I was at work when it happened.
  When I am old an gray and so riddled with Alzheimer's that I can't even recall which hand I use to adjust my glasses, I will still be able to remember turning on the radio and hearing them say that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.
  I also remember riding in my mother's car and hearing the radio say that the Challenger had exploded. That was in 1986, and I can still remember the smell of the heater, the frost riming the rear windows, and the chill of the leather seats. The man on the radio was describing it as it happened. He sounded much like the poor soul whose voice we so often hear breaking down at the sight of the Hindenburg's immolation. I remember him babbling something about seeing an escape pod, which later turned out to just be more smoke and debris. I was actually kind of angry at that guy, for giving me that kind of false hope.
  Almost everyone has an indelible moment like this stamped on their psyche. Whether it's a shared experience, like the Kennedy assassination (part I or II), or more personal, like the morning Mom sat my sister and me down on the couch to tell us that her father had died, tragedy has a way of searing itself onto the brain, knotting itself into the neurons in such a powerful way that it becomes a vivid beacon in an otherwise grey, featureless fog of faded recollection.
  It may seem morbid or grotesque that these events stand out so markedly, and rehashing them may strike you as distasteful. On the contrary, I believe it is absolutely vital that we always remember the impact that events like this have on us. They are a powerful reminder that history isn't something that was used up by the things that happened before we were born, and it's not just black-and-white war film or Ken Burns documentaries. History happens every day, and it's our responsibility to make sure that the people who are going to inherit this country and this planet from us have more than just record debt and the possible insolvency of Social Security and Medicare to remember us by. They need to know that this country is not a monolith. It is vital and creative, capable of growth and change and vulnerable to injury. Most importantly, they need to know how these things affect ordinary people.
  The feeling of pride and unity that developed two years ago seems to have all but evaporated. If we share our stories and remind each other what we felt for the victims, for ourselves, and for our country, maybe we can recapture some of that sense of ourselves as a nation.
  Then again, there's an election season right around the corner...

  Attention, aspiring singers/songwriters/DJs/MCs. Heh heh. I bet you thought I was going to share something useful or productive with you. Alas, LBB doesn't care about your budding career. Retail jobs for everyone! (Damn, I am so bitter.)
  Anyway, here's something fun, at the very least. Songfight is a site that runs a weekly contest. They give you a subject, then you have a few days to write, record and post a song. Visitors to the site can then listen to and rank your song. Every week, a winner is declared. It's exposure, and a deadline to help you flex your chops. Check it out!
  If you're not trying to reinvent the modern musical landscape, you should check out Songfight, too. It's usually fun, always original, and often surprising for the depth of talent some of the posters display. Click now.

  Cowboy Mouth rocks my socks, and several other articles of clothing not normally affected by loud sounds. They're playing at the TLA on South Street in Philly on October 11th. You should go. It's a very fun, energetic, involved performance that engages and entertains. If you don't leave a Cowboy Mouth show feeling happily exhausted, you obviously hit the bar too many times. I'd be going, but I have a wedding that day, so I'm going to take Amy down to DC the following night and catch them at the 9:30 Club. Don't come unless you want to rawk! If you do want to rawk, tell your friends and neighbors, and share the rawk with them, too. They'll thank you for it, I promise.
  As a special bonus (Keren, I'm lookin' at you, here), Cracker is opening for both shows! It's a double dose of rawk. \m/_

  "Yer a bit of an idjit, ain't you?"
  "Well sir, I don't-"
  "Oh, I know. Yer momma probly calls ya 'challenged,' or 'special,' or some other fancy word. But the god's-honest truth is that ya ain't bright enough to light up a dark closet, are ya boy?"
  I'd never heard anyone speak about me so plainly, with so little pretense. He sat there on the porch, idly pulling at the peeling paint, flicking aside the drops of condensation that had pooled in in the cracks where he'd set his can of beer. His gray eyes stared levelly at me from under the brim of his sweat-stained cap.
  "Nossir, I suppose I ain't... I'm not terribl' smart. I try to learn things, but is seems like they just fall right outta m'head."
  His gaze flicked away, out into the dusty dirt yard. "There, now," he grunted. "It's out'n the open and we kin deal with it. Ain't no shame in being stupid, boy. Worst possible thing you c'do is go 'round foolin' yerself about it. Nothin' worse than a damn fool tryin' to convince hisself he's got more brains'n he was blessed with."
  His eyes twitched back and took me in completely. And not just the me in front of him, but all of me, my life stretching all the way back to the womb. I sometimes believe that, if he'd stared at me long enough, my uncle could have looked right back into the past and seen the faces of all the ancestors whose blood ran in my veins. Instead, he looked out past the yard at the cloud of dust just topping the hill that separated our land from the county's.
  "Just you remember, boy. There ain't many places in this life that intelligence kin take you, where hard work'n persistence can't git you just as well."