Sunday with Lainey and Carrie

September 17, 2018

After church on Sunday we took Carrie and Lainey to the Washington D.C. Temple Visitor's Center.It is a special place. Sister Pferdner who serves there with her husband, sat with us and told about giving out Books Of Mormon to a busload of Cambodians, four men from Turkey, and a young couple from Sri Lanka.  That's a normal day for her.

Then we went to the Pentagon 9/11 Memorial. A very special feeling and very special memorial. 184 people died in the terrorist attack when a plane crashed into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m. Each victim's age and location at the time of the attack is permanently inscribed into the Memorial by unique placement and direction. When you go, you can dial a number and listen to a 30 minute narration of events. A surviving victim tells his story and a speech by a brother of a victim, who spoke at the dedication of the Memorial, is on the narration. It was very sobering.

Driving into the Pentagon. You couldn't park there, you had

to park farther away and walk in.

The different colored stainless steel strips have

the year the victims were born. The youngest three

years old, the oldest seventy-seven. There is a starting point

that has the date September 11, 2001 which I didn't get a

picture of. Then you start walking along the year strips.

There are 85 Crape Myrtle trees on the grounds.

They flower beautifully.

There is a bench for each victim, a lighted pool of flowing water underneath,

and the victim's name inscribed. Victims aboard the plane had benches pointed

in the direction the plane was going. Victims in the Pentagon had benches pointed

toward the approach of the plane. So they were each in the opposite direction of each other.

There is a inscribed stone to the right of the doors denoting the spot the plane hit.

Name of victim on front. Water underneath. It lights up at night.

It's hard to see but there is an Age Wall. It grows one inch per year in height.

As you move through the Memorial, the wall grows from three inches to 71 inches.