Remembering 9/11
“Even the smallest act of service, the simplest act of kindness, is a way to honor those we lost, a way to reclaim that spirit of unity that followed 9/11.”
A century ago, modernist novelist and thinker Virginia Woolf said that, “On or around December 1910, human character changed.” She was speaking, little doubt, about the impending augment of the First World War that would officially start four years later as what would become the Great War, which at the time of her quote was heating up somewhere between simmer and boil all over Europe. For rarely does one feel change happening on the magnitude of introducing a new era. Rather, like the way the world turns, you do not feel it happening so much as you realize it has happened: it’s a new day, a new year, we have rotated and revolved. And hopefully, in some ways, evolved.
Except, sometimes you do feel a moment being born. Nineteen years ago, there was a Virginia Woolf reckoning moment for a lot of people, especially here in America. We knew, when those buildings came down, that life as we knew it was over. What would remain would have to be something fundamentally good within us. And human character, or at least the good parts, had never seemed so frail, so contingent, and so less than fundamental to human nature itself. It felt like we were left to our own devices. And this was troubling, especially from the vantage point of those in NY or DC — or anyone with a television, for that matter.
And yet, in America, I have never experienced so much unity, camaraderie, patriotism, and reverence from foreign nations, whether ally or not. Fidel Castro lamented the loss of life on that day, seen on video shaking his head and almost muttering, “This was too much.” Buckingham Palace played our National Anthem. And Americans saw one another as, finally, fellow Americans. All of us, rich, poor, Black, White, LGBTQ, were facing the same enemy. We also rallied around a President who wasn’t everyone’s favorite but who was nevertheless everyone's President. He didn’t have this kind of support before the events of that September morning, and by the end of his two terms would have even less. But for a moment, we largely supported him to lead us through. And we believed and trusted our media. We castigated the hateful and small among us who promoted Islamophobia, as we educated ourselves more about our fellow Muslim Americans, as well as others. In effect, we were introspective to learn more about ourselves. Stricken by the staggering sense of vulnerability that Americans had never countenanced before, sometime around September 11th, 2001, America’s character changed.
Unlike Woolf’s 1910, however, our American character change 19 years later doesn’t feel so fundamental as much as ephemeral. What seemed like a moment that would change us all forever seemed to segue into just another new reality within just a few years. The World Trade Center was replaced, the Pentagon was repaired, enhanced airport security became the norm, and life reoriented itself to its former station, for better and for worse.
And now, we have 2020. Today we face a new, even more invisible enemy, and a crisis so seemingly unprecedented in our digital, convenience and efficiency obsessed and advanced culture, that to be humbled by a virus seems almost like a practical joke. And yet we are more divisive than ever. We have those who think life-saving masks are political gestures and preserving the lives of others is too much of a burden to skip beach parties or be inconvenienced by the mild discomfort of wearing a face covering to the grocery store.
It’s hard to gage where we go from here, how much has changed, or how much of a measure of who we are this toll is taking. We rebounded from the horrible events of nearly 20 years ago today. We must hope that after all we’ve adapted to and evolved throughout that this too shall pass — without taking the best of us with it. To quote Barack Obama “Even the smallest act of service, the simplest act of kindness, is a way to honor those we lost, a way to reclaim that spirit of unity that followed 9/11.” And each of us is empowered to do that every day through simple gestures in consideration of others.
— Christina Lucas