A Rose is a Rose is a Rose
I am contemplating, without drawing a conclusion just yet, the way that people assign significance and meaning to things that otherwise do not intrinsically have any.
Most especially, I keep thinking about what we have done to the date "September 11th." It is only a date on the calendar, you know. September 11th doesn't know that it's different in any way from the 10th or the 12th. This is not to diminish in any way the significance of the event we associate with that day. I'm not talking about the event. I'm talking about a random name -- or in this case, date -- that happens to be associated with it.
In the faculty room last week, someone expressed surprise and ... disdain? that our Back to School Night had been scheduled for the 11th. I asked her what she would have us do: all sit home that night in contemplation? Shall we drop this date from our calendar, never allowing any event to take place on it? I asked her how she would feel if, one day, a grandchild should be born on September 11th. Wouldn't she be happy? Wouldn't she celebrate that date?
I dropped the conversation at that point, but I continue to think. Shall we tell all people with that birthday to mourn, and never feel happy on that day again? Surely, then, the terrorists have won. Anytime we succumb to changing who we are as Americans and human beings based on what they have done to us, then they win. That's what they were going for, after all. To make us weak and frightened, and to make us change who we are.
How many mothers today weep when they give birth on December 7th, that "date which will live in infamy"? How many of us stay home, scheduling no activities, lest we forget to mourn the lives lost at Pearl Harbor, and that attack on American soil? The answer, of course, is none. Pearl Harbor was a horrible disaster, and then we moved on. Not to do so would have conceded defeat.
Let us never forget what was done to us on this day, not just to America, but to the western world at large, including our allies abroad. But let us move on.
WATCHING BEAUTY AND THE GEEK :: ENTRY #1577
I think you're right. There are only 365 (or 366) days in a year, and more events than than take place all the time. My mother died on her brother's wedding anniversary; which do you think her surviving sister-in-law remembers? You don't give up your birthday because something bad happened. I know a woman whose mother died on her birthday; "she did it on purpose, just to get me!" Ya think?
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with you! The event was a violent act of murder and destruction by extremist thugs. To memorialize the day just gives more importance to the senseless act.
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite quotes from a management consultant. "Declare Victory and Move on" Become paralyzed by the event and the perpetrators continue to win.
The press continues to intone "Sept 11" and "911".
Interesting that some would object to events planned on Sept 11 but are oblivious to Erev Rosh Hoshanah.