Defining moments . . .

So, today is a happy day!!  I think of all the moments in life -- the really big, newsworthy moments, that mark passages in life.  Not just mine.  Everyone's.  Everyone has moments they'll remember forever -- some personal, like their own wedding or the birth of a child, some public -- like a royal wedding, or the death of a beloved leader.  As with all of life, we take the bad with the good.

Take, for instance, the Challenger crash:

I was in jr. high school -- and remember watching it live on television.  We were in home room, and that's where we ended up staying, all day, watching the news coverage.  It was somewhat surreal at that age -- understanding the sadness, but not the implications.  The setbacks.  The politics. 

Of course, there was 9-11:

 

This is probably a moment that most vividly stays with me -- the horror as well as the hope.  I had just taken my husband to work, and was driving back home when a live report came on the radio of the first crash.  By the time I was home, and turned the tv on, I watched, on live television, the second plane crash into the second tower.  I remember watching all throughout that day and the days following, glued to the television, hoping for survivors, praying for those affected.   I think for my mom, it was the shooting of JFK that most stood out in her memory.  Martin Luther King, Jr.  The tsunami in Indonesia.  The earthquake in Japan.  Katrina.  All disasters, all horrible in their own way.  And the list goes on, I'm sure.  

Today, though, we've a bit of hope.  A royal wedding!  Our beloved Princess Diana's son, who looks so much like her, has finally tied the "Windsor Knot" as the news is calling it.  To a beautiful "commoner" (gasp!), Miss Kate Middleton, now Princess Catherine.  The Duchess of Cambridge.  I can't even imagine how much her life has changed in just the last 24 hours.  

It was a beautiful wedding.  Regal.  Long.  If you watch the clip of them walking out on the balcony, you see her eyes widen and can see she's saying WOW to the number of people gathered to greet them.  But her smile shows happiness and delight, and I, for one, am thankful for a happy day . . . a happy memory.  

I scrapbooked 9-11, and my feelings and thoughts behind it.  I think perhaps I'll scrapbook the royal wedding, as well, as if I were a treasured guest, to show future generations that we take the bad with the good.  It's this trip called life we're on, and it's a wild ride.  

Best wishes to the new bride and groom -- the new Princess and Prince of Wales!!  May God watch over them and keep them ever in His care.