Reflections
On the morning of September 11, 2001 I received a call from my mother. She was in a panic. I was dead asleep. I didn’t answer her call . . . something about the World Trade Center. I almost rolled over, but I remembered a similar experience back in 1993. I had whatever channel I’d had on before I passed out tuned in, and the news was talking about a bomb that had been set off in the basement.
Surreal, at best, but I didn’t pay it much mind. In 1993 I wasn’t really too politically keyed in, and I was something, to coin a phrase, of a “Loyal Democrat.” So that made no never mind to me. It was an impotent attack that just didn’t impress me all that much.
On 9.11, however, after my mother’s call, I decided I didn’t want to miss it like I had before, so, groggily, I turned on the news.
My eyes swelled up when I saw the top of the tower was aflame.
I sat up, I went to the window wherefrom I could see everything. They’re big buildings, and I could see them with clarity from my vantage point. Thick, black smoke rolled into the sky. I can’t really explain what I was feeling or thinking. It was one of those truly incomprehensible moments. I know my mouth was hanging open. And my heart hurt. And I heard Brian Williams on MSNBC say something like “It looks like a scene out of an action movie,” and that made me angry. I got to thinking about the surrealism of the image itself, and Brian made me mad for contributing to the division of fantasy and reality already present in American culture.
I moved back and forth between the television and the window . . . until the second plane hit. I was pretty much glued to the window after that. I don’t know if I was sad, I don’t know what I thought. It was horror, true, unadulterated horror.
I did think of was a dream I had when I was about 13 years old. The dream was of a large street in Manhattan. Buildings were on fire, and there were piles of burned corpses stacked up at the bases of lampposts, where there were also the charred bodies of hanged men.
Pretty terrifying, and incomprehensible . . . until 9.11.
I’ve been wondering exactly what’s changed since 9.11. I try not to subscribe to the conspiracy nuts, valid arguments as they sometimes make. But the more I consider it, I think they may be right. There are just too many anomalies for this to be totally “them.” I was angry for a while afterward . . . still am, for a lot of reasons, but those things have to do with my total distaste for anyone’s Gods.
I think to think of what’s changed it’s important to remember what was. When Mr. Bush stepped into office, America was out of debt for the first time in a long time. In fact, we had a 60 Billion dollar surplus. When you talk about a Federal Account as a surplus, that means many good things. I remember that campaign, too, and how the Republicans were parading Negroes and Mexicans around and talking about Compassionate Conservatism (which is maybe one of the worst combinations of words in the history of language: compassion seems to me to indicate an unending capacity for love and understanding, whereas conservative means just that, a tight fist). And I remember just how boring Mr. Gore was, but he was talking about things I believed in: science, technology, intellectual evolution. The other side was talking about dinosaurs, and their fathers, and integrity, and getting those stains out of the carpet in the Oval Office. Bill Maher had a good point about how the real root of that campaign was “I fuck my wife!” He said something about how Bush Sr. fucked his wife too, “And that’s a lot of integrity!” It’s funny ‘cause it’s true.
I dunno . . . I dunno what to believe. All I know is what I don’t want to happen, and I don’t want despots in office anymore, I want a global economy with open trade windows, I want a democratic sensibility to seduce the entire world, I don’t want to start drilling in Alaska, I don’t want a President with a “passable” comprehension of the language, I don’t want oil men deciding what women can do with their bodies, I don’t want flag burning made a federal offense, I don’t want every mildly dissenting voice to be labeled a traitor.
But that’s the world we live in now: dependant on exterior sources for our power, thinking five minutes into the future, turning cities full of history into giant malls, the dissolution of the middle class . . . and if you’re not a player, you’re a traitor.
Is that the world you want? It’s not the world I want. How come Microsoft got reamed so hard for being a monopoly, but our own government goes totally un-scrutinized for almost the same behavior? What ever happened to Enron? And, by the way, have you noticed that the acclimation of the media to the right really became an issue after that whole thing disappeared? Curious. How many “probing reports” have been shelved due to fear of speaking the truth?
I can’t stand what this country is doing to itself, and I really hope those who’re suffering from political apathy are going to get off your asses and vote your conscience. The more I think about it, the more I disagree with Carlin on the point of “first you vote these people in and then you complain about them.” It’s funny, but the vote of the individual is the only thing that matters in this country . . . I have to believe that, I have to, stolen elections or no stolen elections.
I still have faith.
Surreal, at best, but I didn’t pay it much mind. In 1993 I wasn’t really too politically keyed in, and I was something, to coin a phrase, of a “Loyal Democrat.” So that made no never mind to me. It was an impotent attack that just didn’t impress me all that much.
On 9.11, however, after my mother’s call, I decided I didn’t want to miss it like I had before, so, groggily, I turned on the news.
My eyes swelled up when I saw the top of the tower was aflame.
I sat up, I went to the window wherefrom I could see everything. They’re big buildings, and I could see them with clarity from my vantage point. Thick, black smoke rolled into the sky. I can’t really explain what I was feeling or thinking. It was one of those truly incomprehensible moments. I know my mouth was hanging open. And my heart hurt. And I heard Brian Williams on MSNBC say something like “It looks like a scene out of an action movie,” and that made me angry. I got to thinking about the surrealism of the image itself, and Brian made me mad for contributing to the division of fantasy and reality already present in American culture.
I moved back and forth between the television and the window . . . until the second plane hit. I was pretty much glued to the window after that. I don’t know if I was sad, I don’t know what I thought. It was horror, true, unadulterated horror.
I did think of was a dream I had when I was about 13 years old. The dream was of a large street in Manhattan. Buildings were on fire, and there were piles of burned corpses stacked up at the bases of lampposts, where there were also the charred bodies of hanged men.
Pretty terrifying, and incomprehensible . . . until 9.11.
I’ve been wondering exactly what’s changed since 9.11. I try not to subscribe to the conspiracy nuts, valid arguments as they sometimes make. But the more I consider it, I think they may be right. There are just too many anomalies for this to be totally “them.” I was angry for a while afterward . . . still am, for a lot of reasons, but those things have to do with my total distaste for anyone’s Gods.
I think to think of what’s changed it’s important to remember what was. When Mr. Bush stepped into office, America was out of debt for the first time in a long time. In fact, we had a 60 Billion dollar surplus. When you talk about a Federal Account as a surplus, that means many good things. I remember that campaign, too, and how the Republicans were parading Negroes and Mexicans around and talking about Compassionate Conservatism (which is maybe one of the worst combinations of words in the history of language: compassion seems to me to indicate an unending capacity for love and understanding, whereas conservative means just that, a tight fist). And I remember just how boring Mr. Gore was, but he was talking about things I believed in: science, technology, intellectual evolution. The other side was talking about dinosaurs, and their fathers, and integrity, and getting those stains out of the carpet in the Oval Office. Bill Maher had a good point about how the real root of that campaign was “I fuck my wife!” He said something about how Bush Sr. fucked his wife too, “And that’s a lot of integrity!” It’s funny ‘cause it’s true.
I dunno . . . I dunno what to believe. All I know is what I don’t want to happen, and I don’t want despots in office anymore, I want a global economy with open trade windows, I want a democratic sensibility to seduce the entire world, I don’t want to start drilling in Alaska, I don’t want a President with a “passable” comprehension of the language, I don’t want oil men deciding what women can do with their bodies, I don’t want flag burning made a federal offense, I don’t want every mildly dissenting voice to be labeled a traitor.
But that’s the world we live in now: dependant on exterior sources for our power, thinking five minutes into the future, turning cities full of history into giant malls, the dissolution of the middle class . . . and if you’re not a player, you’re a traitor.
Is that the world you want? It’s not the world I want. How come Microsoft got reamed so hard for being a monopoly, but our own government goes totally un-scrutinized for almost the same behavior? What ever happened to Enron? And, by the way, have you noticed that the acclimation of the media to the right really became an issue after that whole thing disappeared? Curious. How many “probing reports” have been shelved due to fear of speaking the truth?
I can’t stand what this country is doing to itself, and I really hope those who’re suffering from political apathy are going to get off your asses and vote your conscience. The more I think about it, the more I disagree with Carlin on the point of “first you vote these people in and then you complain about them.” It’s funny, but the vote of the individual is the only thing that matters in this country . . . I have to believe that, I have to, stolen elections or no stolen elections.
I still have faith.
