“Upon coming out of the darkness of the Battery Tunnel into the bright light of morning there was immediately a peculiar feel to the city. The car veered towards the exit ramp as I glanced up to an unexpected sight: one of the World Trade Towers was ablaze. It was an eerie vision without even yet knowing the origin of the blaze.
We tediously and uneasily made our way through traffic continuing to look skyward at the billowing smoke. I had a grim realization that thousands of pieces of paper were floating through the air. In one brief moment the sounds of the city and sirens were overtaken by the sound of a jet and we saw the underbelly of the 767 jet for an instant before it seemed to be swallowed by the south tower.
The next few moments seemed like an eternity. Brett and I were talking but the sound of the explosion still rang in our ears. My heart was racing as heat washed over the car bringing with it the certainty that this had in fact just happened. As debris fell in front of us I found my voice and asked our driver to try to move us.
It was chaos, confusion, fear on a level I had never experienced. The car now boxed in felt like a trap so we got out not yet knowing what to do. The true severity of course hadn’t yet begun to take hold but we knew we needed to start walking.
We headed north with a mass of people as a low rumbling became audible and we began to run initially thinking it was another jet. It was not this as we had feared but the sound of Two World Trade Center collapsing. When we came back up for air in a surreal daze we just kept walking. Five years to build, one hour to destroy.
We found our way to a friend’s place where we watched together the morning unfold over and over again before our disbelieving eyes. We discussed, we were silent, we cried and we comforted. We tried to make sense of the senseless and wondered if we might regain what was so quickly lost.”
September 11th, 2001; I was there. I was at the towers. I watched it happen. I wrote the above just a few weeks later. They are words of one person’s experience of what happened but can’t capture or truly convey that day.
Eight years later this day still brings a wash of emotions and I remember the entire day start to finish. Yet I wonder what have we learned? Initially when I thought of writing this I thought it would be easy. I would speak of the origins and aftermath of this historic day. But it isn’t. Faced with pure ignorance and hatred isn’t easy. The direction we allowed our government to take us after 9/11 isn’t easy. Comprehending the failures pre- and post 9/11 isn’t easy.
For many with the passage of time, and frustrations with the war, health care and the economy the memories of September 11th have been blurred. Eight years ago as the towers crumbled many assumed “our world would never be the same.” Yet, Osama Bin Laden’s terrorists failed to derail Western society. Life for most of us in the west continued with little interruption.
Constancy can easily lead to complacency. President Bush failed in the aftermath by not channeling the surge of international concern into a broader redefinition of America. The ease with which partisans from all sides resumed their usual stances reflected the disturbing tendency toward political polarization and moral disengagement.
Moral disengagement allowed the attacks to occur. And today we are faced with no fewer threats than we were eight years ago.
Eight years ago, we united as a nation in response to unprecedented attacks on our beliefs and freedom. Today, we have a similar opportunity to unite against those things that truly threatened those liberties.