reflections on the trauma of my age

These past few weeks in my visual culture of politics class we have been focusing on trauma in art, more specifically on the influences of trauma on memorials. In an effort to make fresh the greatest trauma of the majority of our class's lives we watched different footage of the falling of the world trade centers on September 11, 2001. To be quite honest apart from that day and the following weeks, as well as the occasional footage screened on the anniversaries of the even I had not seen or watched any images of the falling of the twin towers. For me this moment in class brought back a lot of strong memories, ones that viewing the new 9/11 memorial in New York doesn't quite bring to surface. I was in the 6th grade, in my health class. These classes were held in two mobile homes outside of the main school building, later on the significance of being away from the main school would hit me, but not at the time of course...I was only 11. I vaguely remember another teacher coming in and telling something to my teacher after which we were ushered back into the building, and the humming in the halls about the planes having hit the World Trade Centers was everywhere. I can honestly say that as an 11 year old from Kentucky, and not a very worldly 11 year old at that, I had no idea what the World Trade Centers were, and how this news could possibly impact my life. It wasn't until we were brought into my English class and our teacher had the news on, and we witnessed the planes flying into the buildings, did I begin to fathom the magnitude of this horrific event. I haven't really pondered these memories many times in my life, but watching the footage that a family filmed that lived directly across the street from the buildings made me think of where I was that day and what I was feeling. It wasn't nearly as horrific as witnessing the even 500 yards away, but it still left an impact on my short life. When we began looking at memorials in class we focused on Maya Lin's Vietnam War memorial as well as the new 9/11 memorial. It was interesting to study the differences in feelings one has in viewing these memorials, and the peaceful intimacy that ensues as compared to the violence of what they are meant to represent. I personally believe that the footage from the New York apartment has a bigger impact, although that may not necessarily be a good thing. The memorials are poignant reminders of what happened, which serve as a way to lead us into our own thoughts and recollections. I think memorials serve as an integral part of society, and they can have as much of an impact as footage in this digital age.