GROUND ZER0, New York, N.Y.--Aug. 6, 2003--  Over 120,000 babies were born in New York City following the Terrorist attack on Nine Eleven.   Those pregnant mothers closest to the World Trade Center may have ingested the breath of the Beast of Terror, and its foul exhaust may have long-range impact on their children's health and mental welfare.

    In a report issued today in the American Medical Association Journal, researchers from Mount Sinai Medical Center reported that among 182 pregnant women who were in or near the World Trade Center that day, or in the three weeks following, 8.2 percent delivered babies showing signs of intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR).  
    IUGR has been associated with exposure to tobacco smoke or air pollution.  The study revealed that during the same period, only 3.8 percent of the 2,367 babies delivered at Mount Sinai Medical Center in uptown Manhattan showed signs of IUGR.   All babies whose mothers were exposed to the air pollution near the World Trade Center were born in the lowest 10 percent for the time they spent in the womb.
    A dozen women in the survey were in the Twin Towers when the Terrorist planes hit.
    Effects of IUGR include possible lung difficulties and increased potential attention difficulties.   The study closely follows symptoms from children who have been exposed to second-hand smoke, or heavy air pollution.
    New York County reported more than 20,000 births in 2002.  The county represents the island of Manhattan.  Total births in all five of the counties representing more than 8 million people, exceeded 120,000.
     To the medical world, the aftermath of bad air upon a pregnancy suggests the fragility of the fetus, and its vulnerability to what its mother ingests.
     To the Vigilant world, the impact of the foul air is an example of how the breath of the Beast of Terror lingers long after his or her footprints have been washed away by the winds of time.

     Even though there have been no follow-up Terror attacks since the holocaust of Nine Eleven that took nearly 3,000 lives at the World Trade Center alone, the shadow of the Beast of Terror casts a pall over the land.   It sprouts, like a cantankerous weed, in the bodies of the children who represent the IUGR study.
     Deep in the womb of their mothers, the atmosphere of Terrorism seemingly penetrated the natural defenses.   Each child carries with him or her a scar, unseen, unannounced, of the presence of the Beast.
     These are special children.   They understand the impact of the Beast, that he or she can try and strangle life even when he or she scurried deep into caves, skulking and waiting for the next assault on the peace and prosperity of the world.
     These 128 children who were part of the study may represent only a small portion of the total children who bear the scar of the Beast.   The winds blew for weeks from the Trade Center to the west and east and north and south.
      Anyone who lived near the site, as I do, recalls the stench in the air--the wet musk of burning flesh muffled in smoke and ash that smoldered and hung in the air as vultures hang on the scythes of wind cutting paths for them to glide down upon the corpses below.  How many children tucked in their mother's wombs breathed in the scent of death and destruction through the umbilici feeding their gestation?

     Those who were born underweight from the norm represent 128 of 120,000 births throughout New York City that year, a small fraction of the Terrorist Generation exposed to the atmosphere of deadly destruction that permeated all points of the compass for months.
      Our younger grandson was conceived on September 11.  During the most formative months of growth for a fetus, our daughter inhaled the air of Lower Manhattan where she lives in the East Village, a breath of wind away from the rubble that burned for months.
      What effect did the air have on Angus?  He's a strong young lad, big and thick like a small oak, hardly symbolic of an underweight baby.  But in his lungs, somewhere in his system, remains the ashes of air that haunted all of us with each breath.   He too was afflicted by the Breath of the Beast.  He too was scarred.
       I would like to think that underweight or overweight or simply somewhere in between, all the children--all 120,000 of them born that year--carry with them a ghost of the Beast of Terror.   I hope that ghost is not a nightmare, a genetic imprint of horror, but instead, a mark of Courage, Conviction and Right Actions for future generations.
      A Sentinel of Vigilance is a person who is able to recognize the Beast of Terror exists now, has existed in history, and will exist in the future.   The Beast takes shape and form in the disguise of Fear, Intimidation and Complacency.

     The Beast  can function through the simplicity of a child's nightmare, or the feeling the child has that he or she isn't loved enough, isn't smart enough, good enough, rich enough, pretty enough, big enough, or lucky enough.
      The Beast twists our self worth into pretzel shapes, often turning an innocent child into a angry, hostile, resentful and sometimes introverted being who leaps and ducks and weaves through the Shadow of the Beast.
      Then, there are children who are raised under the Principles of Vigilance.   These children learn to combat Fear with One Percent more Courage, and to tackle their Intimidations with One Percent more muscled Conviction, and, to always seek to decide their Right Actions regarding what is best for future generations--The Children's Children's Children--rather than fall into the quagmire of Complacency.
      It is my hope that the children who inhaled the Beast of Terror's breath through their mother's womb, know that the mark left upon them is a Sign of Vigilance, not a mark of Terror.
      I hope they will rise above their Fears, Intimidations and Complacencies and become Sentinels of Vigilance, wielding the Sword and Shield of Vigilance with alacrity against the great injustices of Fear, Intimidation and Complacency.
      These Triads of Terrorism haunt our society.  They breed in the Complacency of parenthood, people who forget to raise a child with one mission--to overpower the Beast of Terror's threats.
       As of now, we have identified 128 children who may have physical and mental implications from inhaling the air during their gestation.  But, there are thousands more, not only in New York City, but across America and the world, born in the shadow of the Beast.

      Despite all physical challenges these children may face, hopefully they will all rise above the travails of the Beast.   Hopefully, their parents will become Parents of Vigilance, and look upon their children as the gifted, the chosen, the Sentinels of Vigilance the world needs to combat Terrorism in all its forms, in all its shapes and sizes and countless disguises.    
      While the Beast of Terror may have breathed upon the children that day, the Sunshine of Vigilance spotlights them.   It is the rays of hope that always change the future, not the clouds of dismay.
       May the children always know when they suck in a deep breath, that they are inhaling Vigilance and exhaling the Beast's Breath.

Aug 5--Monsoon Of Vigilance--Washing Terrorism Away

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