The other night I celebrated my 21st birthday. For many people, this is a crucial turning point in their lives, the moment when their drinking careers buckle down and get serious (and they often seriously neglect their studies). Because now they can go out to drink with their own driver’s license. And I’ll admit, though my stomach eats a small portion of itself whenever it touches anything spicy or even slightly acidic (think orange juice, much less OJ and vodka), I have looked forward to this day of newly pronounced freedom with heightened anticipation.
There’s just one thing. My birthday, which had been a lovely day for 19 years, falls on Sept. 11. It’s an awkward thing, to say the least.
The day I packed my bags and moved out of Mom’s cramped uterus, in a tiny hospital in the middle of a tropical storm in Stuart, Fla., 21 years ago, now will forever be marked as a day of death, destruction, and relentless merciless media coverage.
And that just plain sucks.
To eat cake, to hang out with my loved ones, to open gifts and generally celebrate life doesn’t feel appropriate on such a day. Last year we did so anyway, but it was with great unease on my part. We stared at the television, watching the black smoke plume evilly into the atmosphere.
Even in the car there was no escaping it, with National Public Radio giving a blow-by-blow account of the horrors that followed. The streets were filled with people who were at a loss. They moved like zombies, easily confused and distracted. Business men and women gathered in restaurants and watched footage of the oft-rewound attacks, murmuring amongst themselves and nervously smoking cigs.
My roommate Vanessa called to tell me to go get extra gas, and that people were panicking and foolishly stampeding the local convenience stores, like frightened sheep running into fence walls.
Ironically, their haste to fill up on fuel only served to fill Middle Eastern pockets – they would have rather eaten refried haggis than do that on that day, of all days.
On top of such heavy memories, I have an ongoing personal crisis that had me on the verge of tears all day long this Sept. 11. Being sociable was one of my lowest priorities on this year’s birthday. Making it through the day so that I could simply go to sleep was in the top five.
And this makes me feel very selfish. Guilt complex, anyone? Had anyone seen me striding through campus teary-eyed, they may very well have assumed that I, like many American citizens on Sept. 11, was overcome with grief for those killed in the attack.
No. I was not grief-stricken. And the pumpkin pie that was served in lieu of the traditional cake still tasted good. Really good, in fact, since it was homemade. It tasted even better for breakfast.
I knew that thousands of innocent people died needlessly a year ago that day, and yet I was more concerned with something a little closer to home to me. But at least I’m honest about it.
I’m also going to be blunt about this: we need to let the subject rest, if even a little.
I’m not saying, by any means, that we should forget what happened. I am saying that the media has sickened me with their incessant commemorations, discussions and hushed, grave reminders of the “before and after.”
How many journalists can honestly cover the subject of “What’s changed …” without feeling a sense of deja vu?
I cannot believe that if I had lost a loved one in the attacks, that I would want to be reminded of just how brutally I lost them, even when moving through the line at the grocery store. You can’t separate the tabloids from seemingly respectable magazines. It’s just sensationalism run rampant, and nobody can resist it.
I don’t think that the families have even remotely begun their grieving process, because the words 9-11 tumble out of people’s mouths and are splashed across the front pages of every magazine and newspaper like a grim boomerang, simply to bounce back under a more colorful guise.
I don’t have a television, but I don’t need to be told what scene was played and replayed on every news channel. It would be enough to push grief into madness.
This business of patriotism is a tricky thing.
How many American flags did you see waving before that day last year? And how many car magnets, bumper stickers and tasteless Wal-Mart “Remember September 11” T-shirts do you see around you now?
The tragedy has been marketed to the hilt. The flag has been cheapened by commercialized patriotism.
There are many people who flew their flags long before this black day. But when Pal’s flies a flag at half-mast, or when you drive past tanning salons with a sign proclaiming, “Find ’em … And kill ’em!”, it’s almost too much. When Amoco signs read “We will never forget …”, I think, “Well, we can’t, now can we?” So come buy our stuff. Look, we’re sympathizers. Consume our products! All American owned!
I saw a Jonesborough supermarket that advertised “American Owned and Proud of It.”
How about a T-shirt that reads, “I Cashed In on 9-11!”
But, as my good friend and mentor Dr. Beth Kopp reminds me, it is a truly American reaction. Grief, sex scandals and national tragedies are so very profitable, and we Yanks (pre-Civil War terminology for Americans, don’t get insulted) are economic opportunists.
Cannibals, eating away at our own.
My birthday night ended rather anti-climactically. I walked the dog alone, popped some Tylenol for my headache, then cancelled that out with a single glass of pink champagne drunk with a friend who was also having an emotional overload. We got a little giggly for a moment, grew quiet and somber again, and then we said goodnight.
Maybe next year, there won’t be quite so much hurt going on. This was my final thought before I drifted off, meaning for myself and for the world. In the blinding light of day, I don’t hold out much hope for that birthday wish. Besides, my 2-year-old cousin blew out the candles for me. I’ll probably be receiving a remote-controlled car before the end of next year.
It’s my birthday. I can cry if I want to. Next year, I think I’ll take a rain check on that.

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