I tried to send Michele an e-mail for her Voices project. I couldn’t do it. I just can’t. Why? I’m not sure. The memories are too raw, too real and too close. It’s been almost two years, and I can’t do it.
I watched Bowling for Columbine yesterday. It was difficult, but even if you don’t agree with him, the message of the movie is important. It’s time to stop being afraid. As a country, we’re still full of grief, anger, pain and in some cases, guilt. Call it national survivor’s guilt. The thing I took from the movie was that we’re a country that’s afraid of itself. We’re afraid of our neighbors, unforeseeable catastophies, shadowy conspriracies, natural disaster, etc. We’re scared because we’re not in control, because the news media crams fear down our throats. The comparison between international media and our’s was incredible.
Even if you hate Michael Moore, he’s right. It’s time to stop being afraid. It’s time to stop allowing the Administration to play on that fear to advance its ideological nonsense while we duct tape our windows and buy distilled water.
It’s time to ignore the Media. It’s time to stop paying attention to vague threats, insufficient theories and hysterical diatribes from those paid to make money for their networks.
I think that this year, on September Eleventh, I’m not going to watch the news. I’m not going to watch TV at all. I’m going to hug my wife, hug Max and I think I’ll take the day off and we’ll do something quiet as a family. He’s too young to remember what happened while he was over at a friend’s house playing, or understand why his father is crying. Hopefully, he’ll remember that we spent a good day savoring twenty-four hours that will never come again.
Maybe that’s what it’s about. Maybe the way we honor the dead, the damaged and the grieving and fight the fear is to take that day to create better memories, create visions of our loved ones smiling and laughing to replace the tears and disbelief of that day.
I don’t know if that’s the answer. But, I’m not afraid to try. I’m not afraid.