Remembering.

I remember when JFK was shot and Martin Luther King. As I grew up, there have been times when the conversations turned to those days. "I remember just where I was when I heard." is a common statement of my generation and my parents' and grandparents'.
Times are different now, we SEE and practically experience the events that will change us. There is almost nothing that isn't captured on video, live video, anymore.

9-11

Those numbers are burned into our memory along with the images of that day. I remember where I was, what I was doing, and even what I was thinking as I watched the terrible events unfold. I was at work in the pediatric oncology outpatient clinic. I had one patient so far, a five year old girl who came with her dad. I drew her bloodwork and sent it to the lab. As I returned to her bedside, her dad said, "My wife just called and said to turn on CNN, a plane crashed in New York." We both turned to look at the TV, and there were the towers, one with terrible black smoke billowing. We froze, and listened to the commentary about the plane crash, but still we didn't know the truth. Then, as we watched, the second plane hit. That is the moment, the instant, that I will truly never forget. The knowing, the realization, the TRUTH. The dad and I locked eyes, and we knew. We knew what everybody in America, and the world, was knowing......it was NOT an accident. Maybe we were silent, maybe we gasped, maybe we said, "oh my god,". That I don't remember. I do remember the little girl, looking at the screen, saying, "somebody should tell those planes to watch where they're going." Such a comic statement but really it was just so sad to me. I wished it were that simple. If only.