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The Effects of 9/11 on One Family

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Real Estate Agent with eXp Realty (888) 397-7352 Ext:1148 RS282607

Diary of a Whimpy REALTOR

 

google peter b lavelle homes for sale philadelphiaI promised my friend and contributor, Billie Bakhshi of the Ambler Patch that I'd share her articles with our community. I've known Billie and her husband Basil for many years. Basil and I used to work together in my previous occupation and I am proud to say I gave Basil his 1st and 2nd Degree in Freemasonry. I will warn though, be very careful of Basil's coffee, much stronger and better than Starbucks.

Please enjoy this article and share if you would like.

 

The Effects of 9/11 on One Family

One mother worries about her children, husband after Sept. 11.

By Billie Bakhshi

 

 

The morning began like every other one that week of September in 2001, with the sound of nurses talking in the hallway, and the sound of the breakfast cart being wheeled up to our room.  Scrambled egg beaters, limp toast, corn flakes and cranberry juice … typical hospital breakfast fare, a tray I was “entitled” to, as a breastfeeding mom to our newborn daughter, and as semi-permanent guests on the pediatric wing. 

I poked a hole in the top of the foil covered juice cup, plunged my straw in and pointed the bed-tethered remoteBillie Bakhshi Ambler Patch at the mounted television on the wall. Charlie Gibson was altogether too perky and pleasant, and I wished I had his life.

Scarcely home from the hospital after being born, my newborn daughter, Kelsey, was admitted to an isolation room on her third day of life. A spinal tap in the emergency room confirmed meningitis, and I would not leave her. Nurses constantly encouraged me to go have a meal in the cafeteria, or go home for a few hours and see my other children, rest, take a walk … do something! Just get out of the room for a little while. Staying in an isolation room with a very sick newborn for the proposed month … even prisoners in solitary have it easier. But how can you go anywhere when the person who’s been closest to your heart for the last nine months is in an isolation room on a pediatric wing? 

Yeah, you try leaving.

There were two windows in the hospital room: the first was a view of another section of the hospital, and a little bit of sky. It didn’t open.

The other window was the television.

Between Kelsey’s feedings, and changing, and taking naps between the constant barrage of nurses, doctors and foodservice people entering the hospital room, the television was my constant companion. 

The morning of Sept. 11marked our first full week of this routine … and it began like every other: morning news, back-to-school fashion shows and forecasts of fantastic warm, sunny weather that would have been perfect for using the new stroller in. But then, the baffled, fearful look on Charlie Gibson prefaced the change to live downtown Manhattan, where the remnants of a smoking airliner stuck out of the World Trade Center.

A few miles away, our fifth-grade daughter, Serena, was getting ready for school, while my husband gave our 2-year-old, Cody, a bath. Serena was tying her shoes while watching the morning news in the living room when the switch to live news coverage happened. At first, she thought that it was an advertisement for a new movie. We both realized it wasn’t an accident or movie advertisement as we both watched a second plane crash into the World Trade Center on live television.

Serena called me on the phone, sounding shaken and tearful. “Mommy, I’m scared … ”

One window still showed the same sunshiny day. The other window into the outside world burned horrifying images in my memory over the next few weeks. When my husband, Basil, brought our other children to the hospital, we huddled together, watching in disbelief.  Every channel showed horrific images: burning towers, attack on the Pentagon, Flight 93 crashing in a Shanksville field, people falling (jumping) to their deaths, the World Trade Center buildings crumbling, falling.

The death toll climbed, and the nation’s morale sank. We were afraid, not just of the foreign attackers, but fellow countrymen.

I looked at my young children, particularly my sick, helpless newborn daughter, and thought to myself, “What kind of world did I bring you into?”

My husband has good reason to be afraid. He is no stranger to being exposed to the violence of extremist radicals. He was born in Pakistan, and his entire family is Catholic. My husband recounts times he was thrown into trenches to hide and be safe. Church groups in Pakistan often meet in secret, behind closed doors, for fear of discovery, as the consequences for proselytizing can be severe, including death.

My husband’s family came to the United States to be safe from these extremists. His family arrived in 1973, and settled into life in the great American “melting pot.”  They always believed they’d be safe here, where the Mother of Exiles reaches out, saying, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free … ”

When the children slept, Basil and I spoke quietly about our safety here. Local news reports began to have stories about violence against people of Middle Eastern decent. People were angry, fearful and looking for someone to blame … someone to punish, but in an irrational, violent sort of way. We sat in our daughter’s hospital room and wondered if we’d be rounded up and sent to internment camps like Japanese-Americans were after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

People look at my husband. They see the shape of his face, his East Asian features, and make up their minds. Following 9/11, he’s had a human resource department recruiter offhandedly say, “I thought you were a terrorist coming to kill me.”

He could be a terrorist? Maybe to a bag of chocolate chip cookies.

During a hospital procedure Basil assisted on, a doctor asked the other assisting nurse, “Is your sister still dating that terrorist?” She replied, “He’s not a terrorist … he’s from India, not Pakistan.” He couldn’t leave in the middle of a procedure, and was effectively trapped with people who shared in this hostile sentiment.

Within the last 10 years, he’s been called a raghead, a Paki camel jockey, a sand nigger.   

Prior to 9/11, he had the same job for 10 years. Many jobs he’s applied for since have dried up and gone away, or worse: Some patients have requested to have a different caregiver. Worse yet, he encounters prejudiced co-workers that create hostile work environments.   

These people don’t realize that he’s a loving husband, and a daddy who sat his kids up on his shoulders, who reads to them, and cares for them when they’re sick. He’s a devoted son who took care of his daddy until he passed away, and is taking care of his widowed mother, who suffers with Alzheimer’s. He’s a dedicated nurse who thinks about, cares about and prays for his patients long after his shift is over. He attends Mass weekly and teaches our autistic daughter to pray, even for the people who tease her.

My husband is a United States Army Veteran who received airborne training out of Fort Benning. He enlisted straight out of high school, wanting to defend and protect the country that allowed his family safety and freedom.

But people can’t see that. And he suffers for it. Our family suffers for it. Just when we think that our lives are going back to “normal,” there is another news report of violence in Pakistan, and we brace ourselves for more bad days of “looks” and slurs, and hope that’s as far as it goes.

As a nation of immigrants, you’d think there would be more tolerance in the world. As one of the most literate, educated countries in the world, you’d expect more understanding. Being human, and not animals, you’d expect one of the characteristics that sets us apart in the animal kingdom … compassion. Quite a few exceptional people do just that. Many others are still guided by hate, fear and prejudice, and act on those feelings, not even fully understanding that they’re only perpetuating more fear, more hate.

When I see my husband dealing with the effects of 9/11,  I look out of my window to see my children playing in the yard and still wonder, “What kind of world did I bring you into?”

Posted by

Peter B. Lavelle

"Marketing Your Home for All It Is Worth"

 

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 Real estate is a people business and you deserve to be treated with the utmost respect, as well as having an agent that will "Do the right thing ALL the time, EVERYTIME."

I believe in challenging the status quo by being different, being original, leading the way, and understanding that attitude reflects leadership.

As a mentor to many youth in our area, I build my business to help them in their path and journey to being leaders in their own right. Please join me in helping to provide for them their path to success.

 

Comments (1)

Karen Winters, Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices KoenigRubloff
Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Koenig Rubloff Realty Group - Chicago, IL - Chicago, IL
Chicago, IL

Very moving indeed.  All my best to Billie, Basil and their children, especially in the week to come.  Sometimes I lose faith over how we treat each other.  Then I try to pull myself together and remember, it's not my place to place judement.  It's the Lord's. 

 

Sep 03, 2011 03:36 PM