Right Here, Right Now

When I was young I always thought that I had missed out on all the big moments in history. I loved reading about the American Revolution, the Civil War, and the World Wars and found the time I was living awfully dull by comparison. In 1978, when I was ten years old, I can recall watching a news retrospective on 1968, the year of my birth. Man, I thought, I missed all the excitement. War in Vietnam, riots in the cities, assassinations. How come nothing exciting like that happens anymore? (Remember I was ten.)

Growing older (and I would hope wiser) I began to realize that I was living through historically important events even though I didn't always appreciate it at the time. The Iranian hostage crisis, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Falklands War, Grenada, Glasnost. Perhaps not everything noteworthy was relegated to the past, as I had earlier believed.

With the fall of the Berlin Wall, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the Gulf War (all in a space of a few years while I was in college) I was able to understand the history making events that I was witnessing and know that I was living in a time that would be remembered years into the future.

But then what? The end of history if Francis Fukuyama was to be believed. The 90's blissfully rolled on with little indication that we were on the verge a new era that would shake the course of history. Sure there was Somalia. And Bosnia and Kosovo. And in the distant background, acts of terrorism against American interests. But they seemed like isolated affairs unlikely to be much talked about or remembered in the long run.

Then came 9/11. Followed by the campaign in Afghanistan. The painfully slow marathon waltz over Iraq at the U.N. And now it's almost surreal as we watch hostilities unfold in Iraq, long standing alliances crumble, and new ones emerge that will surely alter the geopolitical landscape for years to come. We're at a crossroads for our country and our world that may well prove to be a decisive turning point, hopefully in the right direction. History is being shaped. And we’re living it. Right here. Right now.