Where I Stand — Brian Greenspun: Rising above sadness

Friday, Sept. 14, 2001 | 9:15 a.m.

Brian Greenspun is editor of the Las Vegas Sun.

"DO YOU THINK we will ever be happy again?"

That was the question I was asked before bed the other night. It is the same one that millions of Americans asked themselves in the wake of the World Trade Center disasters. The answer, however unbelievable today, is as certain as the sunrise. Yes.

The news in New York and at the Pentagon gets increasingly worse as the digging out from the rubble continues and more bodies are found. Occasionally, there are bright spots ... like the firemen who walked out or were found in the protection of an SUV ... but, with each passing hour the worst fears of families who have been surviving on hope alone are realized.

It is hard to smile when the news continues to be so sad. But, then, every once in awhile, some good news reaches out and touches the millions of Americans who are looking for something to feel good about. Take for instance the New York family that had two children working, one in the World Trade Center and one, you guessed it, in the Pentagon.

The odds were not good for that family, but something smiled upon them because both young people are alive. Those stories, however, are few and far between.

Right now communities around the country are doing what they can to support New York and Washington in this time of great need. They are also doing their best to get back to life as normally as they can. Decisions are being made daily whether sporting events are to be held or postponed. Thankfully, most are being postponed out of respect for the dead and, I imagine, the realities of travel that make playing those games problematic.

Decisions about other, less frivolous pursuits are also being made. Some charitable dinners, which have been long planned, are being postponed, while others are going ahead. There are good and valid reasons for both decisions and who can say which ones are right and which are wrong. The fact of the matter is that we must go on, we must continue our lives and our commitments to our communities. And we must, above all else, show our young people that in the face of devastation, Americans pick themselves up and get back in the race.

Will we smile again? I think as each day goes by and we understand the depth of the American resolve to rebuild our lives, we will take from that experience a belief that life in this country is a blessing and that will give us reason to be happy. We will see the miracles of survival on our television sets and read about them in our newspapers and we will have moments to rejoice and be thankful that we live in the greatest country of them all. That should bring a smile to our lips, however difficult it is when tears still stream down our cheeks.

As we return to our daily lives, hopefully without the same level of cynicism for government and our leadership as we harbored the day before the new world began, we will find other reasons to rejoice, to be happy. For one, we will continue to witness, as we already have, the ability of the politicians at all levels of government to speak as Americans first, with whatever comes second on hold until our current work is done.

That alone should give most people a reason to smile if not a well-deserved chuckle at how stupid and petty the partisanship has gotten over the past couple of decades. We have a grave matter to attend to and the fact that we can do so as Americans should give us all pause to consider what kind of political world we want to return to when this work is done.

And, finally, while I suspect there will be more sadness to come on our soil once President George W. Bush decides to show the bad guys the kind of war they started Tuesday morning, the fact of the matter is that this time and this effort is long overdue. If he leads us properly, and there is no reason to believe he won't, the price of freedom for future generations will be relatively low, compared to what it would be if we continue to do nothing.

I always believed that the generation after mine would know war no more. Having to face our children and explain the inexplicable, imagine the unimaginable and believe the unbelievable has been a process I never thought would happen.

Well, it has. And it has happened to every American and freedom-loving and respecting person on the planet. Will we ever be able to smile again? Can we be happy?

You bet. It may take a few more months, but it will happen.