I won’t keep you long today. A short quick evening dose.

13 years ago today I was a young man at Mizzou who didn’t have a class until 11am(psychology). I had no care in the world. No wife. No kid. I hadn’t met Rae yet(even though she lurked somewhere on the campus). I woke up on September 11, 2001 to an image on a television that I didn’t understand. I thought someone slipped on a Michael Bay movie. It wasn’t a movie. It was real. It was painful. That whole day didn’t change us as a nation. It pushed us closer to the acknowledgement that some things are out of our control. It reminded us that life isn’t about the blows that we take. It’s about the reaction we give forth next. 13 years later, I still feel for the families that lost loved ones. Fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, sons, daughters, grandfathers, aunts, uncles, nephews, cousins, or friends.

The human body is made to feel these things even when it isn’t directly affected. We are built to relate to one another’s condition. I can tell you this. 9/11 didn’t destroy us. It was a test. A test of how much we can depend on each other, without depending on our military or government to speak for us. A test of how we react. How we react to a horrific change in our culture and the world we live in. Never forget people. Never ever forget what happened that day. It’s hard for me to forget because of all the innocent lives that we were lost in a matter of hours. Tell your kids about it. Talk about it with your friends. In a day and age where athletes misbehavior and the latest actions of celebrities crowds the news waves, don’t forget about 9/11 and your feelings on it. 9/11 put everyone on watch and reminded us how powerless this world can be. We were knocked down that day by an evil few could understand. We eventually got up.

At the top of my “bucket list” is visiting the memorial and seeing the Freedom Tower. Walking around the fountains. Touching the names engraved on the border of the fountains, where the World Trade Center Twin Towers once stood tall. Taking Vinny and talking to him about what happened that day. That is the least I can do. Telling my son about the lives lost that day, the reality learned and the way the country reacted. The blue collar people. The high class community. The poor. The rich. A lot of people lost important people in their life that day. The more we remember them, the better off we are.

Thanks for reading and have a good night folks.