I hate this day.
I drove Jaden to school today. I don't usually have the radio playing when he is in the jeep. He's a horrible, no-good, rotten teen and I listen to music that has RHYTHM and LYRICS that you can sing along with and it's bad enough that he has to endure the ride with his MOTHER of all people, let alone have his fellow classmates hear my music. Duh.
After I dropped him off and told him "Have a great day. I love you." and he muttered something foreign and slammed my door, I sighed HEAVILY and turned on my radio just in time to hear a tribute to 9/11. Suck. Gave me a gut ache.
In July, my fellow "chicks" and I visited New York. We were SO excited to see the 9/11 Memorial Museum. Actually, the official name is The National September 11 Memorial Museum. The desription on the website says:
The National September 11 Memorial Museum serves as the country’s principal institution for examining the implications of the events of 9/11, documenting the impact of those events and exploring the continuing significance of September 11, 2001.
The Museum’s 110,000 square feet of exhibition space is located within the archaeological heart of the World Trade Center site—telling the story of 9/11 through multimedia displays, archives, narratives and a collection of monumental and authentic artifacts. The lives of every victim of the 2001 and 1993 attacks will be commemorated as visitors have the opportunity to learn about the men, women, and children who died.
The monumental artifacts of the Museum provide a link to the events of 9/11, while presenting intimate stories of loss, compassion, reckoning, and recovery that are central to telling the story of the attacks and the aftermath.I don't know what I was expecting. I don't know why it didn't EVER cross my scrawny self-absorbed brain that it would be emotionally draining to see the pictures of the human beings lost or to view the remnants of the precious belongings of the fallen.
We had decided that it was on "the list" to visit the Holocaust Museum. One of my all-time favorite movies is Freedom Writers. In the movie, super cool teacher gal took her students to the Holocaust Museum and I was instantly captivated by the horrors that were experienced by the innocent.
However, the horrors weren't personal.
Does that sound crass? Hollow? Unsympathetic? I don't mean it that way. I can't stand what the Jews endured. I have read The Diary of Anne Frank. I own Night by Elie Wiesel. I am ashamed that the human species can be so cruel to another human being. However, it was a part of history that I have heard about and read about but not that I had experienced.
After leaving the Holocaust Museum, we were close to the 9/11 Memorial Museum and decided to see if they were still selling tickets for the day. They were. We went.
Once again, ignorant me, I don't know what the crap I thought I would see? Did I not know that it would be FILLED with artifacts from that horrible day? It was.
At once, it was sobering and horrifying and humbling and haunting and surreal and gut wrenching and yet...honorable. We saw fire engines, wallets, uniforms, iron beams. As we walked down a set of stairs, a set of stairs from one of the towers ran along directly to the side. There was a plaque with the staircase. It told us how many people that set of stairs had SAVED.
I remember leaving and thinking that I would find no comfort in that building if I had a loved one that had lost their life in 9/11. Yet, I am so grateful that the museum was built to bear witness to the horrific events of that day.
There will come a time that those that go through the museum will be innocent to the pain and fear that filled our country. As the decades pass, these objects will be all that remain of the horror...and the humanity of that day.
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