That special image that triggers feelings and memories you thought you had put "on hold"?

While reading the news today I stumbled over this image and suddenly felt a rush of feelings and memories I thought had faded with time.

The pain and sorrow in this image made me remember my own feelings that day - sorrow, anger and relief.

Sorrow for the losses - nobody should have to bury their children. As a father of a teen - this could have been my daughter - it's still impossible to imagine their loss.

Anger for the innocents he attacked - most of the victims where teens. Some even children. All hunted down one by one on a small island. He was dressed as a policeman and urging the kids to come to him, that he would keep them safe. I still get enraged when I think about this.

Relief because he was a lone, white, Christian Norwegian male. Not Muslim, not from a minority group, but someone who would be looked upon as a "fine, Norwegian male". With nowhere to direct our anger - we could come together in grief. We had no common enemy, but a common sorrow that united us all.

Do you have a special image that trigger feelings and memories you thought you had put "on hold"?

 

Just about everyone in the US has this one, I think:

 

It's not an image for me so much as a sound. It's the sound of a jet engine throttling up. It's from 9/11 and comes from the video of the first plane that hit. It was taken by a freelance crew doing some news reporting, and it flew right over them, and you can hear the pilot adjusting to make sure there's impact. The sound increases pitch, and it's one that I hear occassionally at airports. And 10+ years later, that's still the first thing in my head - the smoking buildings.

 

SOURCE

Yeah, not an image, but a sound. I was in basic training when the above came out.

Drill Sergeants lined us up in the hallway and told us we were going to "be busy this year."

Not even they could have imagined that stupid adventure was going to occupy the next decade.

Looking back, I'm not sure where I'd be without that dumb motherfucker's war declaration.

Talk about railroading the future of a generation. This has been half of some .mil careers.

It's really sad that bad foreign policy has basically defined my life. Ugh, what a loser.

 

I'm not a big fan of the dead, but it hit me like a ton of bricks when he died. And every time I see pictures from the last couple years he was around, it hits me again.

 

My grandmother crying in her living room after they announced Martin Luther King had been shot. I was 9 years old. I see her image everytime I see his. That is the only time I ever saw her cry.

 

Thank you for your contribution. It doesn't have to be about death at all, just the images or sounds that brings back all those memories - like it happened this day.

 

Nearly any image from 9/11. My knees actually buckled when I saw the video of the second plane hitting. I don't like seeing any of it even today. That's why I'm not posting an image.

 

This was a sorrowful event for the whole world. When kids die in a cruel and indiscriminate way, it strikes a huge chord. I cried when this happened. For the survivors.
--- merged: Feb 23, 2012 6:15 AM ---

It is the plane sounds. Every time I fly, waiting around, coming and going, even not flying and having ORD planes practically atop me, the sounds of planes throttling make me remember that day.
--- merged: Feb 23, 2012 6:18 AM ---

I can't watch that video, either. It's horrible. Every time I've seen it the emotional wallop is as bad as the first time. For me it is akin to the awfulness of watching the Zapruder film and the president's brains being blown away.
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That's so sad yet and so memorable.
You mentioning it brings me back. We were the same age (I was almost 9)!
Horrible year.
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I don't think it ever crossed our minds that Garcia would actually succumb. Maybe a childish notion but the Dead were all about not being a grown up.

 

the sounds of jet engines whining, and any of the images from September 11th, bring back a lot of memories for me as well. im a firm believer in my own thought control though, and if anything, those sounds and images inspire and motivate me. They motivate me to seize the day, and not waste a moment. the folks in those buildings, and the first responders that ran in, had no clue what was coming that day, and wont get another day back. We owe it to them not to cheapen the value of a day.

There is one image that if i see it, i cannot control my thoughts. my sister and i used to ride ATV's and while i was quite a bit faster than her, she would always try and keep up. this proved disastrous during a trip to a mountianous trail system December 2007. I drifted a sharp corner on a fast fire road, a tehcnique she had not yet mastered. unfortuantely she was still carrying the same speed as i into the corner. she went down a 40 foot cliff and struck a tree in flight. broken neck, severely seperated shoulder, and a cut to the bone across her forehead.

The two of us are also musicly inclined... i play guitar, she plays drums. she is quite a bit better than me... she plays one handed now, because she never regained the use of her left arm after the atv accident.

we have a photo (that i won't post) of her playing in a band before the accident, both hands a blurr as she pounded away on the toms... she was great... that image always instantly makes me think of the accident and what she has lost... very tough for me, since i could have just slowed down and let her keep up at her pace...

 

I run across this photo now and again, and it brings me to tears every time:



John Lennon signing an autograph for Mark Chapman just hours before he would gun him down.

 

Aw hell, PJ. Something in my eye.

 

It's interesting what that photo brings up. I get angry, actually at the sub-human that took his life and I don't even wish to ponder that said sub-human got exactly what he wanted--ever-lasting 'fame' (infamy).

 

My earliest childhood memory.

 

My brain is full of images that trigger feelings: sorrow, terror, shock.
I might say unfortunately, but I am not sorry for it. I think it gives me a perspective on life that encourages me to find joyous things. I think I am happier than the average person because of what I haven't turned away from.

9/11 was very impactful. I will never forget that day. And I will never forget the flood of images that followed, not only of New York, but then Afghanistan and Iraq.

But, I think the most impactful image of my adult life and one that still motivates me to this day was a portrait of this beautiful little girl, maybe 5 or 6, in Sierra Leone who had been attacked by rebels and had both of her arms severed. A common practice used to instill fear in the citizens of Sierra Leone at that time. Her somber face and the imagery associated with her attack (her parents were forced to watch) instilled in me a feeling like an infinitely expanding sheet of linen being stretched over everything I ever thought was important before then. I can trace an exact line in the development of my thinking and feeling of purpose in life from that day up until now....with a few sidetracks. But I will never forget that image.

 

Sorry for snipping the quote there.

I'm not American and that one gets me too, but I think it's more on the level of the individuals that experienced it and how they must have felt. It's awful to imagine the terror that someone must've felt to watch helplessly as their plane went towards the building. And the fear felt by the people trapped in there and unable to escape, not knowing what would happen to them. And the extraordinary level of hopelessness that someone must have to feel to take their own death into their own hands and throw themselves from a such a great height instead of waiting for death to come to them.

Damn.

 

On a less sullen note, ever so often I see a picture of the Olympic Rings and sports figure cutouts that lead up to the steps of the Olympic Training Center, where I competed for a few years as a shooter in the Junior Olympics. It reminds me of a time where I was on top of my game, and serves at a motivator to get back into the sport (which I've now taken the first steps towards) so that I can elevate my abilities to the next level. Seeing it brings on an instant rush of goosebumps, where I can visualize in perfect clarity the feeling of panic I had when the airline damaged my equipment, the way the button felt on the first electronic target carriers I'd ever used, or how surreal it felt to be in what I consider to be the world's greatest cafeteria, rubbing elbows with the best athletes in the world like it's just any day of the week.

 

which training center? my old roommate was in the Junior Olympics for shooting a few years ago

 

Colorado Springs. There's a good chance I know your old roommate, or at least recognize the name!