On Being Mortal and Stupid

Today is that most infamous of recent American dates and I am commemorating it by not listening to any TV or radio or even reading published media about the day. There are many reasons for this, but me being a cold, heartless bitchy-type is not one of them. In fact, I feel certain that by not intaking all the spewed sentimentality, the forced photo opps, and the countless coverage of questions that are easy to ask - as opposed to difficult, complicated, and necessary to ask - I'm actually memorializing a tragedy in a way that's meaningful, at least to me. Thinking about it. Chewing it up. Digesting. Rinse. Repeat.

Yesterday, our pastors mentioned that 9/11 was the day that the world changed. I love and respect both of them, but I totally disagreed with that statement and sneakily wrote so on my bulletin. There's nothing about the world that changed today or any other day -- it was only our perceptions of our place in the world, our status, our own inpenetrability as a nation and people that changed. After all, there is death all around us and always has been; as Anne Lamott says, we are all terminal on this bus. I think what this day did was just remind us that our own terminalness was and is crouching on the doorstep, that our notions of safety were a myth, and that our actions in the world - shock and awe! - had consequences.

When it happened, I was addressing our wedding invitations. It's probably one of those moments that people remember exactly what they were doing, a la Kennedy. I watched the coverage on TV all day, sometimes on mute in order to get the NPR version of what was going down. I listened to the coverage pretty obsessively for the next three weeks. I was trying to understand all the layers, all the pieces that made up this attack. There were lots of them. My work was definitely cut out for me and I dug in with much moxy. I wanted to understand; I wanted it to be logical and seamly, as in having neat, straight seams with no gaps or snags. Like Martin Scorsce, I was looking for the narrative thread, the thing that tied all the information and loss and anger and meltdown together. But, it's never been seamly, at least for me, and that's why I've been so chafed at how it's being remembered, memorialized, talked about these days. As somewhat neat and condensed.

It just so happened that I watched the Buffy episode "The Body" today, which is about loss and anger and meltdown. Above all, it's about death, sudden death. Buffy's been dealing with death ever since she became the slayer, but not natural death. Quick, unexpected death. And in this episode, she has to deal and so does the rest of the Scooby gang. At one point, Buffy is talking to Tara, the only other person who's experienced the death of family member.

Buffy: "Was it sudden? Your mother?"
Tara; "No. (pause) But yes. It's always sudden."

And at another point, Anya (a now-human-once-vengeance-demon) asks about what's going to happen at the morgue, what happens to the body, what do humans do with the body and Willow explodes. Tells her how inappropriate all these questions are. Anya, looking unusually helpless, says "But I don't understand! I don't understand how this all happens, how we go through this. I mean - I knew her, and then she's... there's just a body, and I don't understand why she just can't get back in it and not be dead anymore! It's stupid! It's mortal and stupid! And... and Xander's crying and not talking, and...and I was having fruit punch, and I thought, 'Well, Joyce will never have any more fruit punch - ever, and she'll never have eggs, or yawn, or brush her hair, not ever,' and no one will explain to me why."

I found truth in this today, much more so than watching memorials or speeches or unity gatherings. Because on today, 9/11, it's still sudden. It's quiet. Like the Buffy episode, there's no musical score to make it more comforting. What happened then and what's happened since seems so mortal and stupid. And I, for one, still have the feeling that I don't exactly understand and no one will explain to me why.