Oh boy, midterms!

Despite the sarcasm I was going for in my subject line, I actually didn't have to think too hard about what I wanted to write about for the miterm. The past couple months, we have talked about Mythology, what it means to be a hero, what it means in a post 9/11 world. I wanted to explore what it meant to be a superhero within the confines of the superhero world post 9/11.
There are a number of comics out there that deal with the events of septembe 11th, but the one issue I focused on was Amazing Spiderman, Volume 2, Issue #36. The Marvel Universe, although fictional, is set in real places, real cities. While Spiderman himself does not in fact exist, New York City, his home, does. The devastation caused by 9/11 was so far reaching that even in our most perfect of worlds, one we created, we had to acknowledge that the towers fell. While many of the heroes and characters within the Marvel Universe reside in NYC, Spiderman is perhaps the one most well known, the most connected not only to New York, but to the everyman, to the child within all of us that allows us to believe in the things that Spiderman stands for.
I have reprinted here, the narration that Spiderman provides for this issue.

Some things are beyond words.

Beyond comprehension.

Beyond forgivness.

How do you say we didn’t know? We couldn’t know.

We couldn’t imagine.

Only madmen could contain the thought, execute the act, fly the planes.

The sane world will always be vulnerable to madmen, because we can not go where they conceive of such things.

You can not hear us for the cries, but we are here.

Even those we thought our enemies are here. Because some things surpass rivalries and borders.

Because the story of humanity is written not in towers but in tears.

In the common coin of blood and bone.

In the voice that speaks within even the worst of us, and says THIS IS NOT RIGHT.

Because even the worst of us, however scared, are still human.

Still feel.

Still mourn the random death of innocents.

We are here.

But with our costumes and our powers we are writ small by the true heroes.

Those who face fire without fear or armor.

Those who step into the darkness without assurances of ever walking out again, because they know there are others waiting in the dark.

Awaiting salvation. Awaiting word. Awaiting justice.

Ordinary men. Ordinary women.

Made extraordinary by acts of comprehension. And courage. And terrible sacrifice.

Ordinary men. Ordinary women.

Refusing to surrender.

Ordinary men. Ordinary women.

Refusing to accept the self serving proclamations of holy warriors of every stripe, who announce that somehow we had this coming.

We reject tem both in the knowledge that our tragedy is greater than the sum of our transgressions.

Bodies in freefall on the evening news.

Madness in mosques, shouting down fourteen centuries of earnest prayers, forgetting the lessons of crusades past…That the most harmed are the least deserving.

There are no words.

There are no words.

The death of innocents and the death of innocence.

Rage compounded upon rage. Rage enough to blot out the sun.

And the air, filled with questions.

They ask the question. Why? Why?

My god, why?

What do we tell the children?

Do we tell them evil is a foreign face?

No. the evil is the thought behind the face, and it can look just like yours.

Do we tell them evil is tangible, with defined borders and names and geometries and destinies?

No. they will have nightmares enough.

Perhaps we tell them that we are sorry.

Sorry that we were not able to deliver unto them the world we wished them to have.

That our eagerness to shout is not the equal of our willingness to listen.

That the burdens of distant people are the responsibility of all men and women of conscience, or their burdens will one day become our tragedy.

Or perhaps we simply tell them that we love them, and that we will protect them. That we would give our lives for theirs and do it gladly, so great is the burden of our love.

In a universe of gameboy’s and vcr’s, it is, perhaps, and insubstantial gift. But it is the only one that will wash away the teas and knit th wounds and make the world a sane place to live in.

We could not see it coming. No one could. We could not stop it. No one could.

But we are here. Now. With you.

Today. Tomorrow. And the day after.

We live in each blow you strike for infinite justice, but always in the hope of infinite wisdom.

Because we live as well in the quiet turning of your considered conscience.

The voice that says ALL WARS HAVE INNOCENTS.

The voice that says YOU ARE A KIND AND MERCIFUL PEOPLE.

The voice that says DO NOT DO AS THEY DO, OR THE WAR IS LOST BEFOR IT IS EVEN BEGUN.

When you move, we will move with you. Where you go, we will go with you. Where you are, we are in you.

Because the future belongs to ordinary men and ordinary women, and that future must be built free of such acts as these, must be fought for and renewed like fresh water.

Because a message must be sent to those who mistake compassion for weakness. A message sent across six thousand years of recorded blood and struggle.

And the message is this:

Whatever our history, whatever the root of our surnames, we remain a good and decent people, and we do not bow down and we do not give up.

The fire of the human spirit cannot be quenched by bomb blasts or body counts.

Cannot be intimidated forever into silence or drowned by tears.

We have endured worse before; we will bear this burden and all that come hereafter, because that’s what ordinary men and women do.

No matter what.

This has not weakened us. It has only made us stronger.

In recent years we as a people have been tribalized and factionalized by a thousand casual unkindesses.

But in this we are one.

Flags sprout in uncommon places, the ground made fertile by tears and shared resolve.

We have become one in our grief.

We are now one in our determination. One as we recover. One as we rebuild.

You wanted to sent a message, and in doing so you awakened us from our self involvement.

Message received.

Look for your reply in the thunder.

In such days as these are heroes born. Not heroes such as ourselves. The true heroes of the 21^st century.

You, the human being singular.

You, who are nobler than you know and stronger than you think.

You, the heroes of this moment chosen out of history.

We stand blinded by the light of your unbroken will. Before that light, no darkness can prevail.

They knocked down two tall towers. In their memory, draft a covenant with your conscience, that we will create a world in which such things need not occur.

A world which will not require apologies to children, but also a world whose roads are not paved with the husks of thierr inalienable rights.

They knocked down two tall towers. Graft now their echo onto your spine. Become girders and glass, stone and steel, so that when the world sees YOU, it sees THEM.

And Stand Tall. Stand Tall.

My own personal hero

Even though I missed both the deadline as well as the initial opportunity to share in class my feelings and pictures about my hero's of 9/11, I feel as though I must still share anyhow.

When I think of who my personal hero's are, especially in regards to 9/11, I immediately think about my friends John and Denise Casalinuovo, good family friends whom I've known for much of my life. John and Denise live in Chinatown, and on that fateful day rushed to ground zero to help in any way they could. They ended up helping to run and maintain one of the main relief tents at ground zero, dubbed, The Hard Hat Cafe. For 100 days straight John and Denise, among others, worked together to keep the emergency crews in good spirits as well as solid workboots.

A film was made about John and the people he met down at Ground Zero called 9/12: from chaos to community.



www.912film.com

This is the Bio they give for John on their website:

John Casalinuovo

John and his wife Denise Lutrey Casalinuovo, Chinatown landlords, volunteered at Ground Zero nearly every day from the morning of September 12, 2001 to the closing of the site in May of 2002.

They continue to own and manage their building and every year host the reunion of volunteers and recovery workers there.

John and Denise were hero's of mine well before 9/11, but I think that it's clear that they are hero's to many others as well. Here is John behind the bar at his apartment on the afternoon of 9/11/2008, just last month, gearing up for his annual 9/11 commemoration gathering. An American Flag hangs from the roof of the building, draping the entire structure in the stars and stripes.

John Continues to be not only one of the best, and coolest people that I know.

My Favorite Myth actually exists!

Last week we were asked to bring in an example of one of our favorite fairy tales or myth stories, and there is one in particular that came to mind for me, as it is a story that I haven't heard before, and has a somewhat vague ending in that the lesson to be learned could very well be any number of things, depending on what aspect one focuses on. I have been exceptionally bad at recalling or retelling the story itself with any great accuracy (if you heard my attempt in class, you may agree), and as luck would have it I found it online. The fullest account I have found was written by the author Douglas Adams:

Sifting Through the Embers

by Douglas Adams

There’s a story I heard when I was young that bothered me because I couldn’t understand it. It was many years before I discovered it to be the story of the Sybilline books. By that time all the details of the story had rewritten themselves in my mind, but the essentials were still the same. After a year of exploring some of the endangered environments of the world, I think I finally understand it.

It concerns an ancient city - it doesn’t matter where it was or what it was called. It was a thriving, prosperous city set in the middle of a large plain. One summer, while people of the city were busy thriving and prospering away, a strange old beggar woman arrived at the gates carrying twelve large books, which she offered to sell to them. She said that the books contained all the knowledge and all the wisdom of the world, and that she would let the city have all twelve of them in return for a single sack of gold.

The people of the city thought this was a very funny idea. They said she obviously had no conception of the value of gold and that probably the best thing was for her to go away again.

This she agreed to do, but first she said that she was going to destroy half of the books in front of them. She built a small bonfire, burnt six of the books of all knowledge and all wisdom in the sight of the people of the city, and then went on her way.

Winter came and went, a hard winter, but the city just managed to flourish through it and then, the following summer, the old woman was back.

“Oh, you again,” said the people of the city. “How’s the knowledge and wisdom going?”

“Six books,” she said, “just six left. Half of all the knowledge and wisdom in the world. Once again I am offering to sell them to you.”

“Oh yes?” sniggered the people of the city.

“Only the price has changed.”

“Not surprised.”

“Two sacks of gold.”

“What?”

“Two sacks of gold for the six remaining books of knowledge and wisdom. Take it or leave it.”

“It seems to us,” said the people of the city, “that you can’t be very wise or knowledgeable yourself or you would realise that you can’t just go around quadrupling an already outrageous price in a buyer’s market. If that’s the sort of knowledge and wisdom you’re peddling, then, frankly, you can keep it at any price.”

“Do you want them or not?”

“No.”

“Very well. I will trouble you for a little firewood.”

She built another bonfire and burnt three of the remaining books in front of them and then set off back across the plain.

That night one or two curious people from the city sneaked out and sifted through the embers to see if they could salvage the odd page or two, but the fire had burnt very thoroughly and the old woman had raked the ashes. There was nothing.

Another hard winter took its toll on the city and they had a little trouble with famine and disease, but trade was good and they were in reasonably good shape again by the following summer when, once again, the old woman appeared.

“You’re early this year,” they said to her.

“Less to carry,” she explained, showing them the three books she was still carrying. “A quarter of all the knowledge and wisdom in the world. Do you want it?”

“What’s the price?”

“Four sacks of gold.”

“You’re completely mad, old woman. Apart from anything else, our economy’s going through a bit of a sticky patch at the moment. Sacks of gold are completely out of the question.”

“Firewood, please.”

“Now wait a minute,” said the people of the city, “this isn’t doing anybody any good. We’ve been thinking about all this and we’ve put together a small committee to have a look at these books of yours. Let us evaluate them for a few months, see if they’re worth anything to us, and when you come back next year, perhaps we can put in some kind of a reasonable offer. We are not talking sacks of gold here, though.”

The old woman shook her head. “No,” she said. “Bring me the firewood.”

“It’ll cost you.”

“No matter,” said the woman, with a shrug. “The books will burn quite well by themselves.”

So saying, she set about shredding two of the books into pieces which then burnt easily. She set off swiftly across the plain and left the people of the city to face another year.

She was back in the late spring.

“Just one left,” she said, putting it down on the ground in front of her. “So I was able to bring my own firewood.”

“How much?” said the people of the city.

“Sixteen sacks of gold.”

“We’d only budgeted for eight.”

“Take it or leave it.”

“Wait here.”

The people of the city went off into a huddle and returned half an hour later.

“Sixteen sacks is all we’ve got left,” they pleaded, “times are hard. You must leave us with something.”

The old woman just hummed to herself as she started to pile the kindling together.

“All right!” they cried at last, opened up the gates of the city, and let out two ox carts , each laden with eight sacks of gold. “But it had better be good.”

“Thank you,” said the old woman, “it is. And you should have seen the rest of it.”

She led the two ox carts away across the plain with her, and left the people of the city to survive as best they could with the one remaining twelfth of all the knowledge and wisdom that had been in the world.

[From the book Last Chance to See by Douglas Adams.]

Cut and pasted from http://www.deeshaa.org/sifting-through-the-embers/

Let there be a blog!

There are several questions that come to mind when I think about this blog, the first of which is, "how in the hell did it take me this long to get on board and start a blog?" And more importantly, "why did it take a class that requires me to have a blog to jump start the decision?" (and lets be honest, i'm using a fairly loose definition of "jump start" in that I didn't actually start this blog until a month into the semester . . .)
Although I doubt I will have an answer that satisfies me, the mere fact that I have one now should at the very least be enough for you, dear reader, to read on.