THE NEW NORMAL (repost)

I had gotten up early that morning to take mom and her friend to the airport to catch a flight to Vegas. I lived only 15 minutes from Indianapolis International airport, which made it convenient for family that lived out of town to stay with me the night before catching a flight. Living that close to the airport also has some very noisy drawbacks. Namely the UPS runway choice at 4:00 am launching heavily loaded cargo jets at one-minute intervals directly over my roof. This is where my habit of having a fan blowing directly in my face while sleeping came in handy, still it doesn’t block out the noise completely.

Although it was a workday I was still able to make the airport run for the gamblers because my license had been suspended due to a screw-up with the BMV and an old ticket that never got mailed to the right place. I called the prosecutors office and she promised she would straighten it out ASAP. I didn’t want to take a chance driving the company van so I told my supervisor about the situation and took time off work.

When I got back home from the airport, it was still early so I went back to bed for a bit. I woke a short time later and turned on the Bob & Tom radio show. Expecting their usual laughter and comedy bits instead Tom Griswold was talking in a very serious tone about something that had just happened in New York.
 Through my fog and without the benefit of my morning coffee I tried to comprehend why he was so sullen. Something about an airliner that had crashed into the World Trade center. How the hell could a pilot not see that building I wondered? I turned on one of the network morning shows; they were showing both towers and franticly talking about a second aircraft that had just crashed into the other WTC! My suspicions immediately went to the Middle east, with all the red hot anger and hatred that far surpassed the emotions I had been experiencing during my recent very ugly divorce.

I got out of bed and tried to comprehend this unfolding nightmare, next on the list was the Pentagon, "damn how big was this terrorist operation?" Thoughts of my mom on a plane brought fear into the emotional mix along with the rage and hatred I was already feeling. The next event, flight 93 bravely diverted into the ground by the hero’s who revolted against the murderous cowards. How many planes do these scumbags have control of?
 I had been not been able to reach mom, could they have her plane too? I sat there and kept waiting for the next jetliner to fall out of the sky. Seemingly hours later I finally heard from mom. She related what happened to her flight; somewhere between Albuquerque and Las Vegas the pilot announced, “due to a national emergency they were being ordered to land at the nearest airport”. The plane made a u-turn and landed at Albuquerque where the Red Cross met them. This is where they would spend the next couple of days during the ground stop.

I broke down and bawled like a baby during our conversation. Relieved that mom wasn’t on a plane with a bunch of radical islamics heading toward another target I got back to the TV coverage of the carnage and my rage! I had been trying to contact my then girlfriend who lived in Austin TX; she had a flight scheduled to Indy on the next day for a visit. She worked nights, as a bartender so contacting her in other than her “vampire hours” was next to impossible. Early that afternoon she finally called me back, extremely upset and pissed off as was 99% of the population of our country. She told me she was glad George Bush was president because she knew he would kick somebody’s ass over this. I was shocked to hear that from her, she was no fan of President Bush for sure, her love for Slick Willie and the democratic party made for some heated debates between us, but she was really cute and ran a bar in Austin, what more could a guy ask for? Here she was, a staunch democrat backing President Bush as was most of the country.

I spent the rest of that week watching the TV coverage until I couldn’t stand it any longer then I would go outside only to look up at the clear blue sky and get another dagger through the heart by not seeing even one plane or contrail as I looked up.

 Later that day I was outside talking to a neighbor, we looked up and flying as high as possible was a large jet aircraft with another smaller aircraft flying at it’s wing heading northeast. I realized it had to be Air force One and a fighter chase plane.

 Next came the hoarding panic with gasoline. I heard some mindless profiteers were gouging at the gas pumps. Even though ny drivers license was suspended, we had a Meijer at the edge of our community so I drove there for a tank of gas only to see they had jacked up their price by 45 cents since that morning.

That was small potato’s compared to a north side gas station ran by a middle eastern man who jacked up his gas by about 3 dollars a gallon. Fortunately that little act of greed caused a lot of negative press and they were subsequently ran out of business later. The owner then had a mysterious fire with the owner suspected of pulling an insurance job.

I didn’t hear from the prosecutor that was going to help me with my suspended license for the next several days, I guess everybody had different priorities other than handling my insignificant problem. So I sat at home most for the next 11 days during the worst unpaid vacation of my life alternately watching the news reports until I felt too depressed to watch anymore so I would go outside until I couldn’t stand not knowing what was going on anymore so back to the TV again for another dose of depression. Most memorable was coverage of Palestinians in the streets cheering for the barbarians who murdered thousands of innocent men women and children.

The country for the most part rallied together, flags were flying everywhere, fit men and women were joining the military and were ready for the fight. Patriotism was surging, unfortunately Hollywood and the network news organizations didn’t get the memo. Statements made by three elites stand out in my mind a decade later. First from the late not so great Canadian Peter Jennings, using a tragic event of this magnitude to spout his left winged venom criticized President for not being immediately on site and comfort us with a speech he went on to say “Well, some presidents are just better at it than others

Secondly some female apologist for the PLO, on a news program responding to someone who rightly called the terrorist, cowards, her take on it was they were great warriors who gave their life for what they believed in. She didn’t mention that one of these so-called warriors had so bravely slashed the throat of a flight attendant while her hands were tied behind her back. She never mentioned that they murdered innocent unarmed people or that one of the motives of these terrorist were the seventy-two virgins these losers were supposed to get when die.

 And thirdly was a statement by John Mellencamp, he was on the Bob & Tom show after president Bush made that moving speech to congress. Bob & Tom no bastion of conservatism, had been remarking how great the speech was. When Mellencamp came on the program they asked him if he liked the speech. His reply was “ well I’m a peacenik so I didn’t like what he said” he went on to say how we need to understand the causes that made these people do something like this. Come on Johnny Cougar give me a fricking break!

There were some of the usual blame America first crowd, running their mouth, but for the most part the states were united.

 Unfortunately patriotism for some is a fleeting thing, ten years later I am amazed how short some peoples memory are. The new normal has taken hold and we live with body scans at the airport, close call unsuccessful terrorist attacks on our soil and some that are successful. The new normal means almost daily body counts of the brave Americans fighting over seas to keep these lunatics over seas and away from us.

My personal new normal was mostly trying to deal with the hatred and rage that was burning inside me. I found out that drinking doesn’t help extinguish these emotions, other methods were needed. I wish I could say that I didn't have to find that out the hard way.
I had to find a real secure little cage in a dark basement to lock most of these feelings away where they now reside with the anger and hate left over from my divorce. I hate to hate, it goes against my spiritual beliefs and it eats away at you from the inside. Not to say that those monsters in the basement don’t try to sneak out from time to time. It’s a constant battle to keep these things down there where it’s safer. I do this so I can function in the new normal and not spew hatred at all muslims. I also keep the divorce demons down there for the sake and sanity of me and my kids and my soon to be grandson. I don’t know how the family’s that lost loved ones that day do it. My heart goes out to them, God only knows how they deal with the pain, I’m sure a lot of them don’t do it so well and it doesn’t help when they continually get slapped in the face with things like the “Ground Zero mosque”.

Ten years later, I no longer live on the approach of UPS’s runway. I’m happily remarried to a pretty young lady (not the Texas bartender). Mom’s still going strong and keeping the local casino’s solvent. I have great kids and a grandson on the way (he's here now) that I can’t wait to spoil. A few aches, pains, bumps and bruises but overall I am really happy with my life.

A couple of days after it all began and the ground stop had been lifted, we all went to pick up mom and her friend at the airport. There were hugs and tears all around; the ever-resourceful gamblers had found a local Indian reservation casino to donate to while stuck in Albuquerque.

Thinking back to the day when the planes got back in the air. Later that night standing in the backyard watching all the aircraft back in their familiar flight patterns I began to feel a little more normal. Not the same normal I was on 9/10/2001, but the new normal that we all are almost ten years later.

 Later that night, like clockwork at 4:00 am the UPS payloads were just above my roof once again, engines spooled all the way up and straining against gravity. I knew I wouldn’t feel this way forever, but tonight it was music to my ears.

Don't tread on us bitches!

P.S.  hey Bin Laden, are you wondering where those 72 virgins are and why Heaven is so hot?



U.S. Special Forces pay bin laden a visit