Memories of Memories

As I recall, most of the 9/11 anniversaries I have experienced have been on days that were like the actual day--warm with clear blue skies--which I recall as an “ironic blue”. That morning, if you even noticed it was a beautiful day, it was a fleeting moment and was, in fact, filled with irony. 

Today, in Chicago it is gloomy and overcast. 

Even though 2020 is not the 20th anniversary of 9/11, it seems like it has been happening every day in America for the past few years and has just as much, if not more, relevance. After awhile anniversaries become fungible and turn into a collective malaise. Since they overlap with one another, there are no clear edges of the memories and are more difficult to process. 

I recently saw a film titled Portrait of a Lady On Fire, set in 18th century France, where a painter is hired to paint a ritualized wedding portrait of the daughter of an aristocrat. At the end of the film, character A and character B are at the symphony. Character B does not know that character A is there and is watching her surreptitiously. As the music is performed, B begins crying. She is revisiting a memory of a moment with character A where the music was played on a piano. Character B and the viewer are watching her having a memory as an act of voyeurism.

Revisiting a memory it's like actually seeing it in a film, where it seems like a sequential narrative in hindsight, but they are just fragments held together with narrative “glue”. 

If you have a specific memory, sharing those memories while looking at other people, or simply considering where they are now in their lives, like the nine-year-old girl in 2011, whose birthday is on 9/11 and who is now 20 years old, or as I was anticipating the 10th anniversary of 9/11 in 2010 with fresh memories of Hurricane Katrina.

In the days after 9/11, many rallies were organized for the purpose of consoling one another. 

Above is a photo I took at the rally in Chicago on the Friday afterward. 

All memories are interconnected and triggered by other ones, like in the film where the memory is triggered by a piece of music, a sound, or what the weather was like. 

My collection of memories of 9/11: 

9/11/2009

Weather is exactly what it was 8 years ago: clear blue skies. They're replaying the events in real-time on the news shows. Interesting how it puts you back in that exact context. (Memory is made more salient with repetition in the media)

8/13/2010

Sometimes I look at people and wonder what memories they may have. Kids 10-12 probably have no direct memory of 9/11. I have no direct memory of the Kennedy assassination.

8/28/2010

Fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. In another year we will have gotten to the 10th anniversary of 9/11. They're not some much 'anniversaries' as they are milestones that allow you to compare your position in history.

1/8/2011

Arizona Dem congresswoman Giffords shot at Tucson rally. 6 others killed, including one 9-year old girl, born on 9/11 (apparently with a precocious interest in politics). 

9/11/2011

Beautiful morning, as it was 10 years ago. Things I liked:  The power of names and how musically they are recited, music performed at ceremonies is always immediately powerful and resonant.

The sound of an airplane
The sound of memory
The sound of 9/11

9/12/2011

Interesting: Kids that don't have a direct memory of 9/11 are just bored by it all. Shared memories are largely defined by generational boundaries.

9/11/2012

Beautiful blue skies, 85 degrees. Same weather as 9/11/01.

11th anniversary of 9/11. The numbers and the context will last for at least a century...Every generation understands the past present and future in entirely different ways. Artists more than anyone else are more acutely aware of this phenomenon and use the present and future to define the era. It is only later that a deeper history gets woven into what they do.

4/15/2013

Bombing at finish line at Boston Marathon. (On the celebration of Patriot’s Day, actually 4/19). When the first reports and videos begin coming in you think this is another 9/11 moment: what seems to be a freak accident of some kind becomes grave when there are two explosions in succession. (North Tower/South Tower)...For some younger people, this is sort of their first “Terrorism Moment”. Me: OK City bombing, 9/11. Waco also occurred on 4/19. As in 9/11, the thought is that it is something seen in a disaster movie. Films have shortened the gap between a vicarious experience and actually being there. Some massacres, such as the theater mass shooting in Colorado, occur in the same cognitive space. The theater is a barrier between fiction and reality but becomes the actual war Theater. The heroes will emerge as the days pass, and the narrative will become clearer. We define ourselves by how we deal with disasters. 

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An original piece of mine titled Ironic Blue. Its original title was different and wasn't created for the memory of 9/11,  but rather the memory of the memory of clear blue skies infused with irony.