THE EXTERIOR SHELL of the south tower is all that remained standing after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks (FEMA photo).

I saw a post on Facebook about Sept. 11 observances. One comment was “We’ll never forget.”

*Sigh* We already have.

By that I mean the mood of national unity, kindness and acceptance that seemed to take hold of us. Songs were written. Strangers held hands. Blood was donated. Millions of dollars were raised to the relief for the families affected.

We were a great national family. Not divided by political loyalties or personal circumstances or denomination, region or favorite ball club.

It’s not surprising, really, that we have lost all that. We Americans are a excitable people with a high tolerance for boredom. Yesterday’s passion becomes today’s dim memory.

What we have in place is a divisiveness without recent precedent. With a straight face (and questionable logic), some conservatives claim that Democrats hate America and are barely-concealed Communists. Some liberals seem to believe that Republicans are racists and barely-concealed fascists.

Sometimes I get very discouraged. We are the people who settled a wild continent, won our independence from the world’s greatest power, triumphed in a bloody war to end slavery and preserve the world’s only functioning republic, defeated a Great Depression and Hitler, prevailed over Soviet Communism and put men on the moon.

And yet we can’t see past the self-serving schemes of venal people battering at the walls of our precious democracy for a few more ratings points or personal enrichment?

There’s a rousing song from the animated “Shrek” movie titled “Holding Out for a Hero.” That would be nice … but I suspect the hero we need is the man or woman in the mirror willing to say, “enough.”

That would be the perfect way to remember 9/11. Is it you? Is it me?