In 1999 a group of neighbors in
north Berkeley held a block meeting and decided to create a traffic island at
the intersection of several busy streets – Sonoma, Hopkins and Josephine, just
behind the North Berkeley branch library - to create a safe passage for
pedestrians and a well-marked route for cars.
But a year later, on Sept. 11,
2001, the traffic island, which was still under construction, took on new
meaning after the terrorist attacks. That day, somebody posted a sign in the
triangular space: "MEET HERE AT 8:00 TONIGHT."
And they did. Few words were
spoken; few were necessary. And they kept gathering there evening after
evening.
Then somebody planted three
saplings - one at each corner of the triangle - connected them with clotheslines,
and set out blank squares of paper to be used for notes and clothespins to
attach them to the lines.
And so the writing began. Young
people and old, families, kids on their way home from school, and even whole
classrooms read the messages and wrote their own. Eventually, the triangle took
on an almost festive appearance, with the colored squares fluttering on the
clotheslines. But the atmosphere was always somber and reflective.
As autumn turned to winter, the
neighbors took down the notes, now numbering more than 1,200. One neighbor,
former City Councilwoman Mim Hawley, volunteered to store them in her closet.
Ten years later she pulled them out
and read them, and she was bowled over, both by the emotions they expressed and
the emotions they evoked in her. So she compiled a representative sample - about
280 - into an album.
Some express a hope for peace:
"Please…help me understand and
learn to forgive."
"Pray for an outcome worthy of
all the lives that were lost."
"Someday, when they tell the
stories of how the world came to live in harmony on this beautiful earth, may
they count 9/11/2001 as the beginning. May it be so."
Others are angry:
"Bomb the hell out of the
bastards who did this."
"Let's not let our spirit of
love and tolerance interfere with our basic need to eliminate our
enemies."
"Remember the people whose
last choice in life was to die by fire or jump 90 stories. UNITE to destroy
their murderers."
But the most heartbreaking messages,
as you might expect, come from children:
"I hope the people that died
in the airplane crashes will come back to life. I wish a fairy will come and do
her magic."
"I hope this never happened
and never again will. By Emma age 9."
"In our hearts we know right
from wrong, but sometimes our mind doesn't listen. Molly Rose, age 9."
"Dear people who died, I miss
you."
And one person left this heartfelt
message: "I have never believed in you, God, but now we need you. Please
come."
The album will be unveiled at a
neighborhood meeting at the North Branch library at 10 a.m. on Sept. 13, and it
will stay there, next to the checkout desk, for a month.
Then it will move to the main
library downtown and placed in its permanent home in the library's History Room.
And someday, some PhD student at
Cal who is writing a dissertation about grassroots reactions to 9/11 will be
very, very grateful.
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