What are your generation's memorable moments?
I would say the date known at 9/11 is a memorable one for me, mostly
because it changed the emotional landscape of the United States. I was
living in northern New York at the time, at my first job at a small
college, after receiving my doctoral degree. My family was a six hour
drive away, and my brother John was flying from Boston to Florida on
business. His plane was missing for twelve hours, and we were out of
contact with him until the next day, when we heard it had been rerouted
to Colorado.
That made me want to return to New England, and be closer to my large, extended family.
Another memorable moment was the election of President Barack Obama. I
was working on his campaign in Maine. As the first African American
president, also smart, charismatic, fairly young, and dedicated to many
of my ideals, it seems a promising time for a new America. Well, change
takes time....
I would also say that 9/11 is the event I remember the most vividly. My mum and I went to my friend's flat, so that he wouldn't be alone until his mother came back from working at the newspaper, and it was there that I first saw the footage of the planes hitting the towers. I remember everyone being very worried about what consequences the attacks would bring. There was even some talk of the Third World War. Waiting to hear from your brother that day must have been excruciating. I also remember Slovenia joining the EU a few years later as something that was in the public consciousness a lot, but I don't have a specific memory of where I was when it happened. Perhaps that's because it was more of a process than an event.
ReplyDeleteI would also say 9/11. I believe that most of the people that belong to my generation remember this day.
ReplyDeleteSorry to hear about the ordeal you went through not knowing what happened to your brother. A moment can sometimes last forever and as we see not necessarily in a good way. How much time constitutes a moment and which are more memorable? And is there such a thing as parallel generations? I for one feel part of a number of different cultures, and thus generations as well. And there is the age factor as well.
ReplyDeleteI am a bit older than my colleagues and for that generation the most memorable moments will be several moments connected to the 90s war, either in Slovenia or other ex-Yugoslav republics. In terms of knowing where I was when something major happened, I do still also remember even the fall of the Berlin wall, albeit pretty vaguley as I was a toddler. And Slovenia's first independence day.
For my younger generation(s), I would have to agree that 9/11 was a fairly memorable day to us as well. And Schengen and the day we got our new common currency and lost our old. For that matter, even previous curency-switches were memorable. Not to exhaust the list, there are quite a few.