Wednesday, January 21, 2009

More than a moment

Yesterday, Inauguration Day, over 2000 instant messages were being posted on Facebook through its link into CNN Live. Over 2000 one-liners from all over the world. I wanted to print a screen shot and it came out as 55 pages. :-O
Joy, hope, excitement, tears, amazement were some of the emotions shared. Many comments refered to "what a great moment".
In this fast paced world that takes over the more contemplative one, where short attention span is such a generalized disease that it is almost taken as normal, I shouldn't be surprised to read those words - what a great moment. Yet I think it's not a moment. Yes, yes, a moment is all we have, the snapshot of now, the inmediate present... However observing what was taking place I think it is not about a great moment. It's about a time, a chapter in history, that has been in the make for long time, marinated in good and in bad events. May be what happened yesterday was a moment of collective awareness raising, of noticing that something was going on, and we all were actors in it.