In the Wake of the Tsunami

Sharing Saturday

I woke up my nine year old son with a bribe yesterday morning: "If you get up now, you'll get to see the tsunami hit Hawaii live."

Needless to say, my geography-loving boy scrambled out of bed and was downstairs in his footie pajamas faster than you can say "earthquake." Hawaii? Cool.

We turned on both the computer and the television to see where we would get the best live streaming video, and sat down with our Cheerios, waiting, somewhat nervously, for disaster. He even calculated the exact moment of impact based on what one reporter said was the expected timing of the wave.

As it turns out, the tsunami did not hit Hawaii as expected at that moment, and we instead packed up lunch and his backpack and head out to school before there was anything to watch live.  We did see some video footage of the earthquake hitting Japan from earlier in the morning, and the terrible clip of one town that got washed away by the tsunami there, but I have to admit, watching the devastation left in the wake of the disaster wasn't nearly as thrilling (but in a terrible, looming way) as waiting to see what would happen next.

It reminded me of sitting on the couch nursing this same child, nearly 10 years ago, and watching the Twin Towers and Pentagon smolder and the world as we know it change forever, live and right before my very eyes.

My son will always live in a world of 24/7 news and information, and he will always have the opportunity to watch events unfold as they are happening. He was born into a moment of utter destruction (he arrived three weeks prior to 9/11) and he will never know what the world was like before that moment.

In his world, he will always have immediate access to information about any major event. However, unlike with many things affected by the rapid pace of technological developments, I don’t have mixed feelings about this. I think it's a good thing.

Of course, it is an unbelievably important technological development that we can warn people about imminent disaster with greater assurance and dispatch than ever before. Untold numbers of lives can and will be saved by technology as the tsunami crashes across the Pacific Ocean and tsunami warnings can be pitched out in time for people to make it to higher ground.

And technology helps with quicker aid to victims, more monies raised in a shorter amount of time, iPhone apps and texting donations being the most recent innovation to help with disaster relief. 

But unlike my musings about Facebook as an appropriate vehicle for moment-by-moment revelations of a personal disaster, I think the ability to watch more global disasters unfold live is something that brings us together.

You couldn't peel me off the couch on 9/11 – I had my baby in my arms, and I could not take my eyes off the television for 9, 10, 12 hours running. I was hypnotized and paralyzed by what was unfolding in front of our eyes. At one point later in the day, when I noticed my neighbor coming home, I got up for a brief moment and ran out into the street and straight into her arms. We cried together that day – terrified that our world was falling apart, and that our children were no longer safe. We were connected.

Several years later, I was similarly riveted to the downing of the small airplane carrying John F. Kennedy, Jr. and his wife, Carolyn Bessette. My husband could not understand my gawker reflex. Even though the death of these two individuals had no bearing on my life, I felt deeply saddened, involved, and connected to the tragedy. Same with the loss of Princess Diana. I mourned her for days, weeks, and I watched that revolving door swing around at the Paris hotel, portending doom, and the devastating car chase under the Paris streets , over and over and over again.

The first public tragedy I remember witnessing was the shooting of President Reagan, although I was only 17 and a newly-minted freshman in college who did not support his policies. I was slightly stunned but not terribly moved by it. It wasn't until I moved to Washington, DC a few years later and walked by the "Reagan Hilton" almost every day that its true impact began to dawn on me.

However, I really remember the Challenger disaster. I was working in my first job, standing in the stationery storage closet, and someone had a radio on nearby, documenting the explosion.  I cried along with everyone else in my office.

It's these moments of collective experience and mourning that link us together as a nation and as a people. Just like my parents' generation remembers where they were when JFK was shot, my generation remembers where they were when John Lennon was shot ... when the Challenger exploded ... and on 9/11. It doesn't matter whether it is a diaster that has hit a remote part of the world, the death of an important politician or the loss of a celebrity who has simply touched our lives. It is the human aspect that factors in ... and we all relate to it on that level.

I believe that watching the events unfold live weaves us even more closely together. For all the despair around how isolated we are as a society, about how we live in our own silos and that technology is forcing us even deeper into those solitary cells by individualizing everything we see, hear and play with, I still hold out hope. I think that by sharing these global experiences, whether on your computer screen, your touch pad, your television, or even by old fashioned radio (and how grateful are the people of Japan today for old fashioned radio waves?) I think that we then come together with a collective sense of belonging to the human race.

Just look at the outpouring of support for the American Red Cross and American Jewish World Service and other disaster relief agencies whenever something of this magnitude hits. We may suffer from some philanthropic disaster fatigue from time to time, but ultimately, we prevail. We take out our wallets, we open our hearts to the wind, and we come together, as human beings, to watch, to mourn and to begin building anew.

Comments

[Karen]

Wow.....this is a wonderful article. I paused at the end and had some time of reflection myself, I related to everything you said. Thanks for sharing.

Karen Matson
Colorado

[S Pritch]

What?!? Hurry, son, wake up so you can see a horrible tragedy, isn't this exciting?!? Oh, no, sorry, it didn't hit so get along to school, I'll let you know when the next devastation happens so we can watch it together... Am I the only one troubled by what you are offering your son? While I agree with most of the rest of your article: our technology has brought the world together, furthering understanding, help, healing, even love; but I just can't get over how you are helping create the next generation of "lookie-loos" slowing down the freeway to get a glimpse of someone injured or worse. The more tragedy our children see when young, the more they become accustomed to it and the less of an impact it is. Now, I'm not saying don't share the information with your children, but sit down and TALK about it while watching so they understand what is going on, don't up-play it as entertainment over your breakfast cheerios. While watching, come up with ideas with your children as to how they and you can go about helping those in the tragedy. Now that is powerful!
I know my family's hearts are with those affected by the earthquake and resulting tsunami and we will be holding a community yard sale tomorrow with all proceeds going to those in need...my daughter's idea that the community embraced immediately!

[Kim]

"If you get up now, you'll get to see the tsunami hit Hawaii live!"

"but I have to admit, watching the devastation left in the wake of the disaster wasn't nearly as thrilling as waiting to see what would happen next."

So you were excited by the thought of something as devastating happening again and maybe seeing it live? You really seem to be a sick person. It's equally sick that you "bribe" your child with footage of horrible horrible events. It's one thing to watch the footage to understand the horrible events that have happened to people and quite another to be excited to watch it live and using it as a way for you and your child to spend time together. Do you or your child realize how much was lost and lives that were lost as you were enjoying the thrill of the footage?

Sick.

[Puzzlesguide]

"...the tsunami did not hit Hawaii as expected... and we were forced to... head out to school before there was anything really good to watch..."

wow! you are one sick puppy. talk about schadenfreude! ach de lieber!

[Karen]

I appreciate the feedback, both negative and positive. In re-reading my post, which I admit, I had written hastily yesterday morning, I realize that the first part does come off sounding insensitive to the terrible disaster that had occurred. It was not my intention. I struggled with how to talk about the event in terms of my own lens on life, and as such, I crossed a line, and for that, I am sorry.

I'll also note that my family had a conversation in the car today coming home from our morning at synagogue (where our congregation said a prayer for the victims of yesterday's tragedy) and we discussed the now-threat of nuclear fallout with our kids. It was a heavy conversation and thoroughly frightening for our children and even for us.

I agree with the poster who talked about what is appropriate to share with our kids in that I want to shield my kids from some of the terrible reality of war and natural acts of disaster, while at the same time, they are old enough to hear about and learn about it anyway, so I want them to learn it from me.

I did write a post last year after the Haitian earthquake about how difficult and challenging these conversations can be. I appreciate how sensitive people are feeling about yesterday's sad event and indeed, every disaster that hits our world. I am grateful that both Hawaii and the west coast of the US were spared the worst of the tsunami, and I hope for the people of Japan and the whole world that the rebuilding can begin quickly and our worst fears about the potential for nuclear accidents will not be realized.

[mulberry alexa outlet]

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