We were all kinder, gentler

The Boston Herald

Beverly Beckham

It's all going back to the way it was before September 11th. But how can it?

Is this our fate? Court TV and celebrity news and issues we knew four short months ago were a waste of time are still a waste of time.

Thomas Junta has been charged with beating his son's hockey coach, Michael Costin, to death at the Burlington Ice Arena in Reading 18 months ago. This 275-pound man allegedly smashed the head of the 150-pound Costin against the ground until Costin lost consciousness. What more do we need to know?

So why the national coverage? Why the day-to-day dissection of anger gone awry? Why the news updates, the talk-show discussions, the media frenzy about what is indisputably a horrific crime, but not, as some would have it, a trend? Will we be better people for having watched this sideshow?

On Sept. 11 we realized how much of what we thought was important, is not. We learned this in a flash, as we watched the towers crumble and we dialed everyone we knew to make sure the people we loved were safe. All the things we were talking about on Sept. 10 - U.S. Rep. Gary Condit and the missing intern, Danny Almonte and the missing year he hid from Little League officials, killer sharks and their growing propensity to attack humans - after the 11th didn't seem worth talking about anymore.

For after Sept. 11 we knew with certainty that the most important thing in life is life - living it, respecting it, appreciating it and protecting it. For a time, in the beginning, when TV was a magnet and we couldn't pull away, we went so far as to love people we didn't even know. Human life was suddenly precious. Strangers had shown us this, men and women who turned and ran toward disaster, into burning buildings and into danger, in an attempt to save the lives of people they might not have liked if they had met them on a train or at a diner. That they died for these people, that they gave up their futures, their families, everything, changed us.

How could we dare to even think an unkind thought about a man driving in front of us or a woman sitting next to us? How could we not be kinder and wiser and more generous and patient toward every person we met?

On Sept. 11 we were transformed. We saw one another in a new light and in the same light. We were all under the gun together. And for a while this made everyone equal.

Now here we are, still at war, still on alert, still watching the bodies of firefighters being pulled from the wreckage, and we're slipping back into our old ways, mixing crime with entertainment, just as we did with O.J. Why are we wasting time - time we weren't even sure we would get a few months ago - on a man who beat another man to death?

Why didn't we know about the situation in Afghanistan? Why didn't we know about Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda and the disdain of many Muslims for the West? This is what we asked again and again after we were attacked.

We didn't know because we weren't paying attention. And we're starting to not pay attention again.

There's been a shift somehow. Is it the new year? Do we think the worst is past? Are the year 2001 and all the feelings it evoked history?

People aren't as nice anymore. Why? Where did the "We're all in this together" go?

We're still at war. Anthrax is still out there. There's conflict throughout the world and people in countries whose names we don't know who hate us because we don't even know the names of their countries.

In our own back yard, crime is thriving, there are more homeless than shelter beds, hospitals are running on empty and premiums for medical insurance are devouring fixed incomes. With all this going on - and these are just a few of the challenges facing us - what are we doing focusing on one man with a behavior problem?

Three thousand people died on Sept. 11 and we owe them something. It's not enough that we remember them. We need to remember how we felt the day they died, connected, not just to them but to everyone. That's the gift they gave us.

Fences were scaled. Borders were crossed. Priorities were adjusted. Finally, we got it. We were one nation under God. The things that divided us were forgotten. And in the ensuing days we realized how much of our lives had been consumed with things that don't count. And how precious little time had been spent on the things that do.