9/11/2009

Amidst the horror of September 11, 2001, what I tend to remember most about the day is just how beautiful the weather was. The sky was cloudless, a near-sparkling blue. The sun was shining. The temperature comfortably hovered in the 80s. All of the ingredients for a perfect summer morning.

Today's weather was just about the opposite-- unseasonably cold, wet, gray. Any sign of summer seemed to be long gone. The wind thrashed my umbrella about wildly and sent shivers through my body. After a trip to the financial district to collect my long overdue employee ID, I trudged to work damp and crabby.

At my desk, I watched MSNBC's live broadcast of the ceremony, suddenly transported right back to the streets of lower Manhattan that I had just left. I watched face after face read name after name, realizing that this was the first time in five years that I am actually in the NYC on 9/11. Perhaps that's why I chose to watch more coverage, more clips-- both new and old-- this time around. Then again, I had to shut off the broadcast when I felt my eyes getting too wet.

I can't ever block out memories of earthquake-like rumbles, running up the West Side Highway, and thick black clouds covering the sky. I would tell you that I'm grateful I didn't see planes hit, towers fall, or people die firsthand, but it feels like I did. The footage on TV is all too familiar to me-- I lived through it. I lived. Others didn't.

I kept a copy of the NY Daily News from September 12, 2001. It's hidden deep under my bed, in an old Adidas shoebox. The cover reads "IT'S WAR" in huge fire-orange capital letters. Just a few days later, another cover read "10,000 FEARED DEAD" in that same ominous print. Just typing it out makes me twitch.

In one way, all of it still seems like a part of my not-too-distant past. But with each year that goes by, what happened feels like it belongs to another era, a completely different part of time, of history, my life. It's a strange duality. Handcuffed to history, time ticks on, life continues.

I don't really know how to properly end this entry, because there's a degree of absurdity in trying to tie this subject up with a neat little bow of closure. I could say so much about everything, but I don't know where to begin, how to put any of it in order, to where to stop.