10 Years Later

I've never really told anyone just how much 9/11 affected me. Maybe it's because it's not an easy thing to put into words, or maybe I just wasn't ready... maybe I'm still not.

I don't have immediate family or close friends who died that day. The people I knew were acquaintances at best. However, everyone that died that day was somebody's friend or family... and those are the people I know. People in my life lost parents, siblings, close friends and family members that day. Watching their suffering was worse than if I had to endure the loss of someone close to me. How do you console a person whose loved one died because of a so-called "religious war" in which they weren't even involved? How do you tell someone "it will be okay" after the entire foundation of our nation was rocked by a terror attack on our own soil? How can you make anyone feel completely safe again, when even you still cringe at the sound of a low-flying plane to this day?

I know I'm not the only one from the NYC area who feels this way. I also know that there are people who were affected in far worse ways than myself, so please don't think I'm saying "woe is me" or looking for pity. I was one of the lucky ones... as lucky as you can be in such a gruesome situation, I suppose. The pain I feel is rooted in empathy and fear, as opposed to physical pain or the loss of a loved one. This is my story of 9/11:

I was away from home at the University of Scranton in PA. It was the start of my sophomore year, and I had my first class of the day at 9:00am. I was meeting a friend who had class with me, and I was running a little behind since I woke up late. As I was rushing around my friend calls up to my room and tells me to put on the TV... He said that he saw on AIM (dating myself here), that a friend who went to school at NYU had an Away Message up saying that a plane hit the WTC. At this point I'm thinking it was a little Cesna that accidentally flew into one of the towers... then I turned on the tv.

I won't go into details about my emotions during the morning, as I'm sure you can all guess how I felt. I will say that it was a combination of sadness, shock, disgust and disbelief that I hope to never have to experience again. I will also leave out the details of the horrible things I saw that morning on the news, since it was being broadcast uncensored and in real-time. They are things that are seldom replayed because of their gruesome nature... as well as out of respect for the families of the now deceased.

One memory that I will share.... At the point when the first tower fell I was watching a news feed that showed the towers from the air, but the commentating reporter was on the ground. She kept saying that there was an explosion, but I clearly saw the tower fall. She kept repeating herself over and over to the point where I started nearly yelling at the tv, "It didn't explode, it fell! It fell..."

Everything went silent after that. We turned off the tv and walked up to the student center. I don't really know why. All we did there was go through the motions of trying to eat breakfast, while silently seated around the tv in the cafeteria. We were in PA, but a large amount of students were from the NY/NJ area around the city. The second tower fell while I was there. We all remained silent as we watched, trying to cry as quietly as possible... if the tears even fell at all. It was such a surreal experience that the sadness almost didn't even register. People either wept, or sat silent with a blank, vacant expression that is still haunting to this day.

The campus was silent that day. When people spoke it was in almost a whisper. It was as though we were afraid any noise would break the trance that we had all fallen into that morning. People walked around like zombies... some going through the motions of their daily routine, some just wandering or sitting and staring off into space. Most never went to class that day. I heard from those who did that some of their professors just stood up and dismissed everyone, but no one celebrated like they normally would when getting out of a class. Everyone just stood en masse and slowly filed out the door, barely saying a word.

I eventually got in my car and drove home. The school told people to not leave, but I really could've cared less at that point in time. The highways were littered with little American flags that had blown off of cars. Every house had an American flag hung out front, some on flagpoles, and some just attached by any means possible. There was still an eerie silence in the air.

I went down to Edgewater to visit the memorials along the Hudson river. I could still see the pillar of smoke climbing into the sky from the rubble. The area was usually filled with people smiling for cameras so they could get a nice picture with the skyline in the background. Even I had done it many times. That day there were people taking pictures, but no smiles... no one posing for the perfect shot. Just emotionless faces behind cameras with their lenses pointed toward the empty sky where the towers used to stand, now replaced by a plume of smoke. I have my photos from that day. I still don't know why I even took them. In the back of my mind I knew that it was history in the making, but I also knew that I would never look at them again... and I haven't. They sit in a box, developed and printed, but unseen.

Looking back, I can replay every minute in my mind. Stupid details of what I did that morning are crystal clear... so are the horrible things I watched unfold on my tv. To this day I cannot watch the footage without crying. The same nauseas feeling sits in the pit of my stomach as the second plane hits, then it remains even once the tears start as the first building falls. There is no way I can detach myself from what happened. I can't watch the footage without the feelings from that day coming back. I can't even begin to imagine how those who were there, and those who lost loved ones must feel. Simply seeing that many lives extinguished in seconds as the buildings fall is something I will never get over. I can't even begin to know how it must've felt to watch your spouse, child, family or friend perish that morning.

Now, 10 years later, I'm aware of many small miracles that also happened that day. Everything from people surviving the collapse, to friends oversleeping and missing their train into the WTC. However, the loss of life is still almost incomprehensible to me. All the death and destruction as a result of a terror attack on our own soil... It still frightens me in a way that nothing else ever has. All I can do is pray that others feel the same sadness, fear and disgust that I do, and that they turn it into a way to prevent this from ever happening again. If we do not know and learn from our history, we are doomed to repeat it. I cannot handle a repeat. So please... Never forget.

 

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