Side Dish: Oklahoma City Nat'l Memorial & Museum 4/30/13

On April 19, 1995, Timothy McVeigh, shocking to the American psyche in that he violated the expected norm by being white and non-Muslim, parked his Ryder truck bomb in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, walked away, and heartlessly watched as 168 men, women, and children were senselessly murdered in the worst act of domestic terrorism until 9/11. Citing revenge for Waco, creeping government power, or any number of idiotic right-wing excuses that passed for explanation at the time, McVeigh was swiftly caught, tried, and executed in 2001. And while his insignificance as a human being has long passed from the earth, his act - still a fresh wound for so many - continues to resonate in Oklahoma City. It's tempting to say the bombing hasn't come to define the city, but there's no escaping its centrality to the area. Sure, the arrival of the NBA's Thunder and revival of Bricktown have done much to prove a genuine resilience, but above all, this is the prairie metropolis where violence came calling in an unprecedented fashion. Fortunately, in the spirit of both historical accuracy and emotional heft, the Memorial and Museum will stand in the place of bloodshed, minimizing nothing, but ensuring that when all is said and done, the victims retain a center stage in our national memory.

So why a side dish and not a full NPS review? True, the NPS participates in the site's continuing relevance, but while rangers man the memorial component, the museum remains in private hands (Oklahoma City National Memorial Foundation). And while instinct tends to favor the Park Service's backing, this is one site where the experience is utterly seamless. In fact, the cooperation makes sense, given the federal worker/civilian nature of those who died. It was an attack on the government, yes, but all of Oklahoma City suffered, and why not a partnership going forward? So yes, it's an "affiliated" site, per the official record, and not counted as a full member of the family. Regardless, it just happens to be the gold standard for all memorials, and stands toe to toe with any NPS site in the country. And though natural beauty is studiously avoided, the power the site generates can never be denied. From the 168 memorial chairs, stunning in their simplicity, to the Gates of Time that chronicle a city just before and after the attack (bookending a Reflecting Pool that was once NW Fifth Street), designers Hans and Torrey Butzer have emphasized clean, unadorned consideration. The site asks that you bring your own understanding of the event, pushing little save the idea that at bottom, where a building once stood, only memory remains. It's a graveyard, crime scene, and confessional all at once; a spot where we come to interrogate our own capacity for incivility.

And while the Memorial itself is flawlessly realized and beautifully understated, it is the Museum that truly resonates. If all one asks is to understand - a crucial element for those not alive at the time of the bombing - then OKC has performed brilliantly, providing a learning center so exhaustive and exhausting that it's impossible to imagine what could be improved. The exhibit begins on the 3rd level of the Museum (housed in the former Journal Record Building), establishing a brief background on terrorism. It's not meant to be the final word on the subject, but it's a necessary foundation for what's to come. In addition, visitors can inspect numerous panels and displays about the history of the Murrah Building, if only to see how vulnerable it was to just this sort of attack. But it's the next room where the sadness begins, where we sit in the darkness listening to the official recording of an Oklahoma Water Resources Board meeting that started at 9am just across the street from the Murrah Building. As it plays - and knowing it only lasts two excruciating minutes - we wait in dread for the hammer to fall. As it does, and the revolting noise that represents the loss of so many innocent lives ends tedium with tragedy, the faces of all 168 victims appear before us. It's indescribably powerful, and just the thing we need before heading into the rest of the site. We're shocked, disoriented, and a little numb, and it's only just begun.

The doors open, appropriately enough, on chapters labeled "Confusion" and "Chaos." The images and sounds of the first few minutes surround us, and above all, we are immersed in utter crisis. Was this a gas leak? A deliberate attack? News reports pull us in one direction, while blasted debris and the overall human toll pull us in another. We see the smoke, fire, and blood of that morning, and are quickly thrust into the stories of those lucky enough to make it out alive. Video documents, display cases, and touch-screen computers all compete for our attention, and it's impossible to sort through it all in a single visit. Which is as it should be. A disaster - any disaster, but certainly one caused by human hands - is never a simple story from A to Z. There are starts and finishes, detours and defeats, and the Museum's opening barrage never lets up or allows us to detach. This is the very stench of death before us, and the sheer magnitude of it all leaves of reeling, as if begging for air.

The next "chapters" involve World Reaction (more media footage and breaking news items), Rescue and Recovery, and Watching and Waiting. For anyone who experienced the event as it happened, there will be a sense of the familiar, from the retrieval of victims to the grim faces of rescue teams, but it's further part of the Museum's journey to leave no stone unturned. This is not the future's dry objectivity, but an event as it unfolds, allowing visitors to live the crisis as they did so many years ago. As it continues, the evidence starts to filter in, and we see a larger case take hold - that of a criminal conspiracy. The 2nd level fleshes out the case - arrests, evidence, and investigation - but first, there's the Gallery of Honor, where the families of the dead have chosen photographs and mementos to stand evermore as reminders of the human cost. More interactive computers provide nuance and fullness, though it's the presence of so many toys and stuffed animals (19 children were killed) that hits so hard. Pause and consider the dead, yes, but also weigh the inescapable fact: McVeigh, having visited the building before during the planning stage, knew he'd be parking his bomb right next to a daycare center. Hopefully, the sadness will then yield to anger and depression, as we must live with the knowledge that such men walk among us, completely devoid of conscience or empathy.

The 2nd level ends at "Hope," though it's all but impossible to feel any whatsoever after the overall experience. This is mankind at its worst and most destructive, and all I could feel at visit's end was a sense of waste. An angry man, bereft of joy and a future, murdered 168 strangers out of the demented belief that someone had to pay for, well, something. The frustrated loser, the loner without attachment, inflicted pain in order to escape his own. It's the story of untold savagery throughout our history, and too often we yield to its desires. The most telling detail, at least for me, remained the report that as survivors were being pulled from the rubble that afternoon, major thunderstorms blew through the area, bringing a torrent of further pain onto an already devastated community. Salt on a wound. Insult to injury. And that's what I'm left with, an indifferent universe carrying on despite our all-too-human woes, usually self-inflicted. No god to comfort us, no order to make sense of our plight. Just a hard rain to kick us while we're down. It's the only reasonable way to leave the OKC Memorial & Museum, after all. And kudos to all involved for understanding that. There are the dead, what they've left us, and above all, their permanent absence from our lives.