It's September 10th

It's September 10th. This is what Microsoft Outlook tells me. It's what my phone tells me, and my computer. September 10.
Why am I scared?

It's beautiful in Chicago. Low 54, High 73. The sun is coming down and I'm riding through the park on the bike trail, on my way home. Nothing could be nicer. I'm not even turning on the radio. The birds are chirping, the traffic is light on the streets, only a few soccer players dot the park and middle aged walkers are owning my path.

A man is walking my way, but he's looking up at the sky. It's just the two of us, really. I follow his gaze. He's looking at a big white airplane with red markings on the wing.

The airplane is flying low. It's gone in a moment.

It's September 10th. Why am I scared?

I'm a person of faith so I'm not. I'm not scared. Although traditionally, it is a season of awe and fear for the Jewish People. So I should be scared. We believe that everyone's life, and you don't have to be Jewish here, is in balance during the High Holidays. He/She determines the future for the whole world, sorts through our thoughts and actions in the coming month, sort of like we pick through vegetables and decide on a menu.

But right now, whatever He/She has in mind is going to have to be all right. September 10 is slipping away, anyway, like any other day, and tomorrow, September 11, will, too.

I get an email from Smooth Stone who requests a link. This is well worth the read. It's a tribute to Welles Remy Crowther, a hero on September 11. His greatest ambition in life? Help others.

He's gone.

On a happier note, I just watched Randy Pausch deliver The Last Lecture on the Public Broadcasting Service, WTTW in Chicago. That's something we should all support, PBS.

You're supposed to ask, "Isn't that the guy who died of pancreatic cancer? How could there be a happy note here?"

Indeed, this vibrant, brilliant, fun-loving engineering professor isn't with us anymore. But you can watch his last lecture on YouTube. What a wonderful human being, a person who really understood what it meant to enjoy life and to live it well. And he knew it before he got sick. You have to see him to believe him.

Here's what the sidebar on YouTube tells us:

Carnegie Mellon Professor Randy Pausch (Oct. 23, 1960 - July 25, 2008) gave his last lecture at the university Sept. 18, 2007, before a packed McConomy Auditorium. In his moving presentation, "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams," Pausch talks about his lessons learned and gives advice to students on how to achieve their own career and personal goals. For more, visit www.cmu.edu/randyslecture.

He says he did it for his children. Something about head fakes and football.

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