9.11.10

Untitled, Sept 2001, The New Glitterati.

I didn't want September 11 to go by unnoticed on this blog.

I, along with about a thousand other runners in Baltimore, lined up at the War Memorial Plaza on Saturday morning to participate in the Run to Remember 5k. It was an absolutely beautiful morning, reminiscent of that day.

Not a year passes that I don't find myself in some sort of quiet reflection on September 11, and I don't think one ever will.

We're embroiled in a tense political climate with people clamoring over one another for even five seconds of ludicrous talk time to scream about mosques and spitting on the graves of the dead for attempting to erect anything that even remotely smacks of Muslim-identity anywhere near Ground Zero. It was nice to take a moment of silence, the sun emitting brilliantly against that snappy blue cloudless sky, the slightest of early-morning autumn chill in the air, listening to flags flap and just musing on everything I hate and love so very much about this country. We are, undoubtedly, sublimely fortunate to have opinions on things. Sometimes, though, I think that people take advantage of this.

I ran because it was a way to be active and involved, because it made me feel like a part of something bigger, and because, in some small and probably insignificant way, it made me feel like part of the solution. We can have conflicting opinions, we can fight, we can throw our weight around and we can even come dangerously close to hating one another over political opinions. But, at the end of the day, regardless of affinity or affirmation, we can get together and we can all run a race, elbow-to-elbow, to remember and celebrate and mourn.

If there is any message to be learned, if there is any silver lining, if there can be a tiny drop of wisdom in the midst of the rubble and smoke that still haunts us, then it must be this: we're all in this life together. Whether you like it or not.

Never forget, they say. Who could?

Untitled, Sept 2001, The New Glitterati