After 9/11

This dissertation began somewhat unintentionally in 2001 with my first visit to the overflowing shrine at Union Square Park. This week I’m looking back at the early days of this research – remembering grief materialized in resplendent shrines, identifying the overlapping layers of material offerings and reading these temporary landscapes for evidence of an emerging narrative.

Union Square Park, September 17, 2001

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We’ve all lost people we love. For me, my first encounter with death was losing my grandfather (Pops) to colon cancer when I was 11. The loss was physically agonizing.

For many months after Pops died I wrote letters to him on My Melody stationary with pink rollerball ink, telling him how much I missed him and what was on my mind. But it was never about the actual letters for me, it was about the writing. Writing was not a way of communicating with my grandfather, but a vehicle through which I engaged in the act of remembering. The letter writing slowed down over time, then stopped altogether. I suppose at some point I no longer needed it. » Read the rest of this entry «