That got me to thinking about how events impact our lives. I read an article today talking about how we are the 9/11 generation. That was, for most of us, the first time we realized that if possible, someone out in the world would gladly kill us. When you are ten years old, that is a pretty altering fact to face. Standing in Mrs. Lodwick's classroom, I could not understand how a group of people an ocean away could hate us. As far as I was concerned, the world was made up of families just like mine. Families who got up, went to school, went to ski practice and ski meets on weekends with moms and dads who were coaches or refs. Families that spent weekends together camping and fishing and fighting. Not families sending their little boys into squares full of people with bombs strapped to their chests. Not families that uniformly hated my family. Simply because we went to church on Sunday or happened to live in America.
Have you ever thought about how we ended up here? How it comes to be that we are born into the families we are placed in? Personally, I think God knew I was going to be so stubborn, rude and determined to be my own person that I may not have lasted to age six if I wasn't born into a family with a mom who never cared what people thought or a dad who overlooked a bit of back talk in exchange for hugs. Granted, there were a few times when I was pretty sure that my parents were going to kill me (okay, so maybe those few times have been more recently than I would like to admit but I hope they are only few.) What baffles me is that based on where we are born, our lives and beliefs are molded without our knowledge. At age ten, I had faint ideas of lives outside of Steamboat. I had seen National Geographic, but it seemed to me that they were simply telling me stories and not real lives.
And so as I watched the Towers fall, the reality that someone out there wanted me dead set in. The months and years following have resulted in airport lines, random security checks, bomb dogs, and fear. This is how I grew up. The better half of my life, the half that I actually remember the majority of has been consumed with day to day reminders that we may not be safe. And that people hate us.
When I arrived in Sweden in eighth grade I was greeted by a few things: girls giving eachother hickies in the school hallway, showers that were called douche, and kids my own age telling me that they hoped I would die. Even in Sweden, who has remained neutral in nearly all international issues, I was forced to remove the security and safety of my childhood.
Yet ten years later, I look back at what happened with remorse for the lives lost, and pity for the people who felt the need to attack us. What lives must they have been born into, for them to feel that was a necessary idea. An idea worth their own mortal lives. Worth being sent to their Maker over. Personally, there are very few things I feel are worth my life. Family, friends, and faith. And yet my faith has not called me to kill people, because I was blessed enough to be born where I was. The phrase forgive and forget must be molded for this situation: we must forgive them, because if we don't we will be bitter people who can't accept that sometimes, we need to see that tragedy is a chance for us to realize why we are blessed, and never forget because the memory must remind us of those who were lost and that freedom isn't ever going to be free.
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