September 19, 2001
Jay Walljasper Special to Utne Online
I have no clear idea what shape the world will be in by the time
you read this. The cold-blooded terrorist attacks left all of us
here at
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As a nation we have faced many steep challenges, but we've been
mercifully free of worry about the world's woes crossing our
borders to claim innocent lives. The horror of war, for Americans
not in uniform, has always been an abstract concept. I think this
safe distance from the front lines has shaped our sometimes
oversimplified view of international events and the aggressive
course of U.S. foreign policy. But now, even as the American public
backs extensive military action, we are no longer shielded from the
full realization of what war means for men, women, and
children.
Everywhere you looked were pictures of missing people,
thousands and thousands of them, placed by desperate friends and
relatives, in hopes that a miracle might occur.... These sheets of
paper are absolutely heartbreaking. The pictures of the missing
show people of every nationality and race, every age and religion,
describing their physical characteristics and identifying features
and telling when they were last heard from.... The pictures show
them hugging their wife or husband, holding their child or a pet,
embracing friends in a bar. They are so young. So vibrant. So
innocent.
This is not an account from Berlin 1945 or Beirut 1982 or Sarajevo
1994. This is an e-mail from my friend Ron Williams, describing
scenes outside his front door in New York City. Even now, many days
after the attack, it chokes me up to read it. So does another
passage from the letter in which Ron (co-founder of Detroit's
Metro Times alternative weekly) describes the spontaneous
crowd that gathered along Manhattan's West Side highway waving
flags and homemade banners to cheer firefighters, police, and other
rescue workers heading home after 18- and 24-hour shifts searching
for wounded in the rubble of the World Trade Center.
American flags have appeared all over Minneapolis, too, and for the
first time since I grew aware of the Vietnam War as a grade
schooler, I can gaze upon the red, white, and blue in a completely
unambiguous light. The brave firefighters; the bereaved families;
flag-waving New Yorkers; nervous Islamic-Americans; clergy and
other leaders appealing for tolerance; my neighbors and I anxiously
sharing news on the sidewalk each evening-we're all united as
Americans in our sadness at this tragedy and in our resolve that
such an atrocity will not break our spirit. For me, these feelings
are heightened by the memory of first hearing about the attack from
election volunteers while voting in a primary at a neighborhood
church, and how my wife Julie and I got further details from an
older black man we met walking home from the polls. 'Those are our
people,' he said, shaking his head. 'Those are our
people.'