Have the Courage to Love What You Love
What inspires: Courage It's 11:25 am in Jakarta and mid-day here is melting into a new day on the other side of the world, in New York, where it is 12:25 am on the 11th of September, 2011. As the dawn of the 10th anniversary of the World Trade Center Attacks approaches it's impossible to not to remember that day. Who would even want to? Remembering is the reason today. As I type, a Jakarta' friend's son, whose uncle, his father's brother, worked in the World Trade Center and was lost that day—lost because there was no final phone call or physical remains to bring closure—is sleeping a few final hours (or not) before rising to take part in the 10th Anniversary Memorial. Zubin is one of those selected (by lottery) to read names of victims of those attacks.
As this day of remembering dawns, my thoughts are with those memorializing September 11, 2001. But NOT to remember the attack—as though anyone who witnessed it could forget—it's a day to memorialize, and especially, to remember the people, as Zubin is helping to do. The people who lost their lives. The people who lost their loved ones. And the people who came together to help, to care, to give on that day and long after—even now.
The New York Times website includes Artist’s Respond to 9/11 videos. In one, choreographer Bill T. Jones talks about surviving, guilt, coping and about how World Trade Center tragedy changed him as a person and an artist. It’s worth listening to, especially as we go on with our lives while right now today, yesterday, tomorrow, in so many parts of the world, others are coping with the aftermath of tragedy—both human-inflicted and natural: hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, fires (which, although somehow more acceptable, are no less devastating). Toward the end, Mr. Jones shares what has become his truth: Have the courage to love what you love.
It takes courage to live. It takes courage to create. It takes,it seems, even more courage to allow others the same freedoms we expect for ourselves. Remember together today, on the anniversary of the World Trade Center Attacks. Remember and take Courage.