Some thoughts....

Just like many (most? all?) of my fellow citizens this morning, I paused to spend a few moments thinking about the events that happened eight years ago. Unbidden memories of the 'where' came rushing forward.

Where? In the Manana military housing area, on Oahu, Hawaii. As our neighbors started waking up shortly after it started there was a mass exodus. Some undoubtedly in response to urgent phone calls recalling them to their places of duty. Others, like Cyrilee, rising at their normal early hour, seeing the news and immediately heading toward their bases, knowing without being told, where they needed to be.

We've been told, for whatever reason, that we should view this day as a day of service. As I sit and think about those events from a few short years ago, and more importantly, life in these intervening years, my mind moves from honoring the victims, rescuers, and responders on that day to another group of people... those folks, especially the young folks, who joined the service (military) after 09/11/01. So yes, this should be a day of service...or more accurately, a day to honor service.

Often folks of my age and generation spend much idle chatting time lamenting the direction our society is heading. That the generation moving from youth to adulthood in these post 9/11 years have no sense of place or duty, only interested in having the hippest new smart-phone to text endless strings of opinion about who should be the next american idol.

I say the American Idol is all those kids who walked off that graduation stage, stood in front of a flag, raised their right hands, and told America, "This won't happen again. I will stand that watch, take up that challenge."

Full disclosure, I have a bias... our daughter was one of those. She is currently in her senior year at the U.S. Naval Academy. We are unwaveringly and immeasurably proud of her. While she has never stated that the events of 9/11 were the reason she joined , I would note that her facebook status update this morning simply reads..."9.11.01".