Thursday, September 11, 2008

This Day

It’s September 11th.
Again.

I’m feeling it this year, more than I have for a while. I used to think that this date would always be marked on the calendar in black shadows, but the last few years haven’t been all that bad. This year, though…

This year the tears are back. Right there on the edge. Just on the edge of the levee of my eyes. Just below the dam of my throat. My heart is swelling.

I’m not sure exactly why.

OK, that’s a lie. I know why.

There’s been so much loss lately… The philosopher... And many deaths…

I was working right in Washington DC on that day. In a government building. Maybe a mile from the White House. We were evacuated. I emerged into the sunlight suddenly unclear as to exactly where we were. But I was sure of one thing.

The world would never be the same.

I was right. Big surprise.

I’m an expatriate New Yorker. I don’t live there any more and pretty much haven’t since I left for college. But if something threatens my city, I react with a fierceness that startles me.

On that day I reacted with fierceness and grief. And tears. That’s MY city! How dare they do that to MY CITY!

I didn’t stop crying for 2 weeks. It took drugs to stem the flow.

Drugs followed by 2 years of therapy.

It’s the loss. It always comes back to the loss. The loss and the lack of security. Don’t look away. Don’t turn your back. Don’t drop your guard. Or the next minute, everything could be gone.

Don’t take anything for granted.

Tell the ones you love that you do love them.

Do.
Love them.

3 comments:

Deity said...

I'm having a particularly harder time than i expected, too. Even though it's seven years later, the memories of that day, mostly the hours following when we didn't know what city we had left after they collapsed. I remember those moments scared me the most. They still do. What was left? Unfortunately, seven years later, i can see much change but no real indication of what remains.

oatmeal girl said...

Deity, I'm always so happy to know that you are reading, and your comments are especially welcome.

It's been 7 years. And 7 is a magic number. Not as long as 10, but more powerful. Think the Sabbath. Think sabbatical. It's a time to stop.

So we stop, and take a breath of air that is no longer as acrid as back then, although the sharp olfactory memory of my visit to the site has never left me.

We stop, and we remember, and it all comes back. The day itself and everything since and what we can see ahead. Which is not all that encouraging.

Hope can be hard to hold on to on some days...

Greenwoman said...

I think that for me, this happens to be a year of change for me...a transition from feeling shattered to wholeness. Even so there's more letting go that goes with getting back inside my own power.

I wonder what we will have to give up in order to get back the soulfulness of society?