has taken care of Al Qaeda, you are SO wrong! There are so many "splinter cells" out there & now there will be a struggle for power...and will will need to be on alert as there are going to be very violent threats (at the very least) as a new leader attempts to emerge. I would like to see this as a downfall for this group, but cautiously positive.

In this positivity, I would hope this would lighten the load for our troops...but it will not be immediate due to my theory stated in the previous paragraph.

Now I am going to point out that I am not the only one who thinks that a VERY abrupt burial at sea was a little strange. I do not advocate parading the dead...I was really bothered when Mother Teresa passed away & she was laid out in the open & on camera. (Please note that I am in NO way comparing Osama bin Laden to Mother Teresa...just a death situation.) I was even bothered by the video of Saddam Hussein's hanging, but it was a relief knowing there was proof. I am from Missouri, a.k.a. the Show Me State, so we tend to want that proof. I almost want that picture & documented proof of DNA knowing that it was really him that we got. To say the body is in custody with the United States & then in the same breath say his body was chucked out to sea was all too weird. Let the conspiracy theories begin...

I also made sure my children knew this morning when they got up so they would be in the know when they went to school today. I am hoping that SOMEONE at school brings this up today! My kids were in the dark about the Japan tragedy until we told them AFTER school! But that's just this school system, I know others are better about bringing up breaking news updates that effect the world as we know it.

Will all of this being said, let's all come back together, show our support for each other & our nation, and bring back our patriotism. Oh, and actually keep it up while we are at it.

Stay tuned...

God Bless, AM~Erica