|
Images
of 9/11
It didn't cross my mind that this could be a deliberate attack.
Then by the time I got to work, in different offices people had
TVs on and were huddled around those, and I didn't want to see that.
I didn't know how I'd react, so I tried to get on the websites—of
course, the web traffic that day was just tremendous, and I heard
some more then, and then friends would call in, and let me know.
We didn't do any work in the office that day, I'm almost certain
of it.
The
worst pictures for me were the people who felt they had to jump
off those buildings. And there was a picture in the newspaper, I
think. And it caught a person mid-air, and the fall was tragically
so graceful. I'll never forget that image, because as many people
that died, they were individuals who died; and what someone must
be thinking when they reach that point, "I have to jump,"
haunts me.
back
October
7 (Bombing of Afghanistan)
I
remember thinking, "We're going to attack the government in
Afghanistan in order to get through to who we believe were the terrorists,"
and so then I guess I felt, "Well, it's arrived then."
It didn't take me by surprise.
In
some sense, I was disappointed, yes, and another sense, I felt like,
you can't let it go unchallenged, but is this how we want to challenge
it? Perhaps I was grateful that I wasn't the one making that decision,
too.
There's a professor on the East coast; it's his theory that more
people have died in Afghanistan—and I've seen a lot of debate
about those numbers, I don't know if they're accurate. Certainly
there have been other conflicts and situations where more than 4,000
people have died in a small place. And do I notice? I read it in
the paper and I feel bad, but then I turn the page. And in some
sense you have to—I mean, that's part of getting on. But I
felt ashamed. My life stopped on September 11th. I didn't do my
work; I came home and I watched TV. And October 7th, I went through
my usual routine.
back
"Another
Day"
It's
just like any other day; it's no different than any other day. And
I wrote both of those lines down—Okay, choose one. Can you
make the melody work better with this or that? And I kept saying
them together, because I was trying to choose between them. And
I like that now, because it's repetitive, and that is the point—that
our lives are repetitive and routine until something happens to
us.
So
the message I want to convey: be compassionate a little bit more
when the tragedy hits others. Whether that tragedy be terrorism
or be something even on a smaller scale, but particularly when we
see wars in other countries. All they get is three minutes on the
nightly news, and that's all.
back
Art's
Role
People
paint or write poetry or do music for different reasons. Some people
use it as therapy. I would hope that through an artist's perspective,
though, that you're trying to show something different that we might
have missed, to show a new perspective on how to view the situation.
And with that, hopefully, to help heal the wounds that have been
inflicted. So, perhaps as a healing, a thought-provoking—something
that would enhance our whole being.
back
|
|
|
renae
angeroth
