Patriotism
Where to start. I will get running out of the way. I made up last week's failed long run attempt again at the beginning of this week, and I actually made it the full 80 minutes, and it wasn't altogether horrible. I made it 7.4 miles (average per-mile pace of 10:49), and maybe I could have tried to go faster, but I was okay with it. I actually really sort of enjoyed miles four and five, no clue why. Tomorrow I'll run again on the last day of the year.
It's been a holiday season of movies for sure. It's Complicated was funny and cute, and I'd be lying if I didn't admit that my very favorite person in the movie was John Krasinski (Jim Halpert), who pretty much stole every scene he was in, as I told mo, with his comedic adorableness. I didn't love it the way I loved another Nancy Meyers film, Something's Gotta Give, but I definitely had a good time watching it. Next was Nine. I have to say that I understand why a lot of people would not enjoy this movie and might actually hate it, but I liked it! Mostly I just liked Marion Cotillard, the most beautiful woman on planet earth, as far as I'm concerned. Her part, her first song, and her overall gloriously luminous face were the best things about the movie by a mile. (Hear the whole song here. Just trust me. It was gorgeous.)
Today I went to the big city with my parents and little brother to have a totally delicious lunch of crab gumbo, grilled shrimp, fish, shrimp etouffee, bread pudding with whiskey sauce -- pretty much straight ridiculousness. It was off the charts fantastic. We headed in the rain afterwards to a museum where we watched a new film and visited the exhibits. It was all very stirring, as you can imagine, and I think we all felt a bit raw emotionally on the drive home in the pouring rain. I made the mistake of trying (and failing) to articulate effectively some of my mixed feelings after seeing the movie and visiting the museum. About how it's hard for me to feel pumped up about America and victory while feeling overwhelmed, sick, and sad at the same time. About how everything and everyone now presents it as fact that we did the right thing in bombing Japan, but is that just spin to justify that we did it? Well, this did not go over very well.
I try to remember that my parents were born in 1946 and grew up with a different perspective on this, having parents and siblings who lived through it all. And I know that they think I Just Don't Get It. And I know that I don't. I have tried to get it, though, I really have. I took something like 27 hours of history classes in college, trying to understand. I spent days in Normandy (series of entries starts here) and at the Imperial War Museum in London and the Holocaust Museum in D.C., trying to understand. I dined at the same table as an English D-Day veteran and talked to him about it, trying to understand. I watched and cried through hours upon hours of The War, trying to understand. I have rented untold numbers of WWII documentaries on everything from the Battle of the Bulge (which basically caused me to have an emotional breakdown) to hidden Jewish children and Anne Frank and Hitler's final days to the Berlin Airlift, trying to understand. I was lucky enough to go on a special tour of Pearl Harbor, where I kept on trying to understand. Today was my third visit to this museum. What I'm saying is that I've tried to expose myself to lots of different avenues of understanding. But still. I do not.
It's just impossible for me to process. Maybe it's impossible for anyone to process, and maybe that's why it's all boiled down to we were right, they were wrong, the end. Maybe that's the only way that, as a nation, we could recover and heal from all that happened. My brother tried to tell me that I can't look at it through a modern filter, and maybe he's right. The wars of our lifetime have certainly not been not very clear cut, but back then, maybe things really were a lot more black and white. I guess we had to try to win by any means necessary because losing was too unimaginable. But I swear, I was permanently changed by The Book Thief. All I could think about during the film today when they showed the rubble of a bombed German town, the shell of a burning community, were the people who lived there, who probably were poor and starving and completely effed by the Fuhrer and now dead. And that ultimately it was his fault, not ours. And that ultimately the deaths in Japan were the psycho, un-surrendering emperor's fault, not ours. Right? I just cannot deal with the fact that so many regular, innocent people died who were just living their lives. And I can't even begin to deal with all of the soldiers and military people who died. I mean, I just can't. It actually sits on my chest like a weight, especially after days like today.
And when I tried to explain this, the reaction was that I was simply wrong and we had no choice and we saved the world and that's that. And -- yes. I get that. Of course I recognize that unspeakable horrors and atrocities were being committed that needed to be stopped. Of course I am glad that we won the war and liberated the camps and ended the power of the reigning mega-crazies and appreciate the sacrifices made by millions and recognize, on some level, that we did what we had to do. But it doesn't make me want to stand up and cheer; it makes me feel like throwing up because all I see is the death and destruction. And I think what I did the worst job of explaining today is that while the movie was very cool and riveting, I don't like things that pat America on the back to the extreme about how right we were and are about everything and emphasize that we are the best country ever, because I get icky associations of "enemy" countries patting themselves on the back using the same reasoning about how they're right about everything and are really the best. It is like I am hyper-propaganda-paranoid. IS THAT CRAZY? I think maybe it is. I think this is what sent my family over the edge on the way home. But I can't help it! I think I am in the midst of a personal patriotism crisis! I am just trying to honestly reflect upon this and figure out what it all means. Maybe at the end of the day, part of being alive is being for your own country. Like how you're for the college football team in the town where you were born. Maybe it's just what people are supposed to do.
I think I'll just go watch this and cry some more.
It's been a holiday season of movies for sure. It's Complicated was funny and cute, and I'd be lying if I didn't admit that my very favorite person in the movie was John Krasinski (Jim Halpert), who pretty much stole every scene he was in, as I told mo, with his comedic adorableness. I didn't love it the way I loved another Nancy Meyers film, Something's Gotta Give, but I definitely had a good time watching it. Next was Nine. I have to say that I understand why a lot of people would not enjoy this movie and might actually hate it, but I liked it! Mostly I just liked Marion Cotillard, the most beautiful woman on planet earth, as far as I'm concerned. Her part, her first song, and her overall gloriously luminous face were the best things about the movie by a mile. (Hear the whole song here. Just trust me. It was gorgeous.)
Today I went to the big city with my parents and little brother to have a totally delicious lunch of crab gumbo, grilled shrimp, fish, shrimp etouffee, bread pudding with whiskey sauce -- pretty much straight ridiculousness. It was off the charts fantastic. We headed in the rain afterwards to a museum where we watched a new film and visited the exhibits. It was all very stirring, as you can imagine, and I think we all felt a bit raw emotionally on the drive home in the pouring rain. I made the mistake of trying (and failing) to articulate effectively some of my mixed feelings after seeing the movie and visiting the museum. About how it's hard for me to feel pumped up about America and victory while feeling overwhelmed, sick, and sad at the same time. About how everything and everyone now presents it as fact that we did the right thing in bombing Japan, but is that just spin to justify that we did it? Well, this did not go over very well.
I try to remember that my parents were born in 1946 and grew up with a different perspective on this, having parents and siblings who lived through it all. And I know that they think I Just Don't Get It. And I know that I don't. I have tried to get it, though, I really have. I took something like 27 hours of history classes in college, trying to understand. I spent days in Normandy (series of entries starts here) and at the Imperial War Museum in London and the Holocaust Museum in D.C., trying to understand. I dined at the same table as an English D-Day veteran and talked to him about it, trying to understand. I watched and cried through hours upon hours of The War, trying to understand. I have rented untold numbers of WWII documentaries on everything from the Battle of the Bulge (which basically caused me to have an emotional breakdown) to hidden Jewish children and Anne Frank and Hitler's final days to the Berlin Airlift, trying to understand. I was lucky enough to go on a special tour of Pearl Harbor, where I kept on trying to understand. Today was my third visit to this museum. What I'm saying is that I've tried to expose myself to lots of different avenues of understanding. But still. I do not.
It's just impossible for me to process. Maybe it's impossible for anyone to process, and maybe that's why it's all boiled down to we were right, they were wrong, the end. Maybe that's the only way that, as a nation, we could recover and heal from all that happened. My brother tried to tell me that I can't look at it through a modern filter, and maybe he's right. The wars of our lifetime have certainly not been not very clear cut, but back then, maybe things really were a lot more black and white. I guess we had to try to win by any means necessary because losing was too unimaginable. But I swear, I was permanently changed by The Book Thief. All I could think about during the film today when they showed the rubble of a bombed German town, the shell of a burning community, were the people who lived there, who probably were poor and starving and completely effed by the Fuhrer and now dead. And that ultimately it was his fault, not ours. And that ultimately the deaths in Japan were the psycho, un-surrendering emperor's fault, not ours. Right? I just cannot deal with the fact that so many regular, innocent people died who were just living their lives. And I can't even begin to deal with all of the soldiers and military people who died. I mean, I just can't. It actually sits on my chest like a weight, especially after days like today.
And when I tried to explain this, the reaction was that I was simply wrong and we had no choice and we saved the world and that's that. And -- yes. I get that. Of course I recognize that unspeakable horrors and atrocities were being committed that needed to be stopped. Of course I am glad that we won the war and liberated the camps and ended the power of the reigning mega-crazies and appreciate the sacrifices made by millions and recognize, on some level, that we did what we had to do. But it doesn't make me want to stand up and cheer; it makes me feel like throwing up because all I see is the death and destruction. And I think what I did the worst job of explaining today is that while the movie was very cool and riveting, I don't like things that pat America on the back to the extreme about how right we were and are about everything and emphasize that we are the best country ever, because I get icky associations of "enemy" countries patting themselves on the back using the same reasoning about how they're right about everything and are really the best. It is like I am hyper-propaganda-paranoid. IS THAT CRAZY? I think maybe it is. I think this is what sent my family over the edge on the way home. But I can't help it! I think I am in the midst of a personal patriotism crisis! I am just trying to honestly reflect upon this and figure out what it all means. Maybe at the end of the day, part of being alive is being for your own country. Like how you're for the college football team in the town where you were born. Maybe it's just what people are supposed to do.
I think I'll just go watch this and cry some more.
Labels: half-marathon training, heavy, history, movies, running
posted by eliza @ 8:06 PM
8 Comments:
I love "The War" so much-- WWII is fascinating to me. My Mom gave me that DVD set for Christmas...I'll probably put that in as I "undecorate" this weekend. I want to go to New Orleans to the D-Day museum.
I was born in 1945 and my husband in 1846 and we both agree with you. Some people think we're saving the world now, from Islamic Extremism or some such thing -- they're the ones who are wrong.
You're not alone. I have such a hard time wrapping my head around all the atrocities committed by both sides in WW2. For me, what is so galling is the fact that the US did not get involved until PH; think of all that time Europe suffered under Hitler while America stood by idly. Even in Asia, when the Japanese invaded Korea and the like, our country did nothing. To roll on in then in 1941/2 and be all "we're here to save the day" is pretty sad, you know? It's good that evil was conquered and all that, but...you know. It's hard to explain how you can have feelings of shame and pride all wrapped up together.
It's also pretty disingenuous to always paint America as the saving grace across the globe. From our own First Nation to the Philippines and even today, it seems like we cause more harm than good under the guise of helping.
I completely understand. The more movies I watch and history classes I take and foreign countries I visit, the more convinced I become that it was luck, not any particular moral righteousness, that we ended up on the "right side" of WWII. And lord knows most other wars are considerably less clear. I am sorry that you feel dismissed when you try to talk about this--I can imagine the same conversation going down in my family, which is why we stick to talk about football.
My folks are 12 years older than yours - and my dad is Czech and was in Czechoslovakia during the war. They live in the Czech Republic and every time I visit, I am struck anew how the war is still remembered in a way that it simply is not in the US. I have relatives in Plzen- and that is as far as the Americans agreed to liberate within Czechoslovakia- and people there still praise the Americans like crazy.
So, all that said- you are absolutely right. We pat ourselves on the back, encourage nationalism to the extreme and still think we should be out "saving the world."
I do think you are seeing it in modern terms. There are some people who feel that America waited too long to get involved. If we had entered the war earlier, maybe fewer civilians and soldiers would have lived. It is like a monday morning quarterback. Now you have time to review documentaries, but for them, the wolf was at the door. Choices had to be made and we happened to make the choice that ended the madness of the time. It is impossible to know what the world would have been if we hadn't made the difficult choice.
I believe we can be proud of the choices made. If we had not stepped in what might have happened? It is easier to count the lives lost than the lives saved. Saying that we made the right and courageous choice does not mean that you should not recognize and honor the sacrifice of those who served and remember those who lost their lives. It is possible to do both.
Thanks, all, for sharing your thoughts. I appreciate hearing them very much. I was so very emotional when writing this post, and a day later, I am a bit more clearheaded, I think. I know I'm in no position to judge what happened or the reasons why ... I just want to ask questions and try to understand ... maybe I am asking the wrong questions ... maybe understanding is not possible and coming to terms with that fact is the best thing to do. I really do love my country ... Happy New Year to you all.
I think of this line: "My country, right or wrong: when right, to be kept right, when wrong, to be put right."
I do believe that dissent is patriotic. And I do believe that even the wars we didn't live through are our own history, they belong to us too.
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