Along with the shock, grief, and anxiety of the past few weeks, some of us have been feeling, for want of a better word, inadequate. We're not, most of us, very knowledgeable about foreign countries, or their cultures, or how they relate to each other and to the United States.

Wednesday afternoon, just a week and a day after the Tuesday when everything in America changed, I was walking through downtown Chicago, trying to catch a train. I was hurrying to pick up my daughter from school, and it was starting to drizzle.

There will be many thoughtful columns, articles, and books written about the events of September 11, 2001, so the following won't count for much. If you'd prefer to skip it altogether, that's understandable. As I write, it's been less than 24 hours since the first reports.

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