(no subject)
The sky is so blue today. It's beautiful, perfect weather. There's hardly a cloud in the sky, the first kiss of early September.
It was beautiful nine year ago too.
Every year since I've started this blog, I've chosen to write a post, chosen to remember. To let myself hurt again, to make it so that I will never forget; to acknowledge the pain, remember the slaughtered, honor the brave.
September 11th, 2001. It's a day that's been talked about and analyzed and politicized beyond all imagining, it's a polarizing day - and it should be. Kristallnacht was a polarizing date as well. Every year, except for last year when I couldn't take it, I make a point to review memorials that were created shortly after the attack. I can still close my eyes and see the smoke over the Hudson, vividly remember being in the community center and not knowing what will happen as they played, over and over again, the towers as they fell. It looked so real. It looked like fantastic special effects. It was impossible.
I learned about it at the end of Spanish class, my professor who'd spent the last few years in Ecuador was unruffled. It was unreal, we didn't know the full extent of it. I went to the bathroom, spoke to a friend there, asked her if she knew what had happened - she said she wouldn't have been surprised.
We knew nothing, nothing about what had really happened. And when we did find out... my father's reassurance that my grandfather hadn't been in the city, my mother making emergency plans for us to meet up in another state if we had to evacuate, Ezra on the phone, trying to locate his family. Prayer circles on the soccer field. Cynthia organizing a blood drive. Brad, grabbing his toothbrush and running in to the city to help before they'd closed it to outsiders. Jesse, whose mom worked on the ground floor.
We walked shellshocked. I don't remember being scared. It didn't feel real. But you could see the smoke and ash from the high point of the hill.
No one knew what to do, or what we should be doing. Classes went on, there was no official word about anything. When we learned that passengers had fought off the terrorists on the plane that was headed towards Washington, we were so proud.
I feel like I'm rambling. Because the truth is... today I don't want to remember. It's a beautiful day. I start school next week. Things in my life are finally starting to go right. Why should I weigh myself down with grief and regret, even as I think about the people I know, my friends who have lost loved ones because of this attack - they can never be free of it. I never can either, it changed everything. So why make the point to remember?
I don't have any easy answer for that. Except that I have chosen to remember. This month, I celebrate holidays that had their inception thousands of years ago, and if I don't choose to remember what the day was like before it became accused of being a banner for anyone to do whatever they wanted, who will?
So I remember - the people who died. I remember the people who survived. I remember the friends and family who I knew who waited for word. I remember their faces. I remember the heroes, stepping up into horror and terror and standing their ground in the face of a nightmare. Firefighters, police officers, security guards who never signed up for this - citizens who did what they could to help. I remember the ones who are still afflicted with sickness because of the ash that they inhaled. I remember the attackers, I remember the leaders who stepped up into a crisis.
I remember. And I'm grateful this day hasn't effected me more than it already has.
I remember. And I move forward.
102 Minutes that Changed American History
8:46 am
9:03 am
9:37 am
10:03-10:06 am
It was beautiful nine year ago too.
Every year since I've started this blog, I've chosen to write a post, chosen to remember. To let myself hurt again, to make it so that I will never forget; to acknowledge the pain, remember the slaughtered, honor the brave.
September 11th, 2001. It's a day that's been talked about and analyzed and politicized beyond all imagining, it's a polarizing day - and it should be. Kristallnacht was a polarizing date as well. Every year, except for last year when I couldn't take it, I make a point to review memorials that were created shortly after the attack. I can still close my eyes and see the smoke over the Hudson, vividly remember being in the community center and not knowing what will happen as they played, over and over again, the towers as they fell. It looked so real. It looked like fantastic special effects. It was impossible.
I learned about it at the end of Spanish class, my professor who'd spent the last few years in Ecuador was unruffled. It was unreal, we didn't know the full extent of it. I went to the bathroom, spoke to a friend there, asked her if she knew what had happened - she said she wouldn't have been surprised.
We knew nothing, nothing about what had really happened. And when we did find out... my father's reassurance that my grandfather hadn't been in the city, my mother making emergency plans for us to meet up in another state if we had to evacuate, Ezra on the phone, trying to locate his family. Prayer circles on the soccer field. Cynthia organizing a blood drive. Brad, grabbing his toothbrush and running in to the city to help before they'd closed it to outsiders. Jesse, whose mom worked on the ground floor.
We walked shellshocked. I don't remember being scared. It didn't feel real. But you could see the smoke and ash from the high point of the hill.
No one knew what to do, or what we should be doing. Classes went on, there was no official word about anything. When we learned that passengers had fought off the terrorists on the plane that was headed towards Washington, we were so proud.
I feel like I'm rambling. Because the truth is... today I don't want to remember. It's a beautiful day. I start school next week. Things in my life are finally starting to go right. Why should I weigh myself down with grief and regret, even as I think about the people I know, my friends who have lost loved ones because of this attack - they can never be free of it. I never can either, it changed everything. So why make the point to remember?
I don't have any easy answer for that. Except that I have chosen to remember. This month, I celebrate holidays that had their inception thousands of years ago, and if I don't choose to remember what the day was like before it became accused of being a banner for anyone to do whatever they wanted, who will?
So I remember - the people who died. I remember the people who survived. I remember the friends and family who I knew who waited for word. I remember their faces. I remember the heroes, stepping up into horror and terror and standing their ground in the face of a nightmare. Firefighters, police officers, security guards who never signed up for this - citizens who did what they could to help. I remember the ones who are still afflicted with sickness because of the ash that they inhaled. I remember the attackers, I remember the leaders who stepped up into a crisis.
I remember. And I'm grateful this day hasn't effected me more than it already has.
I remember. And I move forward.
102 Minutes that Changed American History
8:46 am
9:03 am
9:37 am
10:03-10:06 am