The Ghost Towers in Our Hearts

When I visited Franklin Court in Philadelphia, several years ago, I was struck by the power a silhouette can have over us.

Benjamin Franklin's home was destroyed by fire in 1812. In 1976, for our nation's bicentennial, they wanted to reconstruct the house in honor of Franklin but they only knew that it was a 3-story, 10-room building, its approximate size, and where it once stood. So the renowned architect, Robert Venturi, designed a "Ghost Structure" to stand where the house had been and to represent it. It is truly beautiful and powerful.

Since 9/11 there have been many things to represent our extreme sadness and horror surrounding that terrible day. We have many wonderful pictures of the ruins right after the attack and the brave men and women working there. We've had the beautiful beams of light shooting up where the towers once stood - in their own right a stirring silhouette. Now we have the new memorial.

They say if you lose your true love then your heart is changed, forever. For those of us who were alive on 9/11 and were paying attention, our hearts have been changed forever too - we now have a Ghost Structure - 2 towers - superimposed on our hearts. I think that is the way it should be.