Where were you when....? Has it been three years? It doesn't seem like all that long ago when foreign terrorists shook the core of our world. We felt safe and secure. How arrogant, how naive! We heard about all the bad happening in the world, but it was all so distant. It was happening over there. So we read the paper, grabbed a cup of coffee and we went to work. It started out so quiet...so normal.

HTP and I were in Italy on a genealogy expedition. Our group was small. We woke in the morning and joined our fellow travelers for a cup of "American" coffee and pastries provided by the wife of the owner of the small hostel where we were staying. We chatted quietly with each other, discussing the plans we had for our day. After breakfast, we all piled onto the small tour bus which took us to a city on the coast of Italy. We walked on the beach and enjoyed the sun and the sand. We made plans to go shopping. This was our "free" day. No church tours, no castle tours, no municipio visits pouring through musty records in search of ancestors long gone. This was our day to just enjoy. The lunch we had was wonderful. We all laughed and joked at a long table sitting in the yard of a local restaurant. Plate after plate of food was brought for our pleasure. Wasps buzzed hungrily. After this feast, our driver and some of us played at the foosball table that was sitting in the corner of the yard.

The first indication that this day was anything but normal was a quiet interruption of a cellphone. Our head guide called all the other guides to her side for a hurried but quiet conversation as we remained oblivious, polishing off that last crumb of dessert while we chatted about the coming shopping expedition. I remember thinking that I wanted to look for a coffee mug, just like the one that I was currently drinking my coffee from. I never got a chance to shop for that mug. Our guide came and quietly told us that she'd been told that someone had attacked the United States. But we really didn't know what had happened. Someone had called our guide to tell her that a plane had been crashed into the White House. Rumors flew. None of us really knew what had happened. None of us felt like the shopping expedition that was planned for the remainder of the day but still we all piled into the bus to go shopping because that was what we were supposed to do. But the only shopping we did was to find "news". Our country had been attacked. What? Where? Who? Why? Why? Our group split up and we went shopping...for news. HTP and I and a couple of our fellow travelers chanced upon a bar that had a TV. Everyones eyes were fixed on the screen. No-one shooed us away as we were drawn in to watch in horror. The commentary was in Italian. None of us spoke Italian but the pictures were horribly clear. We sat in stunned disbelief, struggling to make sense of the commentary. How many planes? Where? Why? The Pentagon? When we returned to the tour bus, no-one had any parcels. No-one had gone shopping for "things". Everyone had gone shopping for information and it was poor at best. We were all worried. HTP and I sent frantic emails home to our son, our daughters, my folks, our friends, that night. What? When? Where? Why?

It wasn't until the next morning that we received replies. HTP and I hovered near the computer screen in the lobby of our hostel. My Dad had sent us an email detailing the events of that day and so did my teenage son, September 11, and I read the emails aloud to our fellow travelers. Everyone was anxious for news instead of rumor. My daughter emailed that she had picked #1 son up from school and taken him to church for a special service that afternoon, because she knew that is what we would want. #1 son told us not to worry. Our Pastor and his wife called #1 son to make sure he was "OK".

And life went on. Our tour continued but our thoughts were directed elsewhere. Our world had changed. Has it really been three years since then?

Murphyism of the Day

Alinsky's Rule for Radicals

Those who are most moral are farthest from the problem.