I Went Back to Work Today

by J. A. Jance

 

I'm a writer.  My job is writing murder mysteries, books in which there's an immutable rule that the bad guys get caught.  On Monday of this week, I was in Montreal on tour.  It's only through the luck of airplane scheduling that I came home to my family late Monday night through Chicago rather than Tuesday morning through New York.

Tuesday we were supposed to leave Seattle for a week in Ashland, Oregon,--to see plays, play some golf, and finish up the manuscript I'm writing.  We didn't get to Ashland in time to see any plays on Tuesday.  Instead, we spent all that morning glued to the television set, watching as this terrible atrocity played out in front of our eyes; listening as newscasters besmirched our president and came close to calling him a coward for not returning to Washington immediately to resume his rightful place as commander in chief; hearing as reporters demanded answers to questions that would clearly have revealed what would necessarily be classified information.

Finally, at noon yesterday, my husband and I got in the car and, with heavy hearts, headed south.  As we drove, the news was no better.  On September eleven, there would be no Hollywood hero, swashbuckling his way into the cockpit to save the day. 

No, there were only ordinary American heroes who, faced with death themselves, decided to wrest control from a maniacal pilot and crash the rogue aircraft eighty miles short of its intended target.  And there were hundreds of other ordinary American heroes as well, men and women who, on the streets and in the skyscrapers of New York City, willingly put themselves in harm's way in order to save others.  Many of those brave men and women lost their own lives as a result.

And President George W. Bush is no less a hero.  He allowed himself to be guided by security considerations rather than some media dictated madate that he show up and answer reporters' self-serving questions.  No, he set about putting the wheels in motion to serve and protect this country--to care for the wounded, retrieve the dead, comfort the living, and capture the crazed killers.  He also began laying the goundwork for the worldwide alliances that will be necessary in order for us to win this war because believe me, that's what this is--WAR.

We can pull ourselves up short and say "Hey, wait a minute.  What about religious freedom?"  This isn't about religion.  This is about politics, cloaking itself in religious sheep's clothing and then demanding that we give the right to destroy us.  Fortunately, I believe we have leaders who are smart enough to see through that subterfuge.  And if we don't, God help us.

President Bush has been sneered at by the intellectual establishment.  Why wouldn't he be?  He's a man of the West, and in some people's book, that makes him little more than a hick.  Well, maybe he is a president who probably cut his teeth on heroes like Gary Cooper and stories like High Noon and Destry Rides Again where heroes were honorable and weren't afraid to stand up for what was right.

But folks, this isn't a modern-day shoot-out at OK Corral.  And those who think he and the American people don't have the "resolve" to do what needs to be done should think again.

Today, the President of the United States went about his work of governing this country in the face of a terrible, unspeakable tragedy.  And taking a lesson from him, I'm going to do the same thing because what terrorists want is for us to be immoblized by what's happened; for us to be struck dumb and helpless by what they've managed to do and the innocents they, as being without conscince, have been prepared to slaughter.  And if we're immobilized, then they've won.

And so, as I said, it's time for me to go back to work.  It's time for me to open my computer, look up chapter 18, and finish my book, while President Bush and our other appointed and elected leaders set about finishing theirs.  I wish them and us God's speed.

 

 

*J.A. Jance -- a k a Judith Ann Jance is best known for her mystery novels, especially the fourteen books that depict the adventures of Seattle police detective J.P. Beaumont. At signings, she asks bookstores to donate a percentage of their earnings from her appearances to various causes. Over the past 10 years, she has raised more than $250,000 for charities. Her books include; Injustice for All; Taking the Fifth; Rattlesnake Crossing; Shoot Don't Shoot and many more.