At Noon on Friday..... RyanCarrWeber

.... the three organizers of TW and the Organizer of BW stepped into the ring. The Chair of the Teens League spoke:

"What happened on Tuesday morning will become a defining event for the generation currently in america's schools, including the boys who enjoy these two leagues. My generation has days we remember - the day JFK died, or for our parents, the day Pearl Harbor was bombed. Today's young people will remember Tuesday as the day a foreign, cowardly terror attacked the two strongest symbols of this country's greatness - the two cities which the whole country looks to for definition and inspiration. This makes the day auspicious and important."

The organizer of BW spoke next, looking over the combined membership and audiences of both clubs, which sat silently in the stands. "Several thousand americans and other citizens of the world lost their lives on Tuesday. Given the locale in wich they did - america's biggest city - everyone in this country knows someone who knows someone who lost someone they loved. The sheer number of lives lost, and the national sense of sorrow and, in many cases, survivor's guilt, makes Tuesday a tragedy."

One of the other TW organizers took the mike. "President Bush has requested that, at five past noon today, all bells be rung for one minute. Please bow your heads, as we join the rest of the country in mourning our dead." He stepped down from the ring, and walked to the match bell. Lifting the striker, he rang the bell, one toll every four seconds, until a minute had passed. The assembled wrestlers and spectators looked up.

"There is a question," the TW Chair went on, "of how we can continue with sport and fun in the face of such tragedy. The answer is that we have to. Yes, we must mourn those who perished in the heinous attack. But we must also show those who would try to break us that america's indomitable spirit cannot be broken. We must also play on to prove to ourselves that we can rise above the desolation and despair of the last few days. And we can do that."

The organizer of BW spoke last. "In 1996, Jonathan Larson, a brilliant writer and native New Yorker, died at the age of 36 of an aortic aneurysm the day before his musical RENT was to open. That show went on to become the biggest hit on Broadway that year. Larson also wrote another, autobiographucal show, from which the following words, which we will end with, came."

LOUDER THAN WORDS

(excerpted)

cages or wings?

which do you prefer?

ask the birds

fear or love, baby? don't say the answer

actions speak louder than words

what does it take

to wake up a generation?

how can you make someone

take off and fly?

if we don't wake up

and shake up the nation

we'll eat the dust of the world

wondering why

why do we follow leaders who never lead?

why does it take catastrophe to start a recolution?

if we're so free, tell me why?

someone tell me why so many people bleed.

cages or wings?

which do you prefer?

ask the birds.

fear or love, baby? don't say the answer

actions speak louder than words.

by Jonathan Larson