The day before, I celebrated my birthday as usual. With special treats and presents. Friends decorated my locker. Happy birthday was sung more than once. It was a good day.
Twenty-four hours later, everything changed.
I was in science class when it happened. The mood shifted from sleepy and getting the day started to somber and worried—for ourselves, for our families, for our country. It was one of my classmate’s birthdays. At sixteen-years-and-one-day-old, I kept thinking how glad I was that my birthday had been the day before. That I’d had that one good day before everything changed.
Now, every year, when my birthday approaches, I feel the anticipation for the anniversary of September 11th, and I think of my classmate, too.
Some don’t want a lot of pomp and circumstance for their birthdays, while others crave it. I’m a happy medium, okay if my birthday is simple and sweet but happy to go all out, too. However, there’s something about knowing this is your day, the day you entered the world, a day unique to you, but for today’s specific date and likewise many other disastrous dates, it’s also a time of immense pain for so many.
It’s entered my identity, this connection, which is odd, because I often struggle with identity. With knowing who I really am. And I think many Americans share this struggle, whether they like to admit it or not.
Being a melting pot has its benefits. We are a unique country which theoretically offers opportunity to everyone regardless of race, color, background, or beliefs*, yet at the same time these very things make us question who we are. We want to belong, but we don’t know exactly where we fit in. Are we our DNA or our location on the map? It’s why 23andMe and Ancestry exist, right? To help us reason with these questions scientifically.
*Keyword: Theoretically
It’s been twenty-three years since 9/11. Things haven’t gotten better. There are so many things wrong with our country and yet, I love it. While my identity might be fractured by disaster and muddled by points around the globe which some spit in a bottle tells me I’m linked to, I know when I hear the words of The Star-Spangled Banner or I see the largest American flag I’ve even seen hanging near a Boston harbor*, there are no slanders or bad politics or dolled up comparisons that can change the knowing that being American is part of my identity.
*More on this trip later
If my birthday didn’t neighbor 9/11, I don’t think I would identify with it the same. Sure, I’d still remember like we’re all told to do with the shared posts we know will circulate today, but I don’t think I’d feel it in my core. It is a part of my identity growing stronger with every anniversary, with each year that first 9/11 moves further away.
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