Twenty days ago I left for college to study international affairs at the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. One of my friends asked me if I was ready to leave sunny southern California for the excitement of the District. I jokingly responded by saying that “it’ll be exciting unless someone wants to bomb America because I’ll be in the first place they strike.” Looking out of my New South dormitory window on Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, at a smoking Pentagon just across the Potomac River, I realized that there was no humor in my statement. The unthinkable had occurred.
So I sit and I reflect on America and on the path I have chosen for myself.
During my second weekend of college, I attended a concert outside the Capitol building where the National Symphony Orchestra was playing. While walking along the adjacent reflecting pool I felt pangs of patriotism and knew that coming to Washington, to the pulse of our country, was the best decision I could have made. A reflection I should have seen in that pond was the mirage of my interests: I feel like a fair-weather patriot in the wake of the strike against my country.
When I signed on the dotted line saying that I would pursue a course of study in foreign service, I was not sure what I wanted to do with my life.
During the months of anticipation before leaving for college, however, I had convinced myself that I wanted to pursue what Plato referred to as the most noble of goals: being a ruler. This was a task I wanted to do in any way possible, whether in diplomacy or democracy. Now, I question my motives.
The irony of the bombing of America’s defense headquarters will be a daily reminder from my “room with a view.” Why should I participate on a world scene where, randomly, a major piece of international infrastructure, the World Trade Center, can be demolished on a terroristic whim? Part of me asks why not just turn away from my original goals and do something like get a doctorate in Romantic Poetry and study Keats in a cabin where no one can threaten me or my views.
In the end, however, I realize that as a generation before me survived the cold blooded murder of John F. Kennedy and two wars, I can survive this horrific crime against humanity and against my people. Maybe the events which will follow will restore my faith in the international community or perhaps repel me further. Regardless, it appears I have had my first encounter with the turmoil of Washington, D.C.
