Two years ago, we wondered if things could ever be the same, if normalcy would ever return.

Slowly, in small steps taken every day, big parts of our lives have returned to normal.

Perhaps as an odd testament to the country’s resilience, we have returned our attention to celebrity and the sensational. A kiss on MTV between Britney Spears and Madonna was big news. Politics, briefly put on hold, has returned to the Florida-esque theater of the absurd – a pitying look to our friends in California and their recall election tells the tale. And here in Maine, the issue of the day is a November vote on casino gambling.

But the shadows of that terrible September day still touch us, as individuals and as a country. The void left by the almost 3,000 dead cannot be filled. The scars in New York, Virginia and Pennsylvania have not healed. And the victims have been multiplied by the deaths of American and British soldiers, Afghans and Iraqis.

On Sept. 11, 2001, the world wept with us. Old wounds and rivalries were put aside. A new sense of kinship was born. But the opportunity for a new international paradigm was squandered, lost in the search for justice and vengeance.

On Sept. 11, 2003, Afghanistan is a lawless frontier, with American and European soldiers battling warlords and despots for control of the country outside of the capital. Osama bin Laden and much of the Taliban elude capture, skirting America’s reach.

On Sept. 11, 2003, 130,000 U.S. and British soldiers are locked in a deadly struggle in a shattered Iraq. Saddam Hussein is out of power, but lurks in the dark corners of his former fiefdom. His agents, and others sworn to jihad against the United States and its occupation of Iraq, gnash away at what is left of the country.

On Sept. 11, 2003, the nation mourns, searches for the right words and actions. And girds itself for what is to come. Like a person who has lost a limb, we feel the phantom sensations and ghost pains of what has been taken and what has been lost.

Our actions earn us enemies, and our policies inflame passions. But our very prosperity also makes us a target. We are resented for our success, for our omnipresent culture, for our power, for doing too much, for too little.

Billions have been spent and lives have been sacrificed. To be sure, evil men have been tossed onto history’s rubbish heap, and national security has been tightened. Many of those who would see us suffer are dead or on the run.

But the world today is divided and fearful, of terror and unchecked American power. In these uncertain times, America remains a beacon on the hill, drawing the world’s hopeful to its shores. For some, though, that bright light has dimmed.
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