days that change your life

I was watching an interesting documentary the other night about September 11, a conspiracy theory tale about the collapse of WTC 7, the third building to collapse that day. The documentary kept referencing a film called "Loose Change: Final Cut," which I am not endorsing, as I haven't seen it yet, but I will definitely be looking up. I have watched a lot of programs about 9/11 by now, and they all grab me in the gut. Seven years ago...still so hard to believe. More and more, when I see footage from that day, I feel like I am watching a movie, waiting for the action hero Bruce Willis or Ahnold to turn up and save the day. I find it harder to remember what was going through my mind that day, as I watched the second plane hit live on CNN, watched the towers fall, in disbelief. Now I am not a New Yorker, or American, but I was both directly and indirectly affected (haven't we all been?) by the events of that unbelievable day, spending the night into the small hours as a Red Cross volunteer helping settle some of the hundreds of stranded passengers in emergency shelters, using my linguistic skills to translate for a group of Orthodox Israelis who no one else could understand. Years later, I still believe the events of 9/11 sounded the death knell of the tourism industry here in Nova Scotia, as I watched my own business figures drop by 70%, although clearly many factors are at work, so I am still very affected by 9/11.

But what strikes me most about September 11, 2001 is that it may well be the single most defining historical moment which will occur during my lifetime. I've often thought a major difference between my mother's generation and mine was the moon landing. My mom didn't think they could do it (and I know there are some conspiracy theorists out there who think they didn't!), but for me, it was simply an historical fact, one more thing that happened before I was born. That reality dramatically impacted the culture of its time. As did 9/11. Not only can time be forever divided into before 9/11 and after, but the public consciousness has changed, in a way we are unlikely to turn back from for a long time to come. Living in a post 9/11 era is tangible in every sense: economic, social, political, cultural. How strange to think that for my daughter, September 11th is one more fact of history, like WWII, Vietnam, the moon landing - and will it be any more or less salient to her than those distant historical events? She started school a week ago, I think her school commemorates 9/11 in an age-appropriate way (whatever that is. On 9/11 preschool children in New York saw bodies falling from the sky. When are we old enough to witness such a thing?). I knew of a mother a couple years ago who was so disturbed by our school mentioning 9/11 to the children, she actually pulled her kids out of school to homeschool them. Facts are hard, death is hard, terrorism is hard - all these things are hard to explain to our children, when really, do we undertand them ourselves? But I do believe they have the right to share in the knowledge of their socio-political culture, in an age-appropriate way. Naomi's dad is a firefighter, like too many of the kids who lost parents, neighbours, relatives that awful day. This is part of her world. Children have a tremendous capacity for compassion, and love, precious qualities we all need to help heal our real and psychic wounds.

I wonder, can there be positive moments that define a generation? Everyone knows where they were when JFK was shot, MLK, and everyone remembers where they were on 9/11. Am I just a cynic, or are their universally beneficial moments that touch us the same way? It seems good grows more quietly and slowly, while bad can happen in an instant.