We see a New York City and gutted and wounded.

I hear a woman in the gym say,

"Who's to say when they start flights again, it won't happen again? That there won't be kamikaze hijackings again?"

We will never feel as safe again.

To tell the truth, I'm more concerned about other ways of carrying this off. It was a slick mind that thought this out, and wouldn't repeat itself too much. Jets aren't the only travelling bombs out there. Trucks that carry oil and fuel---tons of it--- are moving bombs, and a kamikaze driver could do horrible harm with just one of those, driven against the Capital Building for instance.

That's one of the thoughts that would have been considered morbidly paranoid on ...Sept. 10, 2001.

Not today. Today that's considered...."realistic".

They talk of the incredible toll this might take on the nation's economy, and through it, the world's. The economy was sliding. This did happen in the financial district of NYC. Will this act plunge the world into another Great Depression?

Probably not. Certainly I hope not. Yet sometimes acts happen that change the nature of a country ...forever.

Sometimes we don't realize Golden Ages until they're gone...

If we go into war with the perpetuators with a bloodlust that knows no bounds, it will change our country forever.

Then the bastards who did this will have won...because we will have become them. We will have acted as they would have acted, had they our resources.

If it is foreign terrorists, if it is Bin Ladin, I wonder how many Palestinians died in that tower collapse? How many Afghans? It was the World Trade Tower. How many Muslims?

They are victims, too.

Yet I know they will be counted "martyrs for the cause" by some who may have been behind this...without being asked whether they wanted to be martyrs. It is that willing consent that is the mark of a true martyr....and distinguishes them from...victims.

There is no force on Earth as great as religion, in what it can do, and make others do. I think that's a sign of how important it really is, because it touches on something (in the greatest sense of the word) Universal--- but when it is misused, from the Inquisition to suicidal terrorists, there is nothing as chilling. As deadly.

It's only the truly powerful things that are dangerous when misused.

I hate one particular thought. No matter what we do, Bin Ladin will die thinking he fought the good fight, secure in his place in... Paradise.

If it is him.

I wonder how many ghosts walk Manhattan now? Many people, seemingly sane, believe in a ghostly afterlife, and that a shocking, incomprehensible death leaves many souls in a dazed and unbelieving state, unable to comprehend what has happened to them, or what their state is...

This, I think, certainly qualifies.

Wandering in the dark, in the dust, in the ruins, calling out, wondering why no one comes...souls stumbling about.

Note, I don't believe that. I believe, in my tradition, that the dead have better things to do rather than wander the Earth, any more than a child, when born, would wander a ...womb.

Yet... I'm not sure...who can be sure?---if there might be a time inbetween when the dead might walk...

If so, how many walk the now-dark canyons of downtown Manhattan?

How many have had even knowledge of their life or death taken from them? Atheist, agnostic, Jew, Christian, and Moslem, wandering, crying, not knowing what happened to themselves...

The truth is horrible enough, without resorting to ghost stories. Yet it's a chilling picture...

Yet...

Someone from our IT department sent us a .gif of the flag to use as a wallpaper on our computers. Purely compulsory, but many people did.

Many are urging people to where red, white and blue tomorrow to show their solidarity. There was a gathering of many musicians to entertain a patriotic rally in Centennial Park.

Simple-minded patriotism? Doubtless. Yet a necessary outlet---and better than considering the ghosts.

Sometimes ghosts urge one to action, like Hamlet's father. Sometimes they urge one on to action, to stop the haunting.

It may take a fearful act to stop being haunted by these particular ghosts, though...

Ghosts are notoriously bloodthirsty. Homer said they drank blood, and drew sustenance from it.

Whether they are just symbols of our collective anger, or actual souls, they call for vengeance, and sorrow, and fear.

Fear that may fill the rest of our years.

May we still those fears...forever...without causing enough bloodshed in retaliation that it will shake the world. Let us only retaliate against those who have done this, or given them shelter and comfort---

---And not wage war against half the world, because of their religion or their culture.

That's a war both sides would lose.