Keller @ Large: Remembering The Watertown Shootout

BOSTON (CBS) -- Did you pause last night to reflect on the anniversary of the manhunt, the sheltering-in-place, and the shootout that led to the death of one of the marathon murderers and the capture of the other one?

I don't blame you if you didn't. It was an ugly day and night filled with fear, gunshots, and a last effort by the perps to kill even more innocent people. Not an anniversary we want to commemorate, although this year we're forced to make note of it by the presence of crews making a movie about what happened.

I see where Bill Richard, father of the young boy who was killed in the bombings, says it's "a little too soon" to see the scene recreated, and I can understand how those most damaged by the evil that occurred might feel that way. But I hope it's not too soon to be thinking about how we want the events of that day to be remembered in the future.

Of course we should remember the courage of the officers who cornered that car in Watertown, knowing it contained ruthless mass murderers. We should remember the pride we felt when their bravery and our cooperation with an unprecedented shutdown of the metro area helped end the nightmare, which could have been even worse than it was. And we should always recall how the community rallied that entire week, and began a healing process that continues to bear fruit.

But we should also remember how the perps threw bombs out the window in the middle of a residential neighborhood. And we should never forget the damage that two angry punks did to our city, or become complacent about the threat that it could happen again.