9-11 Rememberances

About a year ago, an Icelandic friend of mine and I were discussing 9-11 over after-dinner drinks. We had a difference of opinion concerning the proper way to commemorate that event, with him favoring a small, bronze plaque mounted on the side of the new building being erected at Ground Zero.  I told him something far more dramatic was required, and thought that being Icelandic, he could not understand the deep emotional pain that had been caused by the events of 9-11, especially for someone like me, who lived in D.C. at that time. I was reminded of this conversation last week, when I was again in Washington D.C., as I looked across the skyline and saw a huge edifice looming behind the Pentagon. Called the Air Force Memorial and located in Arlington Cemetery, it is not officially linked to the 9-11 memorial at the Pentagon, which is an understated affair consisting of one bench for every person killed in that event (excluding the hi-jackers, I believe). This memorial, by contrast, consists of 3 huge, erect, metal pillars, thick at the bottom and then curving off into space, a good 25 stories high. It is evocative at once of the 3 planes crashing downward to the ground on 9-11 even as it also draws the eye upwards, towards the endless potential of outer-space. It is taller than any building in the area, and its fluid, metalic design make it very dramatic. I found it a suitable, if unintentional, memorial to 9-11, and am pretty sure even my Icelandic friend would agree. 

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