I was driving to a construction job in So Cal that morning. I walked into my boss’s office and just watched the TV as the second tower came down. I was 18, I already enrolled in the Marine Corps Delayed Entry Program six months prior and had a bootcamp departure date set for October 8. I soon got a phone call from my recruiter, later that day or a few days later I can’t remember, “we have more spots available to go to MCRD, do you want to go NOW?”
I don’t remember everything I felt that month between attack and before I left for basic. I’m sure my emotions were all over the place, but I do remember being excited knowing I would be able to DO SOMETHING about what had been done to my home, my nation. I can only imagine what my family was thinking knowing where I was headed. I scored very high on my ASVAB tests but volunteered for infantry. “Are you sure?” my recruiter had asked me when I made my selection, “you can do literally anything you want.” I was a bit nerdy and overweight. “Yep, I want infantry.”
Fast forward through basic training, School of Infantry, deployment workups and a lot of training… I went to Iraq twice and was shot once… I’m sure I’ll put that story to paper one day but not today. Here’s what I find amazing 17 years later… almost ALL the new recruits joining the ranks of Americas military were either not alive or too young to know what it felt like to watch people jumping out of windows to escape the flames. To watch the planes disappear and explode out the back. Too young to experience the terror as the towers collapsed upon themselves. I know I WILL NEVER FORGET, but what about those who can only learn about it from history? Will they mark this day as a significant event that changed the way the world worked, or will it just become a test question for class? Will we as a culture TEACH THEM what it meant? Will we teach the next generation that their freedom doesn’t mean “cost-less.” Because, for some of us, the BEST of us, it cost a whole hell of a lot. “Never Forget” “Teach Them”
