By the time we knew it would be a beautiful Indian summer day six years ago in Tigard, Oregon, the beautiful Indian summer day on the east coast had been turned into a day of unprecedented shock and horror. One by one, four commercial airliners filled with travelers fell from the sky. Their impact destroyed the two tallest buildings in New York, several surrounding buildings and parts of the Pentagon. Only the heroic, self-sacrificial actions of a plane load of patriots over Pittsburgh kept the list from being longer and the death toll even higher. As it was, almost 3000 people lost their lives that day. 3000 families shattered. Uncounted thousands of friends and relatives left to pick up the pieces and fill in the holes.

Within hours the skies were emptied. The regular cacophony surrounding our nation’s airports was silenced. Neighborhoods used to the sometimes irritating noise of jet plane arrivals and departures grew eerily quiet. It stayed that way for two whole days.

And for those two days—and the days that followed--our nation stood united. For a few days in September, Democrats and Republicans, African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and  Caucasion Americans became simply…Americans. Flags sprouted in every lawn. Bumper stickers appeared on ’84 Chevys and ’01 Mercedes saying “We Stand United”. And for a few days in September, we did. And it was wonderful and awful and something no one should ever forget.

But normalcy and safety combined quickly with politics and ideologies to return us to business as usual. Few flags fly in my neighborhood on this September 11. And on Capitol Hill some dare to use the word “traitor” when a front line general simply tells the truth.

September 11, 2001 was an awful day. The date will live, along with December 7, 1941, in infamy. Too bad the unity that awful day created can’t live as long.

And that’s the view from the Rabbit Hole on September 11, 2007.