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Sunday, September 11, 2011

A tribute to 9/11

In remembrance of 9/11, I am posting the following which I wrote for the first anniversary of the tragedy.  I delivered it to my fellow employees of the Defense Commissary Agency, Europe, region headquarters, located on Kapaun Air Station, in Kaiserslautern, Germany.  Following completion of these comments, we held one minute of silence.
 
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I am an American.

It is sometimes easy for Americans to think 9-11 only happened to them. It was our buildings, our planes, our cities, our country, our people.

Who are our people?

Our people are of many colors, many races, many countries and many religions…or no religion at all. We are William and Gerlinde and Mohammed and Nejat and Nolasco. We are Maria and Riccardo. We lead our lives in many different ways and yet we are the same. We work, play, love, laugh, cry, live and die.

In the days following 9-11, I felt as though I moved through life watching a bad movie. I expected it to end so I could walk out of the theater into the sun and know everything was normal again. I did not want to believe nothing would ever be truly normal again.

I looked into the eyes of German friends and saw they shared my tears. I heard the emotion in the voice of an elderly man in my village who told me he was sorry…as though he personally had done something to make me sad.

I saw the many flowers adorning walls, fences and gates presented to us by Europeans who shared our pain. I saw strangers in the early days after the attack that looked at me as an American and did not know what to say to make it better. Somehow just their look of understanding soothed the heartbreak.

In an Egyptian restaurant in Baden Baden I talked with the owner as he looked at his near empty restaurant on a Saturday night and told me he did not do this awful thing. I wanted to make him feel better so I told him of my warm reception in his country. Tears came to his eyes as he thanked me and said “you have made my heart sing.”

I came to Europe an American, hungry to see the world. Today I am a different American…I am British, Dutch and Belgian. I am Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Turkish, Saudi and Egyptian. Mostly, I am German, taught by my many German friends who have opened their hearts and homes to me. I am international and I am glad.

9-11 happened to all of me. It happened to all of us.


Written by Gerri Young
September 9, 2002
For 9-11 tribute ceremony