9/11 is always a strange day to me. I was in second grade when the towers fell and I don’t remember the specifics of that day as well as so many of my peers are somehow able to. I do remember that my birthday was just in a few days and I was hoping to have a really big party but all of my parents and relatives and teachers and friends were too glued to the news and body counts to pay attention to me. Because as a 5 year old, everything is about me.
As I grew up, this day naturally gained more significance. I was able to rationalise the severity of this tragedy and just how many people, cities, and governmental policies it affected.
I don’t know when I started to feel the shift began but I eventually wanted us to move on. To this day, memorials and remembrances of the 9/11 attacks remind me more of the negative attitudes towards our fellow humans than it reminds me of the the violence that occurred 14 years ago. I’m reminded of the time I’ve had to sit and watch my Egyptian professor cry because of how badly she gets treated at airports. I’m reminded of how so many people believe incorrect information and have horribly disfigured perceptions about others.
On September 11th 2001 a horrible injustice occurred. Since then, we have all allowed even more injustices to occur. Just because we couldn’t protect our fellow Americans on that date does not mean we should stop protecting our fellow Americans now.
dog with a blog 