A Local Tragedy
by Michael Risen

It seems so much of the commentary of the past year has proved untrue. How many times have we been told that Sept. 11 was the end of irony? The end of pop culture? Those statements and the reactions to them became trite with the speed only modern America can produce and absorb. Contrary to last year's prognostications, most Americans' lives haven't changed in any significant way.

Most, that is. On Sept. 9, 2002 Jonathan Lorino, 21 of New Orleans, was killed in his home. It was 1 p.m. on a busy street in a residential section of the city. He was a senior at Tulane University. A few days later three brothers were arrested for the murder; the police say the motive was probably burglary. He allegedly opened the door, was asked for money, didn't have any, and was pushed into his house and later stabbed.

This tragic event occurred two houses down from mine. I was at work until 6, so the police activity had subsided. I only found out through a rebroadcast of the evening news which featured the story. I went over to his house and all that was there was his door step, eerily normal. No police tape, no marker. No reporters. Nothing.

I didn't know Jonathan as anything more than a friendly neighbor who said "Hi" to me when I was out with my dogs. But to me, his murder has the same impact as Sept. 11. I feel unsafe in a neighborhood that I once felt comfortable in. I feel violated. I feel threatened. I feel like doing something and blaming someone, but I don't know what to do and I don't know whom to blame. The same pain and fear of a year ago is back; but this time, it comes from down the street.

Of course, there are important and significant differences between the two tragedies. But the personal impact, both physically and emotionally, is much the same. Now I take extra precaution when I walk my dog at night. Since Sept. 11 I take more time to get to the airport. I grieve over the two events in much the same way, an unexpected loss coupled with a vague and uncomfortable relief over just being alive.

The lasting legacy of Sept. 11, for me, isn't anything as grand or earth-shattering as a change in my lifestyle. Rather, its legacy for me is that when senseless acts like Jonathan's death occur, the pain I feel is magnified because the emotional wound that opens is all the larger.

The deaths, here and in New York, won't make New Orleans any safer. They won't end irony. They won't stop me from laughing or enjoying my life.

For all our grieving, evil acts are, well, evil, and they aren't unique to an "axis." But I didn't need NBC's all-day coverage of Sept. 11 to make me remember how irrational humans can be. I can just walk past 1011 4th Street.

E-mail Michael Risen at msrise at wm dot edu.