10 Years Later
"He doesn't work there anymore. He doesn't work there anymore."
My mother's words were the first indication that something had gone horribly wrong in Lower Manhattan. I was safely at my desk in my office in Princeton, NJ, doing some last-minute prep for a 9 a.m. news release about something that had already been rendered completely irrelevant by the time my phone rang.
"Mom, what are you talking about?"
"Your brother, his office moved, he doesn't work in the World Trade Center anymore."
I still had no idea what she was talking about, and neither did any of us, yet. The first plane had just hit; the facts were slim; my mind didn't leap immediately to terrorist attack, but assumed it was a small plane with an inexperienced pilot who'd gotten off-course and inadvertently flew into a building.
I sent my brother a short e-mail that today still makes me wince; how could I have been so callous and selfish as to write something like, "I'm glad you don't still work at the WTC. Love you." But at that point, I still had no idea. I didn't know that one of his best friends from college, and that friend's brother, worked at Cantor Fitzgerald and would never come home. I had no idea what more there would be to come that day, and in the following weeks, months, and years. It was unfathomable. It's still unfathomable.
I feel exhausted, emotionally, from all the coverage in this week leading up to the 10-year anniversary. Every year, I'm surprised how raw my emotions still are, how quickly I'm transported back to that day, how guilty I feel that I get so upset even though I didn't lose anyone that day, so what right do I have to mourn when I was so personally unaffected, comparatively? I have my brother, still. Thousands of people don't have theirs.
This morning at the gym, I was reading the People magazine coverage of some of the 9-year-old kids whose fathers died on 9/11, before the children were born. And I wept and I wept (it is really hard to exercise when you're crying, but I realized that I just sounded like I was working out really hard, so no one paid me much mind), for those kids who never knew their dads, for their older siblings who HAD known their dads but lost them so young, for their widows and friends. And I wept because I can't help but think again of my brother and his family, of his son who will turn 10 next month, of their older daughter and the younger one who came along four years later. Of how different all our lives would be, and theirs especially, if my brother did still work there on that day.
We don't talk about it, much; my brother's a stoic and a private guy. I know he must feel guilt, along with profound sadness and anger. I know he hugs his family extra tightly on each anniversary. I know he's tried to be there for his friend's family, the ones who weren't so lucky. There are hundreds of those stories: the woman who was late to work because it was her kid's first day of kindergarten; the guy who decided to vote in the primary election before going in to work; the person who played hooky or slept in or stopped for breakfast or worked from home or took the dog to the vet.
Is that part of what's so devastating, still? The chance of it all, the randomness of who lived and who died? There's always that with death, with any accident or incident: "If I hadn't forgotten my keys..." or "If I'd gone on the highway rather than through back roads..." (it seems disrespectful to invoke "Sliding Doors" in such a somber post, but I guess I've gone ahead and done that now). I guess it's simply the overwhelming magnitude of loss.
I don't know that I can handle any more TV specials or articles about 9/11 this week (although someone just told me that the Village Voice took a very different approach, and wrote about some of the 9/11 charities that were pretty much scams; I do actually want to read that, because I think I can handle feeling enraged more than I can handle feeling so sad). But I do know that I'll remember those who were lost and those who they left behind, and that I'll hug my loved ones just a little bit more tightly.
My mother's words were the first indication that something had gone horribly wrong in Lower Manhattan. I was safely at my desk in my office in Princeton, NJ, doing some last-minute prep for a 9 a.m. news release about something that had already been rendered completely irrelevant by the time my phone rang.
"Mom, what are you talking about?"
"Your brother, his office moved, he doesn't work in the World Trade Center anymore."
I still had no idea what she was talking about, and neither did any of us, yet. The first plane had just hit; the facts were slim; my mind didn't leap immediately to terrorist attack, but assumed it was a small plane with an inexperienced pilot who'd gotten off-course and inadvertently flew into a building.
I sent my brother a short e-mail that today still makes me wince; how could I have been so callous and selfish as to write something like, "I'm glad you don't still work at the WTC. Love you." But at that point, I still had no idea. I didn't know that one of his best friends from college, and that friend's brother, worked at Cantor Fitzgerald and would never come home. I had no idea what more there would be to come that day, and in the following weeks, months, and years. It was unfathomable. It's still unfathomable.
I feel exhausted, emotionally, from all the coverage in this week leading up to the 10-year anniversary. Every year, I'm surprised how raw my emotions still are, how quickly I'm transported back to that day, how guilty I feel that I get so upset even though I didn't lose anyone that day, so what right do I have to mourn when I was so personally unaffected, comparatively? I have my brother, still. Thousands of people don't have theirs.
This morning at the gym, I was reading the People magazine coverage of some of the 9-year-old kids whose fathers died on 9/11, before the children were born. And I wept and I wept (it is really hard to exercise when you're crying, but I realized that I just sounded like I was working out really hard, so no one paid me much mind), for those kids who never knew their dads, for their older siblings who HAD known their dads but lost them so young, for their widows and friends. And I wept because I can't help but think again of my brother and his family, of his son who will turn 10 next month, of their older daughter and the younger one who came along four years later. Of how different all our lives would be, and theirs especially, if my brother did still work there on that day.
We don't talk about it, much; my brother's a stoic and a private guy. I know he must feel guilt, along with profound sadness and anger. I know he hugs his family extra tightly on each anniversary. I know he's tried to be there for his friend's family, the ones who weren't so lucky. There are hundreds of those stories: the woman who was late to work because it was her kid's first day of kindergarten; the guy who decided to vote in the primary election before going in to work; the person who played hooky or slept in or stopped for breakfast or worked from home or took the dog to the vet.
Is that part of what's so devastating, still? The chance of it all, the randomness of who lived and who died? There's always that with death, with any accident or incident: "If I hadn't forgotten my keys..." or "If I'd gone on the highway rather than through back roads..." (it seems disrespectful to invoke "Sliding Doors" in such a somber post, but I guess I've gone ahead and done that now). I guess it's simply the overwhelming magnitude of loss.
I don't know that I can handle any more TV specials or articles about 9/11 this week (although someone just told me that the Village Voice took a very different approach, and wrote about some of the 9/11 charities that were pretty much scams; I do actually want to read that, because I think I can handle feeling enraged more than I can handle feeling so sad). But I do know that I'll remember those who were lost and those who they left behind, and that I'll hug my loved ones just a little bit more tightly.
