One of the most surreal moments today was realizing that almost all of my students were born before September 11, 2001. Before this year, this was true for many, but the older kids had been born before it. Not that it matters – they were only a year or two old in 2001 – but this new realization was surprising today for some reason.

These kids have always known a United States at war. They have always known that if they join the armed forces, there was a likelihood they would be in active conflict and combat zones. This is their normal.

People who are old like me kind of remember what it was like when I we didn’t have an occupying military presence in quite so many parts of the world ( not that it was ever small). We olds like to think that this isn’t normal. It’s not normal, we protest.

It has become normal for so many. It’s on the back burner because we are flooded with an onslaught of insane “news” from a presidency that thrives on drama and attention. But we are spending millions on our continued military presence around the world. When’s the last time you thought of Guantanamo? There are still people imprisoned there.

It’s become the static. It’s become the status quo (or squo for my silly debate friends). It’s the background for an entire generation of children who don’t get that this isn’t supposed to be normal. They don’t remember the inciting incident, and they don’t know any different world.

It’s heartbreaking.