No, this is not the Challenger. We’ve grown too coarse, too cynical, and too jaded. The NYTimes says, the nation’s instinctive reaction was to ask, “What’s next?”. Talking to friends and family leads me to believe the NYTimes got it right. Many discussions were attempts at avoiding the subject. Our skin just got thicker. Our wagons circled tighter. Most parents I know didn’t allow their children to watch TV and they didn’t hear the President’s attempt to comfort the nation. In fact, one said outright, “I just don’t want it on TV. What else is there to talk about? Get it off the news”.
I’m going to take a moment not to think about tomorrow, but to say a prayer for those who just lost a loved one and ask for the strength to not further recoil into my own skin.
Garret says, in my favorite weblogger essay yesterday, “there are a lot of ways to die, some ‘good,’ some ‘bad.’ these astronauts lost their lives in action, doing something they loved. in the midst of our horror at their fates, their sacrifice deserves respect, and honour.” Indeed, “space travellers are a special breed; and they come from all nations”.
And that is where Man’s destiny hides. Across the boundries. Not hiding in caves from the coming storm. In a day where personal trust is at an all time low, a generational trend that started 30 years ago, it’s a fight that always deserves to be waged.
Links:
Scripting News – Terrific linkage at a time of sorrow. Many of the links below are pulled from here. I couldn’t find the will to post yesterday.
Similarly, Metafilter was very active yesterday in it’s discussion threads.
MP3 (right click and download): Julia Ecklar singing “The Phoenix” via Code the Web Socket. A touching and powerful folk tune that fits the moment.
Don’t miss reading Meryl’s “Requiem for Columbia” and Shelley’s “What the Shuttles have given us”. You’ll get some indicators as to why I feel the way I do from what some have posted in Shelley’s comments.
In the 80s: I Remember the Challenger. Hundreds of personal recollections of that terrible day.
Go at Throttle-Up, “It would never occur to a baby-boomer that anything associated with the shuttle could have historical significance. Having lived through the heady excitement of real history-makers like Mercury and Apollo, boomers see the shuttle as an afterthought, an unglamorous eighteen-wheeler hauling satellites to and from orbit.”
Poynter Online – a huge collection of related links.
Just as after the Challenger accident, a chorus rises for the Shuttle program to end.
From 1980, Washington Monthly, Beam Me Out Of This Death Trap, Scotty.
The Corner thinks out loud about perfectly normal people starting to think about “Signs” and links to a 1998 Peggy Noonan article.
Finally, the obligatory, they were warned story. It’s always the same isn’t it?