Story Weavers Writing Featured
Every Thursday at 2:00 PM, a group of 5-10 Episcopal Homes residents gather together and share a piece of their own writing. This week we are featuring a patriotic piece of writing by Carol McClellan, a Terrace at Iris Park resident.
VISIONS IN THE SKY
In my travel journal I called it “serendipity”
for we just happened onto that small two-lane road
after many hours on the freeway,
where eleven brightly-colored parachutes were circling down
for a landing on a small airfield.
We stopped our car — pulled it right onto the field —
and climbed out to watch them come in to land,
aiming carefully at the target painted on the strip,
several riding double beneath the ribbed rectangles of bright silk.
I captured them on film, a special bonus of our vacation trip,
something to remember it by.
We laughed with delight at good timing
and good fortune.
Days later — another happening!
Walking the streets of downtown Toronto,
we looked up to see airplanes from an aerial show
maneuvering in close formation, leaving white trails
curling over the towers above us.
Again — more serendipity!
On our way to breakfast we paused,
held our breath,
and watched the sky fill with silent bubbles of color
as hot air balloons floated up.
One after the other, colored like children’s rainbows, they lifted over the trees
and barns of Danville, New York.
We laughed at last, which was shaped like a witch
flying her broomstick. Black. Never thinking it could be
an omen. Once again I captured it on film to save and show and remember.
The next aerial incident we did not see until evening,
for we were driving, away from TV. There was black again,
this time from smoke from a burning tower in New York City,
and then an airplane, flying like an arrow,
pierced the heart of its twin tower, and burst into a flower of flame.
They showed it again and again, and over and over
we watched, willing it not to happen this time, but it always did.
Then the tower crumpled, and then the first one, too,
as people fled in terror at the monster cloud of dust and debris
which chased them through the streets. And then —
O God, how could this be occurring in my peaceful country, during
my serendipitous vacation — they showed another plane crash into the Pentagon
in Washington D.C. — and one more into the earth itself.
This time I didn’t need my camera in order to save it for remembrance.
I close my eyes and see bodies plummeting to the street,
towers exploding into infernos,
skeletal remains of buildings silhouetted against a sky where once
there were lofty towers full of people going about their daily lives.
These images will never leave me.
But I also remember the flags which appeared everywhere as if by magic,
hanging from windows, freeway overpasses, construction derricks…
fluttering proudly from car antennas, baseball caps, children’s fists…
on badges pinned to shirts, on menus, on the television screen.
And wherever we drove on the rest of our trip
the words “God Bless America” shouted and prayed
from crudely lettered messages on sheets hanging overhead,
from message boards outside restaurants and motels,
from the voices of singers gathered to share their grief and their belief
in the power of God to surmount evil,
and in the endurance of the United States of America.
Author: Carol McClellan (Episcopal Homes of Minnesota resident)
Written: September 24, 2001 (14 years ago)