UCLA Today
Feburary 13, 2002

A number of months have passed since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and their brutal aftermath, and I still find myself marveling at the plethora of red, white and blue that I encounter daily.

Coming of age in the politically active years of the Vietnam War era can't help but influence my current reaction of feeling somewhat taken aback and ambivalent when I see these colors.

But I am mindful that the world in which we live and the current situation are vastly different than in the '60s and '70s. Like many others, I wish to fall asleep and get up in the morning to find that Sept. 11 and what has transpired since constituted a bad dream. But wherever I look, my country's colors awaken me to the brutal reality.

Whether experiencing things directly and horrifically from Ground Zero, or watching them on television from the safety of homes and offices, we were all inundated by graphic images of red blood on the battered faces of walking wounded; white ash mixing with black, mummifying faces ghostlike in their distress; and a blue sky transformed into a theater-of-the-absurd backdrop of unbelievable terror.

Since then I have questioned many things, oftentimes not finding answers. Aside from contemplating why this happened and what I can do about it, I have pondered what function is still being fulfilled for those who wear and/or display the colors of Old Glory. It helps many of us to move, each in our own way, toward recovery and renewal. But more specifically ... I wonder.

Are we publicizing our patriotism, whether we are on the left, right or center in our political orientation? Are we affirming our solidarity? Sharing our grief? Are we expressing our defiance of an enemy? Are we combating our fears?

Does a flag flying from a car antenna mean that the person driving supports the Bush administration's policies? Can it be a sign, too, of disagreement and resistance? What about size? Does a huge flag wrapped around a building mean that the owner is more patriotic, angrier, more defiant or scared than the shop manager who mounts a small decal on a store window or the student who wears a lapel pin on her backpack? If one flag flying from a car means the driver cares, do two or four mean he/she cares more? What's too small a display? What's excessive? Judged by whose standards?

Unable to answer for others, all I can do is share that it has taken me some time to find my own harmony of expression. When my landlady clustered three small flags in front of our house, I removed the one I had hanging on my door. Vacillating between mounting a 2-inch-by-3-inch decal on my car's back window or flying a 1-foot-by-2-foot flag from the passenger side door frame, I finally superimposed a small decal of the world on a larger decal of the flag and placed them both on my rear window. This combined image reminds me that the United States, the country that I love, is part of a much greater whole.

A whole that is urgently in need of prayers, support and healing.

Felixson directs outreach programs for the UCLA Stunt Ranch Santa Monica Mountains Reserve.