UpBeat Living: Flowers After Ashes

by Kebba Buckley, M. S., O.M.

As I write this column, it is September 11, 2001, a day that will live in infamy. The World Trade Towers in New York City have just been destroyed, and the Pentagon badly damaged, by terrorist attacks. Thousands of people are walking home from work in New York City, although it is morning. The European Union is evacuating its capital tower in Brussels. The last 50 airplanes over the U.S. are coming to ground, accompanied by Air Force fighter jets. The normal bustle of cities is dropping to an eerie hush without airplane flights, trains, and busses in motion. CNN is carrying vivid images of the destruction. We are all wondering how our loved ones near Ground Zero are faring. So far, the perpetrators are unknown.

This column’s mission is to emphasize the “UpBeat”, the note that follows the “downbeat” in music. As a reporter, my “beat” is the “up”. So where is the “up” in a day of horrific terrorist acts? Doesn’t the sheer ruthlessness of these acts show the absolute darkest side of human nature? Oh, yes.

Yet, as night is always followed by day, we are already seeing the highest and best of human nature. People who have come out of the WTC towers are saying that inside, those exiting maintained a calm, quiet demeanor as they took the long walk down dozens of flights of stairs. Lower Manhattan is being evacuated. As thousands leave New York on foot, they are walking across silent bridges normally filled with motor traffic. A shoe store is giving free sneakers to women in high heels. Merchants are giving out cups of water. In a city not known for friendliness to strangers, youths are inviting people to step in and use their computers to email loved ones that they are alive. Drivers of vehicles clearing the city are taking on as many riders as they can; a suited man with a briefcase is hanging off a truck bumper. Doctors, nurses, and other emergency professionals, in the City on vacation, are reporting to the disaster sites to volunteer. Human kindness and caring are breaking out all over.

In dark times, people have an instinct to pull together for united goals. We see this operating already in this tragedy, on a national and even global level. Nationally, the call for blood donations has gone out, and already people are lining up in Phoenix to donate pints. The Phoenix Fire Department’s Urban Search and Rescue Team, which performed outstandingly in Oklahoma City, is packing up 70 specialists to go and assist. People in the embattled Gaza Strip have already emailed sympathy and concern to the U.S. Mensans from Spain, France, Hungary, Australia, and Ireland have already emailed their concern for our wellbeing. Tony Blair, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, has already made a statement to the world. He has offered shock at the events, anger at the terrorists, and determined support of whatever kind we may need. Now, Yasser Arafat, PLO Chairman, is making a statement, condemning terrorist acts of any kind. He has a frightened, haunted look in his eyes, far from the cocky expression he usually wears.

Perhaps he sees the global tide has just changed: in the hour of the attack on the U.S., the world saw that we cannot have any more of this. Technology and communications systems that have allowed us to advance human achievements have made it impossible to attack one country without hurting many others. When the planes are grounded in the U.S., world mail, world banking and therefore world commerce come to a near-halt. When Wall Street shuts down, world markets are damaged. This has to be the end of terrorist acts. It has to be the beginning of a fresh, united global effort to clear terrorism. It has to be the beginning of a whole new level of “thinking globally, acting locally” for tolerance and peace.

A Vietnam-era protest song takes the sense of the prophet Isaiah, who held a vision of a world without war or strife: “Those who hope shall again grow strong/ they shall soar as with eagles’ wings/Run without tiring till they come to Me/to know my peace eternally.” Let us hold the hope of world unity and world peace, and let us work without tiring toward those goals, until we achieve them. Let us grow a verdant garden in the ashes of September 2001

Kebba Buckley, M.S., O.M., is a stress-management coach, counselor, and therapist. For over 20 years, she has been helping people seeking pain relief, joy and healing, through seminars and individual sessions. You may write her at KebbaBuckley@aol.com.