I remember the morning of September 11th, 2001 vividly...even now, I can remember all of the little details of the miniscule things that day that I usually ignore. The color of the sky, the exact amount of work I had left to do...all the little crap. Perhaps it's stray memories that hitchhiked along for the ride with the big ones, or just the fact that I don't take anything for granted anymore, who knows?
I remember when the first plane hit the Tower, our supervisor turned up the radio a bit because she thought she heard something about a plane crash in NYC. Even though this would have been a big catastrophe in its own right, we still kept working. Even the radio was announcing that it had been a "plane crash into the World Trade Center." It was still assumed to be an accident for a few minutes.
Then the second plane hit.
We all stopped and slowly started to gather around the radio to hear the news broadcast. As reports started coming in, you could feel the silence like a weight. Everything was happening so fast on the radio that many reports were getting a bit messed up. After the plane hit the Pentagon, an irresponsible report stated that "Washington D.C. is on fire." For the first two minutes or so, all we could think of was a nuclear atack. Even though it turned out to be "only" a plane, I remember those two minutes being the longest, most dread-filled of my life. For two minutes, I honestly faced the consequences of a nuclear attack for the first time...the first time it was ever real. Just like before death, I saw my life play out in front of my eyes.
Soon, the actual reports came in, and we breathed a little. Still, we were nervous. It's one thing to look back at it now and know what happened...but at that time, after three attacks and a report of a plane headed for Washington again, we didn't know when it was going to end. Are there more out there? Is this the first wave of something more insidious? Is my family in L.A. safe? Aren't we awfully close to an Air Base, a military target? Without knowing it was Al-Queda yet, the thought ran through...Is it the Russians, the Iraqis, even the Chinese?
My boss brought in a TV and we watched in horror as the Towers actually fell. Even after seing the damage, nobody thought they would actually collapse. As they did, people were crying, swearing or just sitting with a blank look, as if something from a movie were being played out in real life. I remember having a hard time getting my mind around the fact that this was real, and not special effects.
I remember feeling my safety bubble punctured forever. I remember anger, fear, vengeance, sorrow...and something I could not define, and still can't. I do, however, remember saying to myself "I finally know what went through my grandparent's heads during Pearl Harbor."
A year has passsed, and the sorrow is still there. So is the feeling of loss at the security I once took for granted. But we've grown. We've survived. We bicker amongst ourselves as to the neccesary outcome of this tragedy. We've heard everything from the "Kill 'em all" rabble-rousing to the "Let there be Peace" naivete...and every shade between. But one thing remains.
We survived.
Our ideals survived. Our dreams survived. Our country survived. Our spirit survived. They all became stronger. Something of this magnitude is not going to be resolved in a year, or two, or ten. Perhaps it never will. The world as we know it changed on September 11th, 2001...whether we wanted it to or not.
The real question is..."Where do we go from here?"
I guess that's up to us.
