COLUMBUS, Ohio — Twenty years. It’s been 20 years since that day.
“It was an ordinary morning. Until it wasn’t.”
Words from Sean Rubin.
“I was at home,” he said about September 11, 2001. “I think school had just about started.”
Those who remember the day have grown, learned and persevered. The flipside, of course, 20 years removed, is that a new generation has no idea.
Today’s parents seemingly fear the questions their children might ask while questioning their own answers.
“The goal is to start a conversation,” Chelsea Bruning said.
Bruning owns Wheatberry Books in Chillicothe. Having words and illustrations that children can connect to, she says, is the first step. When it comes to 9/11 it hasn’t been easy.
“I’m trying to get a lot of social issues and current events in picture book form so that parents have an easier tool for kids and I don’t have any for [9/11],” Bruning said.
Which brings us back to Rubin.
Rubin was born and raised in Brooklyn. Two years ago the author was approached to apprise a touchy subject.
“I think that we kind of hesitate not only with kids but with each other because it’s been so heavily politicized, reasonably, but at the same time it just makes it difficult,” Rubin said.
He was asked to write and illustrate “This Very Tree,” which is the true story of a pear tree planted in the 1970s near the World Trade Center that, after the towers collapsed on top of it, survived.
“I think because it’s a tree it just makes it a lot more accessible to children,” Rubin said.
It’s accessible while teaching how to cope, how to grieve and how to regrow.
“There’s a lot of hopeful message in this book,” Bruning said.
Bruning hasn’t been able to get the book in her store due to COVID-19 distribution issues. Knowing what it offers for children and parents she doesn’t mind waiting.
“I like this one because it’s not talking really about the tragedy as much, but about the recovery,” Bruning said.
“Years passed. I regrew. I wondered if my city was regrowing, too.” Again, words from Rubin’s book.
It was. It has.
We all have grown while being reminded from tragedy comes triumph and after the coldest winter spring will come.
Bruning says there are other children’s books that help teach kids how to deal with grief, anxiety and emotional trauma, such as Patrice Karst’s “The Invisible String,” and Cori Doerrfeld’s “The Rabbit Listened.”