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technofile Al Fasoldt's reviews and commentaries, continuously available online since 1983 Have faith -- We will get through thisSept. 19, 2001 By Al Fasoldt Copyright © 2001, Al Fasoldt Copyright © 2001, The Syracuse Newspapers This is a sad time. I find myself alternating between anger and grief, not knowing what to say. I've received more e-mail in the past week than I normally get in a month. Readers who know me and those who don't have been sending poems and photos, passages from scripture, fragments of conversations they overheard last Tuesday morning, essays their children wrote, and much, much more. A rescue worker worn out from searching the debris where the World Trade Towers once stood wrote to ask why so much of the rubble seems to have been vaporized. (The answer: As happened at Hiroshima in the atomic bomb explosion that destroyed that city near the end of World War 2, tons of rock literally were turned to dust.) A reader from Manhattan sent a simple question: "WHY?" I don't have an answer. I received pictures of flags on cars, in windows, on tractors. I wish I'd had my camera in my hand on the Massachusetts Turnpike Saturday when an old Ford Mustang roadster passed us with a huge flag sewed to the convertible top, so I could show all those folks what I saw. I also got hundreds and hundreds of forwarded letters. Most of the time, mail that's forwarded to a lot of other people is junk mail. Even if it comes from your sister-in-law (or perhaps especially if it comes from your sister-in-law), it's junk mail. But I looked at all of it. Some of it was immensely sad. I got more hate mail than usual, too. Without a target for their anger and frustration, some people aim at the first thing that drifts by. I understand that. And I got a lot of mail asking what can be done to help. There are many online sources, and anything I put together now would be out of date and therefore misleading within a week or so. I recommend going to any of the large portal sites -- Yahoo, for example -- and looking for links there. Sites that serve as portals (handy references to many other sites on the Web) have been doing a wonderful job keeping track of helpful sites related to the terrorist attack and its aftermath. There are other actions you can take, too. Forget the technology of the Internet for a while and do the right thing. Comfort those you love. Be strong. Pray a lot. We will get through this. |