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the winnipeg free press is asking its readership to reflect on how they've changed because of september 11th. my guess is they're looking for touching stories about people have gone on to "value every day of their life", or "cherish their loved ones even more". the cynic in me grimaces that this event should somehow evoke special feelings moreso than the daily tales of aghanis starving or columbians being killed or bengalis being flooded. or perhaps the free press was looking for something more along the lines of james lieks' "stirring" (as Andrew Sullivan puts its) piece where he states that "I feel the same anger I did on 9/11; I feel the same overwhelming grief. Nothing in my heart has changed, and God forbid it ever does."

i was in an ethnic conflict class on september 11th. i was at ground zero in february and i will be in new york on september 12th. how has my world changed? what i have learned from 9/11? i have learned that, like a line from marvin's room, emotions are like fish hooks. that they are often so entangled that you can not separate them without being pricked. yet, in this case it is all the more painful. i feel i can not grieve without being connected with a vengeful and retaliatory anger at a group of people who has been termed "the enemy". i feel i can not feel sadness for the families involved without being linked with a battle cry to enter a war which has more to do with geopolitical strength than memorial.

i have learned that there is no room for my ambiguity, my grey, my unease. "you are either with us or against us". carry a flag or carry a gun. i can not do either. so instead i am prompted not to feel, or at least not to feel publicly- for my "response" to 9/11 seems unwelcome in our society or, at the very least, likely unfit company for the moving tributes and reflections we'll find in the winnipeg free press...