Take the time you need

By Joe Pantorno

I don't like talking about this day too much. I can't really get through it without getting emotional and I don't want to be a burden on anyone.

Twelve years ago everything changed. Twelve years ago we lost our innocence, we grew skeptical. We lost loved ones, we cried, we became jaded, we became angry.

We saw a nation brought to its knees.

We still are recovering.

I always take a bit out of my day and watch as much of the memorial services on television as I can. I cry. I pray for those lost and the families that are still trying to make it through.

I see a wife without her husband, children without parents, brothers without sisters, mothers without sons. It enrages me. Their suffering hurts me. The most I can do is offer words and a shoulder to lean on. And that shoulder will be there until the day I die.

The last few years, I've been seeing articles and pieces from different organizations asking the question, when is this enough? When is it an anniversary too old that we stop the memorials, the front pages of remembrance, the moments of silence and go about living September 11 like it is any other day?

The question is prying and certainly inappropriate. An organization can cover whatever it may like on any given day, including this one, but don't try to speed up a process or downplay a man or woman's suffering.

Take the time you need. Whether it's a couple hours, a day, a week, a month it doesn't matter. A day charred in our minds, forever burned into our banks, take the time you need. Say a prayer, light a candle, cry, remember.

Tell a younger generation about this day. There are kids in junior high school that were not alive or far too small to remember.

Thank goodness they weren't, but they need to know.

Let's take whatever time we need to remember, but most importantly, be there for the ones that need it most. Look up at that  newly constructed New York skyline, the Freedom Tower, and realize what it stands for.

It truly is the Phoenix rising out of the ashes.

God Bless.