A guilty return to normalcy

After watching nonstop CNN for a week, Saturday I desperately flipped the channels looking for something upbeat, something happy, something mindless. I finally settled on renting "Bring It On." I was right in between lusting over Kirsten Dunst's movie love interest and laughing at the scene where the cheerleading squad auditions hopeless new recruits when I had to turn the tape off. I was having a good time. And that's exactly why I couldn't keep watching. I felt too guilty.\nLast Tuesday, the United States experienced the worst terrorist attacks in its history. Most people spent last week watching the horrible footage of planes crashing into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, people running for cover when the World Trade Center buildings eventually collapsed and all other breaking news related to the event. For the last week, most people in the United States have experienced sleepless nights and days filled with worry, fear and waiting. In the first few days following the attacks it was hard to think about anything else. It was hard to get through a day without crying and near impossible to try to laugh or have a good time.\nBut although what happened is obviously worse than the average tragedy, it is like most tragedies in that there comes a point where people consciously or unconsciously begin drifting back in to normalcy. People still think and worry about the possibility of war or the death of thousands. But whether they can help it or not, thoughts about upcoming movies at a theater or a band playing at a club somehow find ways of sneaking to the surface.\nSo you go out to a movie, go shopping or indulge in a late night trip to a restaurant for some dessert. You laugh at something on the screen, glory in picking up that longed-for sweater at a considerable discount or begin moving your feet to the music of a great new band. And then it hits: you're having fun while thousands of people have lost parents, brothers and sisters. You're having a party when we might go to war tomorrow. The country will never be the same but your life is moving forward. And that's when you start to feel guilty. Is it okay for us to have fun when our nation is experiencing a crisis? Is it okay to flip off CNN to catch the season premiere of "Friends"? How can any of us think about having fun when something this horrible has happened?\nSome things about living life in this country will never be the same after Sept. 11. As a country and as individuals we aren't going to think the same way or act the same way ever again. It's important to remember that people very close to us are suffering and that our country is in trouble. \nAfter switching off "Bring It On" last weekend I turned back to CNN in time to catch more news. A report came through about a passenger on one of the hijacked planes who managed to contact a relative via cell phone before he died. His last words to the relative were "Live your life." And although many of us feel bad about cheering at a baseball game or taking a tropical vacation, we have to go on and live our lives, not just for ourselves but for those people who will never have the chance to finish living theirs.