Spring Break Report

Just returned from a 3 1/2 day trip to New York City with the wife and daughters. View image Given the demographic composition of the group—4 females, 1 male—much of our activity centered on shopping.

We did manage to get in a show—a brand new big-budget, elaborate-sets-and-costumes musical called Pirate Queen. (I may post a review later). And, because my standard quid pro quo for going along with all the shopping is that we have to do equal time in museums, we hit the Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art for some cultural horizon-expansion.

Because we are big watchers of the TV Food Network, the highlight of the trip was probably dinner at Bobby Flay's newest restaurant, Bar Americain. We had heard that he is frequently present in their open kitchen and, sure enough, he was there when we walked in.

We had an absolutely incredible, if pricey, meal. At one point Flay came out from behind the kitchen counter and mingled among the tables, chatting with the customers. He didn't make it to our table and it's probably a good thing. My bride was determined to have him slide into our booth for a picture—a prospect that mortified my teenagers.

Took the girls up the Empire State building. Walked around Little Italy and had a great lunch in a sidewalk cafe. Went to Ground Zero and visited the memorial center. There I felt all the 9/11 emotions all over again. Sorrow, shock, and fury in equal measure.

As we walked away I thought about the quote attributed to the Japanese General Yamamoto after the attack on Pearl Harbor: "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve."

It occurred to me that if some "general" in Al Qaeda thought something similar after 9/11 he was laughably wrong. Our wakefulness and resolve lasted about six weeks.

We are not awake. We are not resolute.

John Stewart mocks the president while millions laugh and nod. Congressmen "support the troops" by undermining their morale and decrying their mission. The media make celebrities of liars like Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame and make pariahs of men like Vice President Cheney who are doing the hard, thankless work of fighting for Western Civilization.

As we walked away from the hole in the ground where colossal buildings once stood I thought: "9/11 awakened not a sleeping giant, but a petulant child."

Posted by David at March 19, 2007 12:04 AM