Sunday, September 11, 2011

Sleep vs Defining Moment of History

 On 9.11.01 I was a young paratrooper in Bethlem, guarding Rachel's Tomb. The day was hot, and I had just finished a long 8 hour shift of guard duty in the scorching sun. Knowing that 8 hours hence I would be on duty again, I wanted little other then to eat and sleep. Unfortunately for me, every day there was a mandatory base meeting, where the officers would brief the soldiers on base protocol. Barely awake I sat and listened to a speech I had heard so many times before. Suddenly in the middle of the meeting, the officer's beeper beeped - the officer stopped and started at his beeper, then looking up he turned to me (as the only non Israeli in the unit) and asked "What are the Twin Towers?"

We were lucky that on base we had a TV, which we rushed to watch. After an hour or so, and after having explained numerous times to people on the base what exactly the WTC was, I finally made it to bed.

 The historicity of the moment was not lost on me, however for one tired paratrooper in the struggle between viewing history unfold, and a tired soldier wanting his sleep, sleep won.

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