I Remember, but I wish I didn’t

I remember 9/11.
I can see it as clearly as if I were standing in the newsroom with my students– on the phone with my husband telling me to turn the channel to MSNBC because something had happened at the Twin Towers. I can relive every moment as my class watched in horror as the second plane crashed intentionally into the second tower. We didn’t stop watching.

When I got home, I kept the TV on. I didn’t turn the TV off for a week. Not for a second. Every night I tried to sleep, but the news was on. Always.
As I prayed and asked God for a miracle.
That someone would be alive.

I didn’t know a single person in New York or D.C. that day, but it felt like every person interviewed was a neighbor. I watched, stunned, as day after day after day people who lost loved ones were interviewed.

When the news started playing the voice mails left behind by people who never made it home, I cried.

About three months after 9/11, I stopped sleeping through the night.

I’d fall asleep and then wake up catching my breath, sure something horrible had happened to my daughter. I’d have to walk into her room and make sure she was okay.
Once she stayed the night with my parents and I had to call at 2 a.m. to make sure she was alive. My mom laughed and told me of course things were fine. I laughed, too. But inside, I wondered if I was going crazy.

Finally, at a doctor’s appointment in January, I told my family practitioner what was going on. I whispered the words because it took everything in me to make myself speak. I was terrified of what was wrong with me.

The doctor listened to me and then asked me about my 9/11 experience. I brushed her question off quickly.

9/11 experience? I didn’t have a 9/11 experience. The people with loved ones in New York and D.C., with family members in the military, with friends who served as police and firefighters…THEY had a 9/11 experience. I was a passive bystander in every way other than the night we went to church and prayed.

I explained this to the doctor and she didn’t say anything while I talked. When I was done, she asked if I watched the events on TV. I’m addicted to the news. I not only watched it on TV, I accessed it online. It consumed my life outside of work for several days. I wasn’t alone. Everyone I knew stayed glued to the news those first weeks after.

My doctor nodded and then explained that I was suffering from panic attacks. That the panic attacks could be from a form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder caused by my non-stop news viewing. She prescribed an anti-depressant, told me to take it until I felt I could try to go without.

I took the medicine for a few months. It worked. I got better.

I thought it was over. Until this anniversary of the day that changed our lives in so many ways. The news is covering the horrors of that day again and again. You can’t flip channels without seeing the Towers fall. I want to watch Toddlers and Tiaras and Housewives and What Not to Wear and Food Network. Anything to NOT see a replay of those days. And THAT makes me feel even worse.  I can sink into mindless TV and ignore a day that shouldn’t be ignored and so very many people can’t because while my problem was caused by non-stop news, they lost people they loved and cherished.

I feel unpatriotic. I say the Pledge every day at school. I support the troops and say prayers for those in harm’s way. I don’t want us to forget what happened because if we do, it will happen again and again and again, and God knows, we need to do everything in our power to keep that from happening.

But I don’t want to watch the horrors of those days replayed again and again on cable news networks with ridiculous headlines like WHAT IF IT HADN’T HAPPENED? New flash. There is no what if. IT HAPPENED.

So while this is the decade anniversary of the most horrifying day in my memory, I won’t be watching the news. I don’t need to see it, hear it, read it. I don’t need to because if I’m not careful, when I close my eyes, I can’t make it go away.

 

Happy Independence Day and Week 4 Fail

Happy July 4. We had an amazing service at church yesterday about the founding fathers and the US ties to God. It was fabulous! God Bless the USA. And a HUGE thank you to every person who has ever served protecting our freedoms.

Now on to the fail:
It started with the newspaper. The plan, hit the headlines and off the computer.

The reality; trn–dmn–cnn–msnbc–perez–eonline–people. One hour later, I looked up and groaned

It didn’t stop there.

I read and read and read some more.

Not books, but still. And then I watched a Lifetime movie and a Disney movie.

At 9:30 I’d written 1000 words. 4k under yesterday, a non-reading day.

Back to square one on reading deprivation. MAN, it’s hard!!!

What is it about Buffy?

1. She’s tough, and she’s unapologetic about that toughness.
2. She’s a girl, and she’s unapologetic about that, too.
3. She says the best stuff. Kudos to the writers for that one.
4. She’s saving the world. Good vs. Evil, and if the wrong team wins, humanity ceases to exist.
5. Angel and Spike. No explanation needed.
6. It’s impossible for it to be true, but I forget that the whole time I’m watching.
7. She has best friends, and they are awesome.
8. Vampires. Even though I’m kind of tired of vampires everywhere else, I still love them on Buffy. And Dark Shadows, but that’s a different post.
9. Romance.
10. Buffy wants to be a normal girl, but she understands that’s impossible. She embraces her slayer self even as she wars with it.

This is the tip of the iceberg. There are the ties to the goddess, mythology, strong character stories, dialogue, lack of cheerleading ability, crazy fellow slayers, dopplegangers, fake Buffy’s, secret sisters. It’s everything that is good about teen targeted TV, and I love it.
Glad I got to spend two hours with two of my favorite episodes last night: Becoming Part 1 and 2. So good!!!!

The Nellie Oleson Factor

When I was a kid I read and watched Little House constantly. I loved to hate Nellie Oleson. To be honest, I wasn’t all that happy when they reformed Nellie and made her into a nice person on the show.
Nellie was the perfect villain. Only she was a kid, so she got away with being awful without us holding her too responsible for the outcomes of her actions.
Cordelia on Buffy was a Nellie Oleson first season.
Mean Girls, yep, Nellie Olesons.
In Honor and Lies Savannah is somewhat of a Nellie Oleson. She’s the main secondary character, but she’s not really likable. In fact, she more than the villain, Miss Celinda, stands in the way of Sissy’s quest.
Sometimes people ask why I let Savannah be so unheroic.
It’s funny because when I first started writing Honor and Lies, Sissy and Savannah were one and the same. I wanted them both to be heros. It wasn’t possible. I tried to make Savannah someone the reader could route for even though she’s such a snot at times. She’s a product of her environment, she’s protected and coddled, and in the end, she’s shocked by the realities of the world she lives in. I hope the reader can have more empathy for Savannah than I ever did for Nellie Oleson.

Bravery

Watching the long lines of Syrian protestors from the safety of my living room TV, I can’t help but wonder if I’d ever be that brave.
These people know soldiers will fire on them. They know hundreds if not thousands of their fellow countrymen have already died. And yet, they still make their way to the streets where they march in non-violent protests of a government regime they feel is corrupt.
Pictures of torture inflicted on young protestors caught and then murdered break my heart.
I don’t know anyone in Syria, and yet, I watch.
I’ve been watching for months, ever since the Egyptians took to the streets to protest Mubarak. Or really, I’ve been watching for a couple of years off and on, since the protestors started marching in Iran.
The Syrian government’s response is something different, something horrible. Nightmarish.
And yet, the protestors continue to march.
And as they march I wonder WOULD I?
Would I be brave enough to defy an authority that has no problem mowing down scores of people in cold blood? Would I be there day after day crying out for freedom, hoping the world would see me, knowing every second there’s a chance my death could be seconds away?
I ask myself the same thing when I read my bible. The martyrs through the ages continued to preach the gospel even when faced with death for doing so.
It’s easy to organize protest rallies in Wichita Falls where the most danger you find is from some angry man who wonders why everyone is being so nice.
It’s easy to show a belief in God and Jesus and profess christianity in Wichita Falls where the most dissent you find is from atheists who feel christianity is filled with hypocrisy and judgment. It’s especially since 90% of the people in the area are christians.
I don’t know if I’d be brave enough to fight for freedom in the face of death. But I sure am glad the news is showing people who are. Those people challenge me. I hope if I’m ever confronted with the reality of what that kind of bravery takes I’ll be able to say yes, I AM THAT BRAVE. I’m afraid my answer would be no, leave me alone.
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Honor and Lies barely touches on the kind of bravery it took for the slaves of the south to run for freedom, but it’s there, especially in the character of James. I remember studying about the Underground Railroad in school and thinking how terrifying it must have been to leave the atrocities you know for the unknown that is freedom. I wondered then if I would be brave enough to take the risk when often that choice ended in death.  Honor and Lies coupon:  50% off for one month: coupon code is LH94Z.

Elizabeth Lee’s Smashwords Author Profile:http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/elizabethlee
Book page to sample or purchase Honor and Lies: http://smashwords.com/b/65497