The next day

By Bob Kunzinger

The 10th anniversary is upon us.

Not that one. That was yesterday.

Yesterday we took the time just after 9 to remember those lost in the tragic attacks on the two towers that made the World Trade Center. We paused and prayed for the fallen in the Pentagon and the passengers of Flight 93 in Pennsylvania. It was our new Memorial Day on which we will always reflect on the moments that morning when misguided terrorists brought the battlefield to us. Yesterday we remembered where we were 10 years ago, the fear of further events and the confusion while watching scenes from Lower Manhattan and Washington, D.C. God rest those souls.

But today, Sept. 12, is also the anniversary of what made Sept. 11 an isolated incident on our soil. It is the day we demonstrated for the world, including her lesser groups who laughed and cheered at the scenes of the towers tumbling, why we are still here.

Today we mark the anniversary of the tremendous and moving demonstration of the strength of our backbone, the courage of our citizens and the unity of our souls in the face of grave and unknown danger.

On Sept. 12, countless Americans moved toward Ground Zero to search, to help, to assist the survivors and to come to the aid of our neighbors.

Relief workers flooded the area. Companies and units from every aspect of our culture, including engineers, construction workers and the Red Cross, came to help. The rest of the city shut down, as did the areas surrounding the Pentagon, because workers walked off job sites to assist at these.

On Sept. 12, money poured in from everywhere in America to help feed, house, recover and, eventually, unite those directly affected the day before. It was the day we woke and realized we really had been attacked, we really did lose 3,000 members of the American family and we knew what to do next.

That's what those cheering in the Middle East on Sept. 11 never anticipated about America. If they're going to try to kill some of us, they're going to have to kill us all, because right after they took their best shot, we knew exactly what to do: Get up and get back to work.

We've been doing this for more than two centuries, and we're really good at it.

We have fought with other nations as enemies and as allies, we have fought with ourselves, we have learned to address just about every cultural, social and political issue that has been tossed before us, because we have it in our national bloodstream that our strength cannot be compromised if we keep pushing the envelope, improving and building this nation on a common foundation of unity borne of a freedom unequaled in world history.

America's not done. We have never stopped growing, and our roots are evident in the masses of citizens who turned out Sept. 12.

On Sept. 10, people walked by the World Trade Center and often hardly gave them a second glance.

On Sept. 12, those towers stood stronger in our collective consciousness than any anthem.

Today marks the anniversary of who we are. We are a group of people whose roots are so deep and so diverse, so tested and weathered, and so tied to each other that nothing can possibly bring us together faster than others' attempts to bring us down. When things are at their worst, we are at our best. And 10 years ago today is one of the finest examples in our history of how you define "America."

Bob Kunzinger of Virginia Beach is a professor of humanities at Tidewater Community College and the author of four books of essays.