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| Artwork: Peace, Dove, Love By Skitch |
NOW:
It's
one of those questions that, as an American, you'll probably hear the
rest of your life, and I'll bet you have an answer for it, “Where
were you on 9/11?”
I
woke up on September 11, 2001 feeling sure that this was going to be
just another day in what I hoped would be a long life full of mundane
days, sprinkled liberally with spectacular moments. It's how I'd
begun to view life, how numb I'd become to all but the gas hand on my
vehicle, the cell phone in my pocket, the money in my purse.
That
morning my husband and I had an old quarrel concerning our blended
family. Our values were and are very similar, but our methods have
always been polar opposites. He Plans (note the capital p) and though
I've now learned the power of a good agenda, I love being spontaneous
and wouldn't think life worth much if it were all as rigid as a plan.
He and I are also separated by the churches of “feels” and
“think”. I'm a feeler and he is a thinker. To be fair, he is
largely correct when we hit the brick walls in our relationship
because even my staunchest spontaneity and warm fuzzy feelings have
to admit that logic should almost always prevail over emotions in the
end. Add to all this that my husband has lived a few years more than
me, is wonderfully intelligent, and is incredibly aware of life, and
you end up with a relationship that's just a bit more one sided than
what is likely ideal. He has somehow managed to give a myriad of
things a lot more thought than I have and usually that wins out. I
learned early on that often I was going to look back on our arguments
and begin to think of them more as sessions. While I had my face
buried in “True Story” he must have been pondering the ways of
human nature and the truths of the universe. It can be embarrassing
and is always frustrating, but I don't know if it is more frustrating
for him or for me. I know it has been a beautiful life beside him,
but it has been humbling for me, and likely exhausting for him.
I had
to go to work on that tragic yet beautiful day. Aren't they all
beautiful? I made a quick stop at the library, and checked out some
books, including a thick volume by Kevin Leman entitled “Keeping
Your Family Together When the World is Falling Apart”. Ironic, I
know. The library atmosphere struck me as “odd” that morning.
There was a charge in the air that I did not understand. I bundled my
books into my bag and left, assuming they were getting ready for some
bookish event.
I
first heard of the twin tower tragedies in my car on my way to work.
I switched on my radio a few moments after leaving the library. I
drove through miles of autumn tinted woods without seeing them. I
drove on auto pilot while I listened with disbelief and more than a
little fear. I parked and went inside, wondering a million thoughts
at once, feeling raw inside and out.
My
husband stopped by my work station later in the day. It was a slow
time of year and no one was out much, they were all glued to their
televisions, so I'd had time to both dig into Kevin Leman's book, and
time to ponder the attacks going on around me. They did not make
sense, but the book did. I'm sure it would have made sense on any
day, but it rang as true as a bell on September 11th.
Suddenly our petty differences didn't mean very much. My husband and
I embraced and assured each other that, come what may, we were in
this life together. His arms felt like a harbor from the storm, after
the fierce reminder of how precious and fragile life really is. Our
problems were put into a very real and very painful prospective. How
could a few differences in parenting methods mean anything when
people were dying so tragically and with such injustice?
Many
petty arguments later I find that I'm still struggling to hold on to
that idea. Sometimes my husband reminds me, “This isn't a big deal.
Remember September 11th?” Sometimes he reminds me of my
own favorite words in such times, “Will this matter in a hundred
years?” And sometimes he gets sucked into the faux drama of our
lives with me. I struggle to remember before he can remind me, that
life is too fragile to worry about minor things. It's too fast to
focus on this instant enough to be angry about something that isn't a
big deal in the grand scheme of things. Ask yourself, “Will it
matter in a hundred years? Will it even matter in five years?”
I
want to remember that day. I want to remember the only thing that
seemed good about it: The realization that we are not in this alone.
Every day I struggle to hold onto the good that came to me as a
result of that tragedy. I've become more aware of life as a whole.
I've come to believe that September 11th is everywhere and
it's all the time. As you read this people are dying, killed over
things as silly as religion, as pointless as ownership of the land
that was here millions of years before us and will be here millions
of years after we are gone. People are killed for the harvest that
land holds, be it vegetables or oil. It doesn't matter if these
people are in America or if they are in Iraq. It is pointless to
wonder if they are Christians or Muslims. I don't care what color
their skin is or if they are male or female. They are my brothers and
sisters and I care that they are dying needlessly. It cannot matter
if they are my countrymen, my religion, my color, my sex. All that
matters is that they are dying pointlessly and that they are human
just like me, just like you.
These
days, I try to be more aware, more educated, to make better decisions
that may truly matter in the long run. The world has bigger problems
than my emotions, and though I strive to always remember, “This
isn't a big deal,” when my husband and I don't agree on some
trivial subject, what I never want to forget is that the big deal is
out there, the big deal is all around us. I try to concentrate on
what I can do about the things that are important. We can each make a
small difference and a lot of small differences can make a large
difference. We can reach out to our brothers and sisters that need us
to look at the big picture, to stop quarreling with our spouse or
neighbor, to stop looking at the gas hand, the cell phone, or the
money in our pocket. They are counting on us to take a breath, look
at the world around us, really see it, and concentrate on the things
that will matter in a hundred years.
A young, but very wise friend of ours, gave my daughter and her girlfriend a bit of advice recently. My daughter's friend is worrywart, a pot stirrer, and a fretter. She was telling him how everything scared her or intimidated her. She went on about how she doesn't take any risks or enjoy much of what she does because she is always fretting about what could go wrong and who would judge her if it did.
ReplyDeleteThe young man listened carefully then said, "The next time you start worrying about something stupid, say to yourself, it doesn't fu**ing matter." As he said the last four words, raised his right hand, passed it in front of his face from left to right palm facing out as though casting a spell.
He said, whenever he and his family or friends were squabbling over or worrying about something minuscule, one of them would do this gesture/chant. He said they did it so much, that they didn't even bother with the phrase, just the gesture and everyone knew what it meant.
I have adopted this gesture/phrase (with a modified curse word) whenever my people are sweating the petty stuff. "It doesn't effing matter." We need to put your energy into something that does.