Apocalypse
Apocalypse
"You say you will never forget where you were when you heard the news on September 11, 2001. Neither will I." So go the opening lines of a piece that made the rounds by e-mail and got a lot of radio play in the months since the event. For me, as for so many others, the shock waves are still being felt.
I thought I had finally reached maturity; that I had a real sense of who I was. What a surprise to find myself changing; evolving into a new and different person. I find I am still being shaped and changed by the milestones of my life.
If November 22, 1963 marked the death of innocence for a generation, what will be the result of another apocalyptic event 38 years later? How will those in their teens and early 20s react in the years to come?
I find myself wondering about these and other events that have marked milestones in my life ... some of them things totally foreign to anyone not born in my generation. I remember little of the Korean War. I was too young and television coverage of such events was years in the future. That had changed by the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis and we all stayed close to radios and television, fearing the worst. But nothing before or since rocked us the way the Kennedy assassination did until September 11, 2001. That evoked the remembered fear, the hollow feeling and the strange fascination that made us keep watching even thought recoiling at the horror of it all.
I think about my parents and the major events that shaped their world: the Great Depression, World War II, Korea, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Kennedy assassination, street riots, Vietnam, the Gulf War. Surely those are every bit as cataclysmic as the things I have faced. Somehow they found the strength to keep on in the face of such huge challenges. Did they question as I am doing? Did they feel themselves changing and wonder how and why?
Looking at that list, I note the things that were unique to their generation and those that we shared. I'm struck by the thought that we are part of an unending parade of catastrophe, with generations linked by the horrors they have experienced.
Perhaps I will never find an answer to all my questions. Perhaps I will get tired and stop asking. Perhaps enough people will ask enough questions and finally some answers will emerge. Perhaps, if we are very lucky, some real progress will take place. And perhaps the world will forget and go back to business as usual. That's my least favorite scenario, although I admit it is the most likely one.
Artistry
01/31/02
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