..and why I'm thinking of 9/11..

[elionwyr]

Friday was the first time I've come anywhere close to NYC since the terrorist attacks.

I am not, personally, someone that was intimately affected by 9/11. Being outside Philly, we were touched by it at work - our phones went down (I'm still not sure why), parents were panicking because their kids were in school near the Willow Grove air base, where an air show the weekend before had brought in many military aircraft ("Could they be a target?")..our internet servers were overloaded, so we resorted to radios to try to follow what was happening.


I had called my husband right after the first attack, who curtly told me that he was sure everything was ok. When we spoke again, hours later, it was just long enough for him to apologize and to tell me to be calm, be strong, and get home safely. (We were worried because public transit kept shutting down, and he was in Philly, which was largely shut down right after the attacks. Again, no one knew what to expect next.)

Someone at work helped me get most of the way home; I then found a bus that was still running and managed to actually beat my husband home. He had borrowed a van from the museum and brought around 10 people back to our place because traffic was so bad - it made more sense to carpool and get out of the city.

We watched the photage of the attacks, asking, "Where's Godzilla?" Nothing looked real...it really looked more like a movie set.

..And I was reminded of all this by the preceding articles, as well as by my first actual sighting of the city since the towers fell.

We crossed over the George Washington Bridge - the same place where Josh (this weekend's groom) was stuck in traffic and had a clear view of the WTC attack.

There are no visible reminders during the day, outside of the changed city profile. But I was reminded, as we passed through this part of the city with all the grey tunnels and walls of stone, of a dream I had when I was very young (at least, I think it was a dream).. of getting off a bus one some grey, eerily quiet morning and walking around these streets.
(I can't think of any logical reason why this would have happened in real life, though I know we took a few school trips to NYC when I was young, and I assume this is why I had the dream.)
The dream has haunted my confused childhood memories for years - and for whatever reason, it stirred in my thoughts again on Friday.

I wonder if people have forgotten.
Have they forgotten the shock of hearing a plane fly overhead, after days and nights of silence?
Has the memory of hugging a loved one in the aftermath of that Tuesday's confusion faded?
...Should it?

Comments

[reive.livejournal.com]

I think for those of us who didn't loose someone and weren't in the immediate vicinity, we have forgotten in a constant sense, but I know I never go more than 48 hours without just _stopping_ at the enormity of it all at some point -- in the middle of the street, in subway tunnels, shopping, and I just want to sit down on the ground for a while. Because how could this be? How could anything like this be?

Re:

[elionwyr.livejournal.com]

Reading your posts/thoughts have definitely had an impact on me.
I think that, without the visual, without the taste of the air, it's too easy to be detached.

It is a shock, for example, to get an email from a scared friend who's just been told her brother-in-law has been called to serve, his family's been given military ID's, and they're not allowed to talk much at all about where they're off to.
Even with watching the news and knowing we're at war, it's a shock.

Having people this weekend say, soberly, seriously, "Jason should *not* go with the fossils to Cairo next month," sends a shiver down my spine.

Small reminders.
..And a disjointed response. :)

[roadnotes.livejournal.com]

I think that's it. You can go for hours, even a day or two, without remembering, and then suddenly something brings it back: the slant of sunlight across a building, a grit-covered car, a loud noise. . .