I was glad to see the Boy Scouts in our neighbourhood put up the flag for 9/11. I thought it was not an official holiday but it feels like one. I noticed it is “Patriot Day” on the US Holidays listed in Google Calendar.
A qick wiki lookup shows that it was originally “Prayer and Remembrance for the Victims of the Terrorist Attacks on September 11, 2001” which is REALLY REALLY LONG. Maybe just too long to put on a little calendar square. It was officially designated as “Patriot Day” by Joint Resolution 71 (407-0 votes) and then proclaimed officially by George Whacker Bush on September 11, 2002. It also suggests flags be at half mast.
In any case, it feels more poignant than Memorial Day or Veterans Day to me, probably because it is an experience that I lived through and it felt like it affected me directly.
Other than Desert Shield and Desert storm, and I guess Vietnam when I was baby, and now the Afghan ongoing military conflict, there hasn’t been any poignant event like 9/11.
I know that sounds almost trite after just listing all those other conflicts. But I think of 9/11 as something a class apart. It affected me more internally, more viscerally, changed my world view more dramatically, caused me to evaluate what life on Planet Earth is all about. Perhaps because it was not a military conflict, but a terrorist act; it was closer to home. I had friends and family in New York that day, literally blocks from the event. It was emotionally draining. It came out of the blue.
Anyway, I am glad they put up the flags to remind us all that we have not forgotten. That we should re-evaluate why we are here, what really matters, if what we are doing has any meaning.