Heroes

There are a lot of things about September 11th that brings tears to my eyes; the many people who died the ones who were left behind, the motherless and fatherless children, and even knowing that there is such evil in the world to send the attack in the first place. I hate seeing others in pain, I hate knowing that people suffer, and I hate that there are so many people ungrateful for what they have.

So many people go through life and don’t give any thought to what is happening to keep them safe. I’ve had this conversation with my husband many times, although he is a lot more opinioned than I am on this subject. When the whole TSA pat down debate was going on I’d asked my husband if he would let them pat down our daughter if we were to fly somewhere. He shocked me with his answer – “yes” and he further explained that going through the proper security is what keeps us safe (granted he had a lot more to say about this but that would be a whole other blog). It got me thinking, a small inconvenience is worth making sure thousands of people don’t lose their lives again.

Hundreds of thousands of families are split up each year because one parent, or in some cases both parents, are deployed in the military to fight for our freedom. My heart goes out to these families every day because I know it is hard to be so far away from the ones you love, especially when they are in very dangerous places, putting everyone else’s lives above their own. The military volunteer to join, they join knowing they could die so that so many others can live. Just this fact alone makes them amazing people.

The people in the military are not the only ones to go to work protecting us; the police officers and firefighters do the same thing. More often than not, the police officers are overlooked for the jobs they do. Every morning they wake up, put their uniforms on, and go to work with the disadvantage of not knowing what the day holds for them. They could have a day where they do nothing but drive around and the next day they could be fighting for their lives.

The police and firefighters on September 11th did not go to work that day expecting to get the calls they got; they did not expect to running into the buildings that everyone else were running away from – but they did. They took charge of everything they could; they saved so many lives and lost so many of their own. They didn’t put themselves in danger because it was their job, they did it because that is who they are; Heroes! It is the people such as these that make me feel so proud. It’s not only the ones in New York, but everywhere because had the attack happened in any city there would be the same type of person putting their lives in danger to save another.

I wish everyone could see the good these men and woman do every day and not only on the anniversary of September 11th – don’t give them such a hard time because they wrote you a ticket because YOU were breaking the law. It has taken me a long time to realize that these men and women are doing their jobs to keep you and others safe and a ticket is just that – a ticket, but if you were ever in any danger they would be the first ones to come to your aid; putting their lives at risk to save yours.

Being the wife of a cop I face the same fate of those New York families, one day my husband may not come home from work because he put someone else’s life above his own. He, along with every other police officer and firefighter, has my upmost respect and it is not only on one day of the year – it is all year long.