Still Listening for Someone to Ask

I remember 9/11 about as well as anyone would who wasn’t directly involved. I remember being on 24-hour duty that day at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. I remember being skeptical of the trainees calling for us to look at the television in our small waiting area. I remember watching the concrete barricades get placed in front of the glass hospital door. I remember putting up an American flag before the month was over. Not because I had to. For the first time in a long time, I wanted to. I wanted to identify with this country and the people in it. It was a belief in something… more. A belief that despite the saber-rattling from the White House and unfounded claims of WMDs, there was something good and positive about this country. Back then, I could still believe there was a country underneath the government. I could believe that even when we were wrong, enough people still knew wrong when they saw it. A quarter century later, on that same country’s birthday, I couldn’t give a shit. This…