This year, Grandparents’ Day falls on Patriot Day, September 11th. Sunday will also mark the tenth anniversary of 9/11. It will be a day to remember and honor those who perished in the attacks, as well as celebrate our grandparents.
The significance of both of these important days falling on the same calendar square bears special meaning, I believe. Each year, when September 11th rolls around, I remember exactly where I was the morning I learned of the attacks. I clearly recount turning on the radio in my car and being confused and bewildered by what I was hearing. Would there be more attacks? Who could do something like this? Was our nation at war? Was my family safe? And then came the news footage and the images. Horrifying.
The event drew to mind an event I’d only ever heard about, something that happened years before I was born. My grandparents were all of the Greatest Generation. They survived and endured through World War II. Each of them could recount where they were and what they were doing when news of the attack on Pearl Harbor came across the radio. I now knew what it was like to look on in horror at a brutal attack against my fellow countrymen and women.
Although Patriot Day endeavors to honor those who lost their lives on 9/11, the day never fails to make me take stock of my own patriotism and love for my country. Much of this I owe to my grandparents. They were a generation of people whose parents risked everything to cross the ocean to come to this land, and throughout my childhood, they painted a very clear picture to me of what it meant to be an American – a deep, undying respect for our nation, reverence for the flag our soldiers fought under through world wars, the pride felt when our country rallies together in times of crisis. Sacrifice, perseverance, and a sense of unity.
My grandmother passed away five years ago. She left behind several books of partially-used ration stamps from the 1940s. I asked her once why she kept them, and mentioned how hard it must have been to struggle to get things like sugar and shoes. Her answer was that she kept them to remember how her family could make it through any hardship, because these were sacrifices that every American was making to aid in the war effort. I always marveled at that measure of patriotism.
This year, on Sunday, September 11th, my husband will hoist the flag on the pole at our house. I will slice apples with my kids to make a good old fashioned American apple pie, the very recipe my Grandma Mabel taught me to make, and we will share the stories with them of 9/11. We will tell them of the courage and self-sacrifice of the firefighters, police officers, paramedics and first responders who fled to the falling towers to assist their fellow Americans, and how so many of them died in doing so.
Although my grandparents and great-grandparents have all passed on, their memory reminds me of the strength and determination this country was built upon. It makes me happy to think that this Sunday I will celebrate Grandparents’ Day by remembering four people who lived through a critical part of this nation’s history, and passed along those lessons and stories. And I will celebrate Patriot Day, a day to commemorate those who lost their lives to prove that this is still an amazing country, and Americans can still pull together and endure any hardship.
And hopefully, my children will grow to know how fortunate they are to be little Americans.
The significance of both of these important days falling on the same calendar square bears special meaning, I believe. Each year, when September 11th rolls around, I remember exactly where I was the morning I learned of the attacks. I clearly recount turning on the radio in my car and being confused and bewildered by what I was hearing. Would there be more attacks? Who could do something like this? Was our nation at war? Was my family safe? And then came the news footage and the images. Horrifying.
The event drew to mind an event I’d only ever heard about, something that happened years before I was born. My grandparents were all of the Greatest Generation. They survived and endured through World War II. Each of them could recount where they were and what they were doing when news of the attack on Pearl Harbor came across the radio. I now knew what it was like to look on in horror at a brutal attack against my fellow countrymen and women.
Although Patriot Day endeavors to honor those who lost their lives on 9/11, the day never fails to make me take stock of my own patriotism and love for my country. Much of this I owe to my grandparents. They were a generation of people whose parents risked everything to cross the ocean to come to this land, and throughout my childhood, they painted a very clear picture to me of what it meant to be an American – a deep, undying respect for our nation, reverence for the flag our soldiers fought under through world wars, the pride felt when our country rallies together in times of crisis. Sacrifice, perseverance, and a sense of unity.
My grandmother passed away five years ago. She left behind several books of partially-used ration stamps from the 1940s. I asked her once why she kept them, and mentioned how hard it must have been to struggle to get things like sugar and shoes. Her answer was that she kept them to remember how her family could make it through any hardship, because these were sacrifices that every American was making to aid in the war effort. I always marveled at that measure of patriotism.
This year, on Sunday, September 11th, my husband will hoist the flag on the pole at our house. I will slice apples with my kids to make a good old fashioned American apple pie, the very recipe my Grandma Mabel taught me to make, and we will share the stories with them of 9/11. We will tell them of the courage and self-sacrifice of the firefighters, police officers, paramedics and first responders who fled to the falling towers to assist their fellow Americans, and how so many of them died in doing so.
Although my grandparents and great-grandparents have all passed on, their memory reminds me of the strength and determination this country was built upon. It makes me happy to think that this Sunday I will celebrate Grandparents’ Day by remembering four people who lived through a critical part of this nation’s history, and passed along those lessons and stories. And I will celebrate Patriot Day, a day to commemorate those who lost their lives to prove that this is still an amazing country, and Americans can still pull together and endure any hardship.
And hopefully, my children will grow to know how fortunate they are to be little Americans.
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