September

A lot’s been going on in September. Each year it fills with events big and small, short and tall, rise and fall.

Being the month after Merdeka, it shares the happenings brought about as the Malaysian Independence Celebration. It does help that the shopping month stretch between August and September. There is an air of celebration which still lingers on to this day.

Abroad unfortunately, the events are less of a celebration. Just look up the news front any day and you’ll be greeted with destruction, sadness and sorrow.

Planes crash in August through September and I can only imagine how relatives cope. After Katrina, onward comes Ophelia. It is comforting to understand that there is hope. Four years after 9/11, the survival lesson, was it learned?

Green Day tastefully sings for us all this September. My first impression told me that releasing this single then was a brilliant marketing strategy. The uplifting beat and the meaningful lyrics however , is enough to brush that impression away and acknowledge it is truly a brilliant song, apt for times like these. It makes me realize that not everything is about making big bucks.

The more I listened to Green Day’s September, the sadder I get. At times, my eyes water when I listen and empathize. The video says it all but when I relate to other events in September I get caught in the sadness of it all. When this happens, I honestly needed time to regain myself, hold back the tears and focus on what I was doing earlier, like I did driving to work today.

Extracts from Green Day's "Wake me up when September Ends";

Summer has come and passed
The innocent can never last
wake me up when september ends

like my fathers come to pass
seven years has gone so fast
wake me up when september ends

here comes the rain again
falling from the stars
drenched in my pain again
becoming who we are

as my memory rests
but never forgets what I lost
wake me up when september ends

ring out the bells again
like we did when spring began
wake me up when september ends