Before and After

We all remember the moments in our lives when there was a before and an after.

We have personal milestones that changed everything. For me those personal milestones revolve around the people I love.

I have always been someone who looks at a date and can immediately bring back that date’s memory. I have always wondered whether other people have a mental calendar the way I do where I work through the year, every year remembering the night I met Bruce, the night we got engaged, the day my father had a massive heart attack and then stroke, the day my Mom’s surgery took her life and other pivotal moments in my life. The recent births of babies and weddings are high on my list, too. All share one thing — those dates changed something forever. These dates acknowledge points where certain aspects of my life are always going to fall into before and after categories. They are my micro moments that together have created the tapestry of my life.

This weekend I thought about the universal moments — the macro moments — that have affected our society. While there have been social trends in our lives those trends have been gradual and we don’t always recognize exact moments or like with Columbine and Sandy Hook, policy changes fail and even actions like March for Our Lives haven’t affected the dynamic as expected. The increase in hate and Anti-Semitism also can’t be pinpointed to a single incident. For the general public, before and after for these societal changes aren’t as clear cut.

All weekend I reflected on the current environment and realized that In my lifetime there are two moments in time that remind me — of societal moments of before and an after.

When I was an elementary school student, I remember with clarity the day JFK was assassinated. I can picture Mrs. Emrich pulling the tv over on the AV cart and remember leaving school and taking two buses to visit Mrs. Dachman, my second grade teacher who was recovering from back surgery. I can remember understanding that this was something monumental, but even knowing that, as a child, it wasn’t as obvious as one would think. The next day, I went ahead with my plans to go to downtown Cleveland with my friend Pam Whitfield. I remember seeing banks of TVs at the department stores all tuned to the news. But I was a little girl and what was more important to me was getting my frosty at Higbees before we hopped on the rapid transit to come home.

As I look back, knowing now what I didn’t know then, that weekend was a “before and after moment” for our nation. The political assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr and Robert F. Kennedy and others had dramatic effects on our history. But John F. Kennedy’s assassination was the pivotal before and after moment.

The second moment didn’t occur for many decades. It was a beautiful Tuesday morning and I was watching the Today Show standing on my treadmill when I saw the first footage of the plane hitting the World Trade Center and then in real time watched the second plane hit the second tower. It was the end of a feeling of security for millions of people. I don’t need to explain it. We all just know. Whether we knew one or dozens of people who perished that day or only read about them as we poured over their profiles in the newspaper, our lives were forever changed. Generations will remember where they were on September 11, 2001 and the fear and anxiety that followed.

The fall of 2001 was a time when our nation and world were on the same page. There was a feeling and expression of community that drew us together in national grief. Faces and phone number papered Penn Station and across New York City that eventually faded but one thing was clear. We were changed. There was a before and an after.

While the world has been grappling with the COVID-19 pandemic for weeks, for most Americans, today may be the day we will always remember. Actions by Governors and Mayors across the country today have been not only necessary but brave. We have no idea what comes next but the immediate future will be very different.

We are not before. We are not after. We are during.

The children and adolescents in our life might not appreciate the gravity of this moment. Someday though, they will remember and will look back and see what we did right and what we did wrong.

Let’s hope that in the days and weeks ahead we act smart, we stay safe and we come together as a community by being kind to those who need our help. That’s my plan. This baby boomer hopes it is yours, too.