Time heals all wounds. Live and let live. Forgive and forget.

I can't. I won't. How can I?

That day six years ago is as vivid to me today as it was when the whole tragedy unfurled in front of my tear-filled eyes for the first time. And it wasn't just the jets crashing through the World Trade Center or into the Pentagon that created the anger, the hatred and the resentment. Instead, it was the fact that some radical group had taken the very best days of my life and utterly crushed the happiness I was feeling.

My wife was less than one week away from delivering our first child, and to say that we were excited is the understatement of the decade.

Nervous can't describe our feelings up until that point either.

And then "it" happened.

The tears streaming from eyes faster than the plumes of smoke rising up from Ground Zero were tears for my unborn son, my wife and the family I hoped to create — one that values love and the pursuit of happiness as well as an individual's life and soul.

Forgive and forget? Forget it.

But let me tell what I personally took from Sept. 11.

I have no fear.

The very thing the terrorists hoped to achieve by their heinous, cowardly attack on innocent victims took me in the opposite direction. Instead of fearing the world I live in because of their actions, today I embrace the unique challenges and obstacles that I face. I fear nothing in business, health or family matters. What else is there?

How can I do anything but live without fear?

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

How ironic that the phrase FDR used in 1932 is as applicable today as it was then. In fact, the sentence before his most famous phrase is even more fitting after 9-11. "This great nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper."

And that's exactly what this great nation has done. We have survived — somehow. We always survive. It's what we as Americans do.

To be sure, there will be other terrorist plots, car bombs, wars and such. You will never be able to meet your loved one at the gate in an airport again and the conflict in the Middle East won't likely be solved during my lifetime.

But this great nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and prosper.

Time heals all wounds? Hardly. I still cry when I hear the National Anthem or read about another selfless soldier who gave a life so that I might be free to write and speak my mind each day.

Live and let live? No way. This is my life now, al-Qaida. There was a time when I was afraid: afraid to love and afraid to take chances that might cause pain.

But that pain has been replaced by a passion so great, nothing can shake the foundation of my being. I live like everyday could be my last because of the events on 9-11, so take THAT Osama!

Forgive and forget? Never. How can I forgive someone that is too afraid to come out and fight fair? As for forgetting, how can I forget an incident that is going to shape the rest of my days on Earth and make me a better person each day?

I am urging each of you to never forgive or forget this horrible incident, but instead, make it something that turned your life around for the better. It did for me.

Christian Ola, a community columnist for the Butler Eagle, resides in Mars with his wife, son and daughter and can be reached through christianola@aol.com.