"Never forget." Every 9/11 I hear this over and over again. "Never forget" -- as if I could if I wanted to! This directive continues to baffle me, year after year.
I wish I could forget the morning I heard a loud crash from the other side of my office, just blocks up the street from the World Trade Center. I wish I could forget seeing that second plane smash directly into the second tower, the sinking fear when I realized the first collision wasn't an accident but an attack, then the sight of the first tower collapsing, a sight that literally drew me to my knees with despair. I wish I could forget the confusion, not knowing what would come next and whether it was safe for me to walk home. And the smell. How I long for the smell to fade from my memory.
But there are some things that I want to remember.
It was a heartbreakingly gorgeous, cloudless, sunny morning. I walked home from lower Manhattan, across the Brooklyn Bridge, and finally to my home in Brooklyn, with a colleague. We were all scared. There was smoke and dust everywhere. People in agony. But everywhere there was also a spirit of camaraderie. We would get through this because we're New Yorkers. We're tough.
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Delis gave away free water. Bars and restaurants opened their doors to anyone passing by. Strangers sobbed on each other's shoulders. In the weeks that followed, thousands of people volunteered for the cleanup and for all the other work we needed to recover. I want to remember those we lost -- but I also want to remember those who worked to rebuild our city.
Strangely absent from New York City was anger, talk of retribution.
I'm not sure what saddened me more: The deaths of all the victims, or the seething hatred those deaths seemed to spark elsewhere in America. Or the cynical way the tragedy was twisted to justify a war in a country that had nothing whatsoever to do with the attacks. All the lies.
We dishonor the dead of 9/11 with hatred, vengeance, and lies. Never forget? It's impossible to forget the loss and the violence. What I want to remember, always, is the way we stood together in the wake of 9/11, not with an us-vs.-them defensiveness but with compassion. I want to feel gratitude for my life and for the lives sacrificed trying to save others. That is the 9/11 we must never forget: The moments when we saw each other as brothers and sisters, forgot about our differences, and revealed our best selves.
What do you remember from 9/11?
Tribute in Light installation designed by John Bennett, Gustavo Bonevardi, Richard Nash Gould, Julian Laverdiere, and Paul Myoda with lighting consultant Paul Marantz.
Image via Sister72/Flickr
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Comments 34
I love how you throw in the statement about the war.. you are obviously uneducated about the war you speak of. way to go. touching article
umm no she is actually right about the war.
I remember the nation unifying behind our president, and the disgusting, filthy liberal vermin spending over a decade spewing unspeakable lies and the vilest of slander against their own nation as they were appalled that that president was from a different party.
How ironic that you post that link and this article, and then have the unmitigated gall to accuse others of "lies"...
Sadly, as predictable as it is stomach turning...
I live in Pa, not far from where the plane went down in Somerset County. I will never forget the terror of a plane missing over us and no one knowing where it was, or watching the innocence of those in my high school fade away, as we all began to realize the horror of what was happening around our country. Cliques and hatred fell away that day as we all stood shoulder to shoulder and arm in arm...everyone holding on to everyone else..as we tried to process what was going on. We stood in solidarity the rest of the school year, linked by the horrendous tragedy, and the realization that the world as we knew it was changed forever.
you people are disrespecting not only the men and women who died today 11 years ago but your country. fight and argue about the war on a different day. today is about remembrance and a country scared that stood together in the face of tragedy. we honer not only are troops but our civilians we to easliy forget that. thank you to our troops and our civians who lost thier lives and to the ones who still fight and believe in our contry.