Laurie Campbell wrote:

> At 9/11 there was an utter, complete, eerie silence over the entire city.
> People didn't even leave their motors idling during the minute. Even
> weirder, instead of standing with heads bowed, they were looking up the
> heighth of the skyscrapers.

In school, we had minutes of silence, both the week of 9/11 and
at the one-year anniversary. I made sure to talk to my students
(both times) about what was expected behaviorally (i.e. "sit
still, don't shuffle, and be silent"), why we did what we were
doing, that it was (as you said) an "expected thing" in our
society (i.e. "it's polite, guys"), and the slightly-cynical
what-you're-supposed-to-be-doing-internally (i.e. "I don't care,
as long as you behave properly. What you do in your head is up to
you. You could pray; you could review your spelling words; heck,
you could decide what you're going to wear tomorrow. Nobody cares
what you do in your head at a time like that. But you need to
behave").

At Tyee, the week of 9/11, I think there was a lot of serious
consideration going on. Here at Cedarcrest, I'm not so sure; I
think these kids might be a bit too young to really comprehend.
But then again, I might be doing them a disservice by saying
that, too.

> The rest of them evidently left no mark at all, because I have no memory of
> the events themselves, even though I know there must have been a minute of
> silence for such people as Winston Churchill

I don't remember any other moments of silence in my life--though
I do remember some of the happenings. I remember Reagan being
shot, and the Pope; and I definitely remember the Challenger
disaster. But I don't remember moments of silence for any of
them, either.

Lissa TheyHaveToLearn Wingling

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