The Last Airbender

I took in a movie this afternoon, The Last Airbender. I didn't know too much about it and later learned it was an animated series that showed on Nickelodeon. Some of the slightly wooden acting notwithstanding, overall not a bad film. I loved the waterbenders and quickly learned to loathe the Bad Guys, the firebenders. A nice blend of Narnia, Kung Fu from the seventies TV series and a gentle reminder to just be nice. It naturally set itself up for a sequel, or two or three, but I was still satisfied with the ending.

Emerging out into the midafternoon sunset, I walked by our local fire station where a bunch of the firefighters were doing what we all seem to do best here in Aspen; hang out and watch the people go by.

However, something was new to the already new fire station. There at the base of the flag pole was a 6' x 1' piece of inch thick steel. Something had been burned into it's mass, so a closer look was warranted.

The artist, using an acetylene torch had delicately cut out the outline of the World Trace Center buildings. This was a piece of the first tower to get struck on September 11th, 2001 and it was a gift to the Aspen Firefighters.

AVFD had invited a great bunch of the NYFD members to Aspen in the winter that followed the tragedy that was 9-11. Those NYFD members hadn't forgotten the generosity that they were shown at a time when they were struggling to find much good in the world. And so, they returned that generosity.

I believe that many of us search for that generosity at times, but believe it is lost, or gone forever. Mankind seems hell-bent on destroying itself either physically, financially, environmentally or just politically.

But, still, somewhere down inside of me I don't think that is all together true. Maybe there isn't The Last Airbender out there, the very last of his kind to save us. Maybe inside of us all is The Lost Airbender. Gone away for a bit, but with a bit of searching, we will find that Airbender and allow that gentle nature to come out and play for a bit.