Monday, September 10, 2012

In Honor of Their Act

On September 11th there will be much written and said about the attacks on America 11 years ago.  I add this.  Look at your watch.  Wait for 10 seconds.  That is the time that it took for a jumper to hit the ground from the upper floors of Tower One.  He or she would be hurling down at greater than 150 miles per hour.  Such impact is impossible to survive.  Perhaps he had already lost consciousness.  Perhaps she had felt a rush of release from the inferno that was melting steel and would kill her for sure if she stayed.  Sometimes two held hands as they fell showing the world that they were alive on the descent.  Reports estimate that 200 jumped, almost all from Tower One.  Incredibly to me, some observers, some family members refused to accept that the jumpers jumped.  Jumping was a conscious, willful act.  Those who would not believe what cameras and eye witnesses saw were sure that those trapped would obey their religious prohibitions against suicide.  They would wait on the will of God.  All of the official reports term the jump a "fall".  I choose to see it differently.  In the face of the unimaginable choice between death and action they chose action.  Their will to live transcended their stockpile of shoulds and oughts.  Their leap into the abyss was their final fist-shake at fate.  I cannot get them out of my mind.  I will dwell on them tomorrow. 

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