How Will History Remember?

Last night, Heather and I had a moving conversation with a couple who invited us over to dinner. Let it be known, first of all, that dining at someone's home, being a guest in their domain and sharing a meal, to me is the most sacred and special thing. The early church used to meet in homes and communion was a meal shared by the members. In the same way is having dinner with friends, sharing stories and opinions. Heather was funny last night to point out that when someone says something I don't agree with, I always respond, "You're more than welcome that have that opinion, but.." which roughly translates, "Your opinion is wrong." I thought that was funny.

I digress. The subject of New York came up and somehow we started talking about September 11th, 2001. The couple both were in Manhattan at the time the planes hit and the towers came down. They related fascinating and heartbreaking stories of that day and the days to come, the ghosts covered in ash streaming uptown from Wall Street, the volleys of phone calls between circles of friends to make sure everyone was alright, walking from pay phone to pay phone and realizing not a single one works anymore upon discovering you left your cell phone at work, smelling the stench of burnt rubber and metal Thursday night as the entire city flocked to downtown bars in a show of solidarity, taking a cab down a deserted fifth avenue and watching a line of police mopeds emerge from the smoke gray with soot, the empty triage centers set up outside the perimeter, waiting to treat survivors that never came.

They were moving first hand accounts and I am so proud to have heard them. It got me thinking about history and how we recount past events. Earlier in the weekend I had watched the movie Hurt Locker and while its suspense thrilled and entertained, it left me feeling empty and sad, knowing this film is many peoples' reality, and will the history books ever really be able to relate that to future generations? I suppose it's always been this way. Growing up, reading about the Civil War or WWI or WWII, my history classes never gave me the sense of what it was actually like to experience those times and there was never any sense that there were lessons to be learned from these powerful events. Was that for my protection? Or is it because wars turn into dead history lifeless on a page, transformed into information to memorize that dooms us to keep repeating them?

Which finally lead me to the importance of art and interaction. I hope that we can continue to produce art in a fashion that promotes dialogue about the past and continue to hold events like 9/11 in a national consciousness that doesn't use such memories as buzz words for a political ideology and or a manipulative emotional transgression. There was so much beauty in our friends' recounting of those days, and so many life affirming, human moments that may have been forgotten if we hadn't chosen to allow ourselves to discuss them that it makes me sad for those of us who treat subjects like war as taboo.