Never Forget: September 11, 2001

I originally wrote this post last year on my (now retired) other blog, but it is fitting to repost it here today:

I will never forget the events of September 11, 2001. So many men and women lost their lives in the biggest terrorist attack on U.S. soil. I think about it almost every day. Sometimes people seem to forget (or pretend to forget) what happened. They talk about the “War on Terror” in such a negative way without reflecting on the real reasons behind it. Listening to Darryl Worley’s song Have You Forgotten? and looking at archival footage from that day make me wonder if maybe we should show images from 9/11/01 every day. Americans need to remember what we learned and what we are really fighting for. This is just as important now as it was seven years ago.

President George W. Bush will be remembered in history for being a wartime president (whether that is a good thing or a bad thing in itself is debatable). Although there are so many nasty things the Left has called our president (i.e. “retarded cowboy,” “war criminal,” “bumbling buffoon”), one thing is certain: Bush has kept our country from another terrorist attack. As Daniel Henninger wrote in an article today for The Wall Street Journal, “Lest we forget, as someone said, let’s revisit the bare details of that day. This presumably is the reason for anyone’s post-9/11 antiterror policies.”

One of my heroes is Todd Morgan Beamer. I did not know him personally, but I have read and connected with his story. He was one of the passengers aboard United Airlines Flight 93. A group of brave men and women would not surrender and they fought the hijackers. They succeeded in preventing the plane from reaching its targeted destination (presumably the White House or the U.S. Capitol) by crashing it into a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Todd Beamer’s last audible words to a 911 operator were “Are you guys ready? Let’s roll.” A motto that is near and dear to my heart.

Source(s):

http://911digitalarchive.org/

http://www.september11news.com/

Senior Year

Senior year was awesome, but it was nothing like you might expect. Half my class (the part I was in) wasn’t at the AVPA campus or even the MCST campus at all. The ones of us who had at least a 3.0 GPA took all our classes at the local community college. We were also required to do an internship, which would give us enough credits to officially graduate high school. Being at CCM was incredible. There was so much freedom; I got to choose all of my classes, drive to school, and go wherever I wanted for lunch. And more than that, I was with mature college students. CCM offered such a diverse environment and I met people of all ages and backgrounds; I even befriended a 30-year-old woman in one my night classes.

Going to CCM really changed my perspective on a lot of things. Despite attending a “different” school by going to AVPA, I had felt incredibly sheltered and cut off from the rest of the world. The opportunity to go to college my senior year (I am aware it was just a “community” college) helped me realize there was more to life than just the things within my comfort zone. Not only did I get this remarkable experience, but I also got 20 credits which would transfer to a four-year college.

Junior Year

Being juniors in a school (called MCST) with no full-time seniors, we were the oldest class in a completely unfamiliar environment. The layout of the campus was mind-blowing. Building Four houses at least six different Academies. The auto-mechanic school was next to the veterinarian school and that was across from the culinary school. It was a bit overwhelming for my senses to smell car oil, then caged hamsters, and then fresh-baked cookies as I walked down the hallway.

Although MCST was diverse in terms of students and their studies, the school was relatively new and seriously lacked many extracurricular activities. Because they had never offered the upperclassman a prom, my class decided to be the first ones to start the tradition. In a weird turn of events, I wound up becoming very involved in the school. I was elected Vice President of the Student Government and also acted as one of the co-presidents of the prom committee.

Since the school was nothing like your typical high school, we decided a conventional prom would not cut it. We decided to rent out a yacht and take it for a night cruise around New York Harbor. Prom night happened after junior year had officially ended. It was the last time my class would be together because half of us would be going to county college for senior year. At the end of the night, my class huddled together and cried to the song, “Photograph” by Nickelback. It was quite corny, but that was our class song. It was a beautiful night that somehow made all the challenges we had to go through worthwhile.

Leaving Our Mark

News came to AVPA in January 2005 that the school would be moving back to the mothership. We would no longer be part of BHS, but we would instead join the other Academies in the larger vocational school that Fall. This was great news for some, and distressing news for others. I was somewhere in the middle. I didn’t like BHS, but I knew going to a totally different school would require more adaption. One positive thing about the move for me was that the new location was much closer to my hometown. One negative thing was that we would no longer be “those f*cking Academy kids” because everyone in the school would be an Academy kid (the only difference being the field we were studying). On the whole, I was more excited than anything for a change of the scenery.

The news roused a lot of debate between kids, parents, teachers, and the school board. Some tried their earnest to protest the move, but their efforts failed in the end. The last month of my sophomore year was spent helping to pack up boxes and prepare for the great migration. One memorable thing we did as a class was to write all over a white board. We signed signatures, quotes quips, and jotted jokes in the name of saying goodbye to the old ways and hello to a new adventure.

QOD: “We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we’re curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.” – Walt Disney

Sophomore Year

Sophomore year was a blur. It went by so fast that I don’t remember most of it. This was the year of stronger relationships. Not only did we, the students, grow closer together, but we also started forming bonds with our teachers. This was true for all the AVPA teachers, except for the history teacher(s) because we went through six different ones that year.

One event, or rather series of events, that I remember most from sophomore year was a humanities assignment on the presidential election of 2004. My class was divided into two groups (Bush and Kerry) and we prepared for months for a final debate on the election issues. I was (happily) put on Team Bush. This was one of the posters I designed for our campaign:

I don’t remember which team won the debate, but I know which candidate won the election. This campaign solidified my political ideology as being a conservative Republican.

Freshman Year

Freshman year of high school was quite an interesting experience. It was really a fresh start for me (no pun intended). The thing I remember most about that year was the beginning of my relationship with my fellow classmates and the attempted assimilation into the mainstream of the school. You see, AVPA was directly attached to BHS, but it was separate school. We were known throughout the “normal” high school as being the “Academy kids.” Half of our day was devoted to BHS classes (like math, world language, and gym) and the other half was exclusively Academy classes (meaning media, theatre, and humanities). For obvious reasons, my classmates and I loved our Academy classes and loathed the others.

From the first day, there was an obvious division between the two schools. Being part of the minority in a large school, we were the ones ridiculed and antagonized. The offenses aimed at us were mostly due to that fact that we were seen as being “different.” Although I had to deal with catty remarks on almost a daily basis, I was never physically confronted by someone outside of the Academy (but I know students who were). Among other things, the harassment took its toll on my classmates and, as a result, many dropped out of the school. In spite of it all, the ones of us who remained were stronger and more unified than ever before.



QOD: “The test of courage comes when we are in the minority. The test of tolerance comes when we are in the majority.” – Ralph W. Sockman

The Letter

The majority of all my favorite memories happened during high school. For most kids, high school is one of those experiences they wish to forget. But for me, high school was the best time of my life. What I believe has most do to with my love of high school was the fact that I didn’t go to a “normal” high school. I went to The Academy for Visual & Performing Arts (AVPA), a vocational school with an intensive focus on the arts.

On a beautiful Saturday afternoon in May 2003, I beat out my sister in going get the mail. I ran to the mailbox, opened the door, and flipped through the mail as I usually did while standing in the street. I saw a letter addressed to my parents from AVPA. I froze as I stared at the return address. I walked back into the house with the letter grasped firmly in my right hand. I tossed the rest of the mail onto the pile on my mom’s desk.

My mom sees that I’m holding the letter and asks, “What’s that?”

I don’t say a word, but I dash into my bedroom and close the door behind me. I knew that this was it: either I would go to the local high school with my friends from middle school or it would be the start of a whole new adventure. I ripped open the letter and started furiously scanning the text. The first word that stuck out to me was, “Congratulations!” A thrill of excitement shot through my entire body.

At this point, my mom was knocking on my door trying to figure out what was going on. I don’t remember what happened the rest of the day. But I somehow knew back then that this was one of those crucial, game-changing moments of my life.