A Footnote for the Kids

I don’t really recall how exactly it came up, but the boy was asking what was special about today. Or something to that effect. I was a little surprised- in previous years the school had discussed the day and what had happened with him so I’d assumed the same thing had happened this year. Perhaps I was wrong.

Rather than starting an inquiry, I went over the rough outlines of what had happened: terrorists had flown a plane into what was then the World Trade Center and the buildings had collapsed. The terrorists had also flown a plane into the Pentagon and tried to fly a plane into the White House. I told him they had failed because the passengers on the flight had revolted and attempted to retake the plane and that it had crashed in Pennsylvania.

He said “I thought something had happened to the Twin Towers.”

I can still recall many details of that day- where I was at work, how they’d setup a TV so we could watch the coverage, how co-workers simply sat there all day watching the events unfold, conversations, images. I can still recall moments where co-workers simply sat down with their head in their hands, not wanting to believe what they were seeing. It is a day I’ll never forget.

It’s also a day the boy and the lass will never remember. They were not yet even born. Come to think of it, I wasn’t even married yet.

As such, they have no ties to the day or it’s events. Everything they experience as they become more aware of the world around them will have been affected by that day. Yet, to them, it will all simply be normal. They didn’t know about life before terrorism was a political football. Their first trip on a plane (yes- they have yet to fly!) will set their expectations and they’ll have little reason to think that things were once different.

Obviously, in many respects, there is little tangible affect on their own lives. They go to school, they play with their friends, they do their extra-curriculars. I’m not trying to say there are terrorists around every corner and hiding in every bush.

I think it just struck me that the impact of this day emotionally on them will be next to nothing. While I and the rest of us who lived it will remember it for the rest of our lives. Certainly, they will learn about it and come to understand the impact it had on the world as time went on. But I suppose it will be for them like Pearl Harbor was for us- a day that will live in infamy. But no true understanding of what that means.

Part of me feels that’s for the better and wishes that they will never have cause to empathize with us. There’s another part that doesn’t think they will be that lucky. Only time will tell that tale.