September 11th, 2001; I turned 10 years old a few months prior and had just started fifth grade. They didn’t show the news coverage in my school for a long time, and my teacher had to do it without permission. I remember a cloudy feeling of doom: our country was plunging into war. What was going to happen? I learned about the Revolutionary War — the war against an oppressive government; the Civil War — the war of the federal government against the states; and Vietnam — the war we never “won.” What would this new war be against? A new word started appearing everywhere, “terrorism.” Something just wasn’t right. “How long will we be at war?” I thought, “Hopefully not that long. Hopefully it won’t be as bad as Vietnam.”

13 years later, I am almost 23 years old. I have lived over half of my life during a…