There's not much to say. I'm sad most of the time, even though I'm trying to just let it go, and missing New York more than ever. It seems like Covid will never end, since that would require the great majority of the country to work together and get vaccinated, and every day the sheer resistance of people ranting about freedom and their rights just disgusts me (see: video of a host at Carmine's being attacked for asking customers to show their vaccination cards).

This is not new. Every time there has been a crisis in this country that required collective action there have been holdouts according to personal philosophy, religion, or simply a contrarian nature, but the internet now allows these people to create a community that reinforces fringe beliefs. From sea to shining sea we have electronic bonds creating an echo chamber that makes them feel they have seen through the curtain of deception. The vaccine is killing people! The vaccine is actually making people get Covid! The government is lying!

Yes, the government is probably lying about some things; it does need people to fall in line and cooperate, but I believe that no President, Democrat or Republican, has truly wished ill on this country and its people. Not even Trump, although he was probably only interested in looking out for himself and those who voted for him. 

What is the chance that this is an elaborate hoax cooked up by the US government to fund genetic modification of the coronavirus in China and leaked/released just to create circumstances where they could shut down the economy and then peddle vaccines that will turn the population into zombies/kill the recipients within a year or so/microchip people for the New World Order, while simultaneously creating a socialist welfare system by taking jobs away from formerly hard-working people who are now dependent on the government and therefore easily controlled...

Read that sentence above and realize that approximately 20-40% of the country believe all or part of it, and that only scratches the surface of what is flying around GAW, TD, and other corners of the right-wing internet. This is the state of our country and it makes me want to just give up on America as a country and humans as a race. 

As an anthropologist this will be a fascinating time to study the range of human behavior so maybe I should make that my next career. I keep reminding myself that all of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again. This too shall eventually pass.

Almost twenty years. That's how long it's been since 9/11 and this year's anniversary seems different. Sure enough there have been the flood of retrospectives, "as we watched" documentaries, and updates from various parties involved, but somehow it seems more detached. To most, "Never Forget" has turned into just another date to note as an Important American Event; it seems that only for those who experienced it firsthand or lost someone that day is it an indelible mark on their soul.

I watched something similar happen even on the first anniversary, as I had just moved to North Carolina to start grad school. I was staying in a dorm with all grad or international students and sat alone in the TV room that morning and cried throughout the ceremony while everyone else went about their day as normal. I hadn't known anyone who died, but growing up in New Jersey, having a cousin who lived through it on the ground that day, and other tangential contacts made it more real to me. But for people who were from other countries or other regions of the US, 9/11 was done in their minds since the personal connection wasn't there. UNC's only public acknowledgement that day was a short ceremony on campus to honor the Chapel Hill alumnae that had been killed in the Twin Towers. Obligatory mention, then move on.

Now there is, essentially,  an entire generation that have no firsthand memories of that day, watching in terror and horror, not knowing the towers would collapse, the awful death toll, the months lower Manhattan was basically shut down, and all of the ripple effects that led to where we are today, including Afghanistan and Iraq. I know major events are supposed to fade into the history books, in the same way that I don't react to learning about WWII as if I had lived it, or been alive when JFK was assassinated.

I should take it as a sign that things are proceeding apace. Focus on the now while remembering that day privately, keeping all those still affected in my heart, and know that 9/11 really has crossed into history for the great majority. It's time.