Six Years

Six years ago, life was much different for the world. Terrorism, for the most part in America, was a thing of foreign matters. It hit home in a most dramatic, and horrific, way six years ago today.
Once again, today on the anniversary, there will be many articles written by the media outlets regarding September 11, 2001. They'll obviously do a better job than I can, and I won't try.
Six years ago was a completely different time for us, and it feels like a different lifetime. We lived in a different part of New Jersey, in a different house. We were pregnant with our first child. We both worked completely different jobs than we do now.

On that day, life changed. But how cliche has that phrase become?

The following day, as no planes flew overhead (which we saw a lot of, considering we were right between Philadelphia and Newark airports), life was scary. No longer did we just have the normal fears of having a child, but we questioned raising a child in a new world. If terrorists could hit there, then where else? Was it wise to hope? A war was inevitable at that point.

Life moved on for us. The planes began to fly again. I had a birthday, then we celebrated our "last Christmas as just husband and wife." Maureen had a birthday, then we had our very precious daughter on a lightly-snowing magical day. Life was better. Maureen resigned her job to raise our daughter, I found a much better job, possibly my dream job. We learned that the world was a good place to raise kids, and we had our second child, a boy. We moved into a bigger house, leaving the area that I spent over 36 years of my life, and relocating an hour from central Jersey to south Jersey. We brought our kids to Disney World. I was able to go to see the Philadelphia Eagles in the Super Bowl (although with a loss.) I quit my "dream job" after the president of the company essentially became paranoid and delusional, and started my own consulting company. Our daughter just started Kindergarten last week, and I started a podcast last month.
There were also some negative times in this time as well. Shortly after 9/11, anthrax came to town, literally. The huge post office in our town, Hamilton Township, was shut down when it was discovered that it became contaminated by the anthrax letters, as Hamilton served as a regional sorting hub. We have also endured two wars, both of which are ongoing, and with rumors swirling of a third to start soon. Maureen developed celiac disease. And this year we lost a beloved member of our family, who is very much missed by us all.

Six years.

Amazing how a life can change so much in what seems to be such a short amount of time.

It was wise to hope, and I won't ever stop again.