Here in Chicago, it was hard enough to find anyone excited about Michael Jordan's comeback even before tragedy rocked the nation. Now it's even less of a big deal. Now it's harder to talk about ``heroes'' who wear jerseys and shorts.

Now people here seem to want him back even less. Even before the sports world stopped after the terrorist attacks, few could muster much excitement about seeing Michael Jordan play basketball again. Chicagoans especially knew it wouldn't be the same, now that Jordan is older and slower and, for the first time in his career, beatable. This is where he ``retired'' after hitting a championship-winning shot, and many here wanted it to stay that way. He was, after all, a Bull to the core, and seeing him in a Wizards jersey seemed like a Ph.D. working at McDonald's - it wouldn't fit, it wouldn't be right. Besides, the city could and should have kept Jordan, if not in uniform then at least in the front office, if only its inept owners didn't repel him with their attitudes and practices.

But we knew that during his career Jordan fed off the game, and ran on the fumes of competition. And so, at age 38, with a creaking back and a healing broken rib, his best days behind him, Michael Jordan will take the court again, this time for the Washington Wizards.

And although many who were once glued to the TV to watch him say they're reluctant to watch this new version, Jordan may not be through with his surprises. His capacity to enthrall may not be spent. He returns as one of the league's handful of elite players. He may juke Kobe or Iverson once in a while, enough to make us glad we got to see it. He'll contend for the scoring title, and, with number one draft pick Kwame Brown as his apprentice, may very well lead Washington to the playoffs.

So what worth could Jordan's comeback possibly have at a time like this? What does the outlook for an old basketball player possibly matter?

Americans right now are looking to their culture for comfort and unity. We're searching for ``normalcy,'' whether we're looking in the right places or not. In such an atmosphere, an unprecedented joint telethon featuring celebrity entertainers is considered, probably correctly, to be among the nation's most patriotic tributes. As we fly the flag we look for elements of America, for national symbols to soothe us with their sturdy familiarity.

What could be more American than Michael Jordan? He's the embodiment of our optimistic spirit, our love of hard work and success, our individualism and competitive drive. He's one of the most visible stars in our cultural temple of television. He's a lucrative catalyst for our brand of global capitalism. Now he's playing in the nation's capital. He may, more than ever, again be a source of our national pride.

Michael Jordan represents America's best - in his ability to transcend barriers of race and class--and worst--in his global market dominance. Think of it this way: This week Jordan announced he would agree to donate this year's salary to the victims of the recent tragedies. Let me be clear: I take this to be a sincere and inspiring gesture. Still, the full picture is that Jordan has always avoided the issue of human rights abuses in Nike's international production while he takes the company's millions.

To me this is America in a nutshell - touched, unified, and earnestly compassionate when tragedy strikes, yet too often oblivious to the crassness of its own international power. Jordan's worldwide popularity and marketed products make him a flagship of 1990s-era globalization, and not an entirely appealing one.

To clarify, I do not begin to excuse terrorism. It is a global plague and advances no cause. Neither, though, do I neglect America's self-oriented frame of mind, its single-mindedness in the truly complex Israeli-Palestinian conflict, its economic sanctions that starve civilians but hardly discomfort culpable leaders, its disproportionate actions in areas of oil markets, its trade practices that threaten authentic ethnic culture with its own mass-marketed generic entertainment culture.

It is at least tenable to find mirrored American attitudes in Jordan's stubborn, I'll-show-you determination and success, which his latest comeback again demonstrates, as well as in his telecommunicated, globally marketed image and celebrity.