September 10 and 12

If we really knew it was "goodbye", would we leave?
- Unknown

The Good News of the Gospel is that the worst thing is never the last thing!    
- Rick Wilson

For eleven years people around the world and in the The United States especially have paused on and around September 11 to remember and reflect.

We remember the surprise, the shock, the horror, and the deep sorrow.  We remember the unfathomable and senseless loss of life.  We also remember how for a brief moment the majority of the world was united by all of these things and joined together in condemnation of violence perpetrated in the name of militant religion.

As I remember and reflect I can't help but think of the before and after of that day.  I reflect on how the problems and worries of September 10, 2001 suddenly became far less so, and how the routine yet final meals, conversations, and embraces of so many people suddenly had lasting significance.  And then the sun came up on September 12.   The world, changed as it was, carried on.  We carried on in healthy, loving, constructive ways, as well as dis-eased, fearful and destructive ways.   And the world we live in today is significantly so because of the choices we made then and continue to make today in response to those and other shocks, horrors, and sorrows.

It may sound simple and perhaps even glib, yet profoundly true:  we have choices and make decisions every moment of every day that contribute to and create what tomorrow will be and how we look back and remember the "last" opportunities of our lives.

Everyday of our life is another chance, another September 10 or 12.