A Day in Infamy

After reading The New Yorker's "Talk of the Town", the images that defined 9/11 came back to me with a new significance. Reading from the accounts of people who stood in dis-belief in front of the rubble that had once been the highest part of the New York Skyline. As John Updike says in his part of the essay, " there persisted the notion, as on television, this was not quite real..." The immensity of this event was greater than the feat of creating the towers; what was once majestic  shock and awe was now the manifestation of terror and death. Watching the towers fall was not just the loss of some big buildings, it was the loss of people, people with families, people who had done nothing wrong but go to work that morning. As John and many others watched the towers fall they watched the largest massacre every to be carried out in American history. The phone calls made by those trapped in the tower and airplane were what gave reality to many such as myself. I listen to the calls from loved ones, knowing that this is the last they will ever speak to each other, a different side of culture was demonstrated. The true passions and loves of so many uniting all at once. On that day every Americans heart was beating together, we were together truly one nation, indivisible.

But then came the after shook, the uncontrollable result of the most traumatic nation event in American history. People stood in the streets, sat in their homes, and stayed motionless at their desks; the nation was shell shocked. No one had an explanation for the events that had transpired. Politicians stood up and gave warming speeches, ensuring everyone that nothing was out of place, that whatever had just happened wasn't quite real. But for many this was not enough; thirty, forty, fifty years ago maybe people would have been okay with this explanation. But society was educated, they were not about to believe that this loss was nothing for civilians to worry about. The people needed answers. How could this great superpower of a nation be threatened by anyone, who would dare try to fight with us. This was not something that was allowed to happen in America. The answer that arose was the devastating fact that America was losing its hold, and we the people are now going to suffer with her.

An Original Introduction

After the final day of College Literature I was left a changed man, no longer a meager twerp existing as a footnote in society was I as Yoda would say. As I enter my first days of summer as a new man I began to think about how I interacted in the world, what was I good for? My quest to search for the answer to this question had begun; with my valiant steed I went out to conquer The Beast.

What looked like a simple task turned out to be a time of struggle with few triumphs, but to succeed in my goal of self understanding I was forced to continue on. I often found my self running in circles coming upon the same ideas that I started with, never building meaning. I felt as Bartleby  the Scrivener must have felt in the dead letter office, what I needed was to become unstuck in time and see what my future held.

So in my desperation for understanding I took a nap on the toilet, the two places I do my best thinking. As I sat upon my throne I fought for everything that I was worth to release this growing pressure from the pit of my stomach. I fought so hard that soon exhaustion came over me and I had to rest; sleep soon won over and my journey through space and time began.

The results of my travels reveled to me two things: one, I am a very heavy sleeper when I am on the toilet and two, Kurt Vonnegut was right about human involvement in the end of the world...So in the end I learned very little about my purpose on my expedition. So what is my purpose?

Well I like fire,

and space is really cool,

not to mention aliens,

and my very favorite, building stuff!!

So if I put all of this together...

I end up in star wars training with the Jedi and blasting away at the Sith Lords battle fleet outside the death star orbiting the Ewok's home planet!!! I don't think life could get much better for me.