Before the Annoyance Gets Stale...

I always feel like a jerk writing something negative after a long absence, but you know, it wouldn't really be my blog if it was any other way.

I have to say I was completely irritated all day long on Saturday. 9/11, that is. This year I was absolutely annoyed by the "Never Forget" sentiment. It seemed more this year. Or maybe I'm just done with that sentiment. I'm sure part of it is the recent surge in anti-Muslim thinly veiled racism in the debate over who should be able to build near Ground Zero. I can't even begin to tell you all the Amendments that would be violated by prohibiting Muslims from building. Um, hello?! Religion! Property! America loves those things!

As an even further aside, on Saturday one of my religious cousins had a cartoon showing Jesus blowing the match that the crazy pastor was going to use to light Qurans on fire. It said What Would Jesus Do? I couldn't tell if the cartoon was depicting Jesus blowing the fire out or trying to make the flame grow by adding oxygen. So, who the hell knows what Jesus would do? I don't have a direct line, but I commented to my friend that, from what I remember, the big J.C. seemed to be into forgiveness and whatnot, so probably not vengeance. Then my cousin called my a slippery lawyer. Great.

Anyway, maybe that's my problem with "Never Forget." Yes, it was terrible and painful and made me feel angry and vulnerable. But, at some point you've got to pick up and move on. "Never Forget" means keeping the raw pain ever present, doesn't it? It means fanning flames of anger that can foster resentment and hate. That's an awful lot of energy spent on preserving and protecting bad feelings and negativity.

I say, no thank you.

Divorced kids learn early on to be resilient. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps and learn to have a little joy in life. (This is not an endorsement for raising kids in divorced families. Well, it sort of is. Because we are cooler. And "better" cite SKE. Ummm...we'll talk more about that later.) Maybe "Never Forget" means different things to those who insist on writing such mottos as their facebook status nine years later. But with the flag-waving and the political cartoons, it seems like not.

So, how about a new slogan? Or perhaps a good old Wellstone standby: Stand Up; Keep Fighting! And make sure you remove your crazy cousins from your newsfeed!