Remembrance
Sep. 11th, 2006 09:30 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rhienellethYou know, I was on my way to work this morning before I remembered that today is 9/11, the anniversary of the first foreign attack on US soil since Pearl Harbor. And the Japanese, at least, attacked a military target.
It's kind of like the anniversary of the day my father died. At first, you remember every month. Then, every year. And finally, eventually, a year - an anniversary - goes by, when you realize somewhere halfway through your day that you didn't wake up thinking about it that morning. And you feel vaguely relieved, because that's a sign of healing, but also guilty, because damnit, how dare you forget something so lifechanging, so important, so irrevocable as that day, even for a second.
But see, we're supposed to. That's why memory fades, so we won't have to relive the tragedy and the loss and the grief as if it's fresh and new all the time. Because no one could live like that and stay entirely sane.
At the same time, it's important, vital, intrinsic that we remember what happened on 9/11, that we not forget that 3,000 people died in that attack, most of them civilians, and that over 400 firefighters and police officers involved in the rescue effort gave their lives in the aftermath.
I am not going to talk about the politics that have come to surround those events, the issues given rise by the US response in the following years. Because, IMO, whether you agree or disagree with the measures and steps taken since 9/11 five years ago, today of all days, it is important to simply remember the tragedy itself. The lives it cost, the lives it destroyed, and those it forever changed. For the first time in our history, the advent of technology and media made the 9/11 attacks viewable the world over, almost as they happened. The world watched with us as we sat in our homes, at our jobs, and stared transfixed at our television screens as the images of those planes striking the Twin Towers played over and over in horrifying clarity. And again, when the towers collapsed.
I remember the frantic phone, e-mail, and online message board chains that sprang up for loved ones and family members to check in and assure another they were all right. One online friend of mine, in particular, waited on pins and needles for her whole family to check in. Her parents, her brother, and an Uncle all worked in either the Pentagon or near the WTC. Thankfully, they were all alive and well. I can't imagine what it must have been like for her, to be the one waiting to hear.
I remember the early morning phone call from Mark's Mom - who was, coincidentally, supposed to be flying out to Texas that day. We were going to be driving her to the airport. Instead, she woke us up with the words "Turn on your television. I think we just went to war." And after those four fateful planes, no one flew anywhere that day.
I haven't been able to watch any of the recent movies that have been made about 9/11. They might be testiments to those who died, or those who survived. They might be well worth the watching. I don't know, because I can't bring myself to watch them. It's too soon, the tragedy too fresh, IMO, to be immortalized with scripts and camera and actors playing parts.
And I'm afraid. Afraid that watching them might resurrect in all its intensity the initial bloom of emotion I felt five years ago. Horror, fear, grief, anger.
I can't imagine what it takes, to be the type of person who would decide to crash those planes, to take all those lives. To this day, it makes me speechless with anger, with rage to even think about it. How dare you attack us, on our own soil? How dare you attack civilians who had no idea, no warning as they went to work that day? How dare you exploit the freedoms we paid for in the blood of our ancestors, our forefathers, in your terrorism?
I have no words of my own to express the breadth and depth of my own feelings on these events, or my visceral response to them. Instead, I believe I'll give you words spoken by one of our Presidents, to remind myself of the value of those freedoms, of the unique gift they really are. Evil should never be permitted to destroy them. It is my opinion that the Declaration of Independence embodies that which makes the United States of America truly what it is. It is our heart, as a nation. President Abraham Lincoln agreed, and spoke of it when he visited Independence Hall:
"I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. I have often pondered over the dangers which were incurred by the men who assembled here, and framed and adopted that Declaration of Independence. I have pondered over the toils that were endured by the officers and soldiers of the army who achieved that Independence. I have often inquired of myself, what great principle or idea it was that kept this Confederacy so long together. It was not the mere matter of the separation of the Colonies from the motherland; but that sentiment in the Declaration of Independence which gave liberty, not alone to the people of this country, but, I hope, to the world, for all future time. It was that which gave promise that in due time the weight would be lifted from the shoulders of all men. This is a sentiment embodied in the Declaration of Independence. Now, my friends, can this country be saved upon that basis? If it can, I will consider myself one of the happiest men in the world, if I can help to save it. If it cannot be saved upon that principle, it will be truly awful. But if this country cannot be saved without giving up that principle, I was about to say I would rather be assassinated on this spot than surrender it."
~ Abraham Lincoln, 1861
Lincoln loved the ideas and spirit embodied in the Declaration, and did his best to remain true to those ideas and spirit throughout the war. He did not 'give up that principle', but felt the need for it as acutely as our forefathers did, when they signed the Declaration. His assassination, fortunately for us, came not that day, on the steps of Independence Hall, but four years later, at the conclusion of the Civil War.
It is his attitude and beliefs that I believe we must keep in mind, even as we strive to keep future acts of terrorism from striking our soil. And at the same time, we must never, ever forget, the lives ruthlessly taken. For them, I turn again to Abraham Lincoln, far more articulate than I, for the words to express my feeling:
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.
~ Abraham Lincoln, the Gettysburg Address, 1863
It's kind of like the anniversary of the day my father died. At first, you remember every month. Then, every year. And finally, eventually, a year - an anniversary - goes by, when you realize somewhere halfway through your day that you didn't wake up thinking about it that morning. And you feel vaguely relieved, because that's a sign of healing, but also guilty, because damnit, how dare you forget something so lifechanging, so important, so irrevocable as that day, even for a second.
But see, we're supposed to. That's why memory fades, so we won't have to relive the tragedy and the loss and the grief as if it's fresh and new all the time. Because no one could live like that and stay entirely sane.
At the same time, it's important, vital, intrinsic that we remember what happened on 9/11, that we not forget that 3,000 people died in that attack, most of them civilians, and that over 400 firefighters and police officers involved in the rescue effort gave their lives in the aftermath.
I am not going to talk about the politics that have come to surround those events, the issues given rise by the US response in the following years. Because, IMO, whether you agree or disagree with the measures and steps taken since 9/11 five years ago, today of all days, it is important to simply remember the tragedy itself. The lives it cost, the lives it destroyed, and those it forever changed. For the first time in our history, the advent of technology and media made the 9/11 attacks viewable the world over, almost as they happened. The world watched with us as we sat in our homes, at our jobs, and stared transfixed at our television screens as the images of those planes striking the Twin Towers played over and over in horrifying clarity. And again, when the towers collapsed.
I remember the frantic phone, e-mail, and online message board chains that sprang up for loved ones and family members to check in and assure another they were all right. One online friend of mine, in particular, waited on pins and needles for her whole family to check in. Her parents, her brother, and an Uncle all worked in either the Pentagon or near the WTC. Thankfully, they were all alive and well. I can't imagine what it must have been like for her, to be the one waiting to hear.
I remember the early morning phone call from Mark's Mom - who was, coincidentally, supposed to be flying out to Texas that day. We were going to be driving her to the airport. Instead, she woke us up with the words "Turn on your television. I think we just went to war." And after those four fateful planes, no one flew anywhere that day.
I haven't been able to watch any of the recent movies that have been made about 9/11. They might be testiments to those who died, or those who survived. They might be well worth the watching. I don't know, because I can't bring myself to watch them. It's too soon, the tragedy too fresh, IMO, to be immortalized with scripts and camera and actors playing parts.
And I'm afraid. Afraid that watching them might resurrect in all its intensity the initial bloom of emotion I felt five years ago. Horror, fear, grief, anger.
I can't imagine what it takes, to be the type of person who would decide to crash those planes, to take all those lives. To this day, it makes me speechless with anger, with rage to even think about it. How dare you attack us, on our own soil? How dare you attack civilians who had no idea, no warning as they went to work that day? How dare you exploit the freedoms we paid for in the blood of our ancestors, our forefathers, in your terrorism?
I have no words of my own to express the breadth and depth of my own feelings on these events, or my visceral response to them. Instead, I believe I'll give you words spoken by one of our Presidents, to remind myself of the value of those freedoms, of the unique gift they really are. Evil should never be permitted to destroy them. It is my opinion that the Declaration of Independence embodies that which makes the United States of America truly what it is. It is our heart, as a nation. President Abraham Lincoln agreed, and spoke of it when he visited Independence Hall:
"I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence. I have often pondered over the dangers which were incurred by the men who assembled here, and framed and adopted that Declaration of Independence. I have pondered over the toils that were endured by the officers and soldiers of the army who achieved that Independence. I have often inquired of myself, what great principle or idea it was that kept this Confederacy so long together. It was not the mere matter of the separation of the Colonies from the motherland; but that sentiment in the Declaration of Independence which gave liberty, not alone to the people of this country, but, I hope, to the world, for all future time. It was that which gave promise that in due time the weight would be lifted from the shoulders of all men. This is a sentiment embodied in the Declaration of Independence. Now, my friends, can this country be saved upon that basis? If it can, I will consider myself one of the happiest men in the world, if I can help to save it. If it cannot be saved upon that principle, it will be truly awful. But if this country cannot be saved without giving up that principle, I was about to say I would rather be assassinated on this spot than surrender it."
~ Abraham Lincoln, 1861
Lincoln loved the ideas and spirit embodied in the Declaration, and did his best to remain true to those ideas and spirit throughout the war. He did not 'give up that principle', but felt the need for it as acutely as our forefathers did, when they signed the Declaration. His assassination, fortunately for us, came not that day, on the steps of Independence Hall, but four years later, at the conclusion of the Civil War.
It is his attitude and beliefs that I believe we must keep in mind, even as we strive to keep future acts of terrorism from striking our soil. And at the same time, we must never, ever forget, the lives ruthlessly taken. For them, I turn again to Abraham Lincoln, far more articulate than I, for the words to express my feeling:
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.
~ Abraham Lincoln, the Gettysburg Address, 1863
