Me: No, they didn't.
James: Yes, they did. I just saw it on TV.
Me: You sure it wasn't a movie preview or something?
We spent that day, thirteen years ago, glued to the television, taking in those same images of planes and towers and planes and towers and planes and towers. We couldn't stop watching. We watched, hoping that every news station was somehow horribly, terribly wrong. Hoping that something that crossed the screen would be different, better, would make more sense. I remember moving from classroom to classroom, from screen to screen. Some teachers tried to teach, but we refused to learn. This is not a time for poetry, we cried!
We just didn't know what it was a time for.
That day was also my best friend's sixteenth birthday. She came to school gleeful and done up, with dollars pinned to her shirt and a wide smile fixed on her face, ready for congratulations and birthday wishes. Instead, she spent the day feeling as though someone had blown out her birthday candles before she could.
Every year, the reminder comes again: 1 year anniversary, 5 years since, 10 years later. We do not forget. For the sake of those thousands of people who died, and their families who live on without them, we won't forget. For the sake of our future, we cannot afford to forget. For the sake of the people born on that day, we all but wish we could.
It's nothing new. People's birthdays have fallen on days like this for thousands of years. Any American born on December 7th and alive in the '40s knew that their birthday took second violin to the war in the Pacific. Any New Orleanian born on August 29th will always share a birthday with Katrina.
In a much smaller way, I understand. I was born on the same day as my paternal grandfather, and as a child, I spent many birthday weekends with my extended family, swallowing (sometimes not so gracefully) the fact that no one knew it was my birthday, too. In fact, I carry with me to this day a distinct memory of spending a birthday party for Papa in the back room of my uncle's house. I loved (and love) sharing his birthday with him. I hated that his birthday was more important than mine.
Whether good or bad, the presence of these historical events fade with time. We do not still mourn the day that Rome fell. Even Lincoln's assassination ceases to be a well-known date (though we are well aware of the tax deadline that shares it). In the same vein, September 11th will fade into history, and that day will slowly shed itself of the harrowing shadow of planes and towers and planes and towers and planes and towers.
Today, for the first time since 2001, no one mentioned the Twin Towers. The music teacher didn't sing a patriotic song. The students didn't share what they knew about it. Adults didn't talk about where they where when. I only remembered it because today is my best friend's birthday. Which means that 13 years later, she can once again blow out the candles out on her own cake.
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| Happy Birthday, Nika! |
I love you!
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