9/11 Comments

Instead of writing something trite about today, I'll share the comments of a poster named Reichman on Fark that do a much better job:

The worst part is I think what happened today is lost on most people, those that weren't there, or those that don't live in that tri-state area.

To us that live here, we got robbed of freedom and our security. Ever since I was a little kid, we'd go on these long trips, but once I saw the Twin Towers (and c'mon you could see them from MILES away), I knew I was home. And I guess that's part of my association with them.

But I was there also, my first glimpse of those towers wasn't safely on TV with a "America Under Attack" banner on the bottom. I went to high-school in Jersey City, 3 blocks off the waterfront, directly across from lower Manhatten (anyone familiar with Jersey City, should know St. Peter's Prep). I remember walking down those 3 blocks to the waterfront and watching this landmark burn, passing hundreds of people walking out up the street getting out of Manhattan. I remember all you could hear were sirens and screaming. You could see the people jumping... I had gone inside for a bit, and went back out around 9:50-10:00, just in time to see the first tower collapse. It was unbelievable, I remember everyone looking at it in disbelief, it got very quiet when finally someone just uttered, whispered really, "it collapsed", and this woman in the street just fell to her knees in tears. The rest of the day was rough, people were just walking up the street (since the ferry was leaving them off right around my school), and I saw the people covered in dust, those frantically trying to get in touch with loved ones, and those people who were just broken down. I think most of all, I remember the smell. Even 15 miles out of the city where I live, the next morning you went outside and you could smell it. And at my school, you could smell the burning steel/concrete/glass/... for weeks. The entire area just, smelt like death.

I had gone into the city about 11 days later on Sept 22nd. Had gotten tickets to a Yankees game from a friend of my dad's who was afraid to travel into the city. So I went, and it was very strange to see how the city had changed. I remember seeing the men in military fatigues and m16's in Penn Station. I also remember the posters, to me that had to have been the saddest thing. To those that weren't there, people had put posters all over the city, asking if someone had seen their loved ones. They put pictures up on these posters, and things like "Worked on the 100th floor", or "Worked at Cantor-Fitzgerald" and you just knew that on all of these posters, that these people were gone. And I'm not talking 1 or 2 posters, I'm talking about thousands, covering every wall, every lamp post, every telephone pole.

My comments are rather simple:

I remember trying to keep it together and train my staff on their second day on the job when all I wanted to do is send them all home then go home myself and watch TV all day.

I remember being confused up until that point (I am a US immigrant) over where my home was, but then on 9/11 realizing that I was an American.

I remember seeing Rudy Guiliani and everyone in New York trying to keep everything together by force of their wills alone.

I remember the stories of how the people of a small town in Newfoundland opened their homes and hearts to all the transatlantic traveleres stranded on that day.