Remembrance

On the seventh anniversary of 09/11, it's all too tempting to editorialize on the events of that day, thinking that the passage of seven years tends to draw some closure, a platform if you will, on which one could pontificate. Evil presidents, evil oil magnates, evil governnments, evil terrorists, the history of Muslim fanaticism, the history of democratic fanaticism, the history of financial fanaticism, the bravery of the passengers, the baseness of the murderers, the structural integrity of tall buildings, the structural integrity of chief executives, the cost of large standing armies on foreign soil, et cetera, ad nauseam...plenty of things to discuss.

But my guess is that most people are already doing this...or have already done this...or are already tired of hearing about it. And I can't claim to have exhaustively researched the topic---either from the Commission report or from the ravings of conspiracy theorists' websites---so what good would it do anyway?

Instead, I'll just recount my own experiences that day. (Be forewarned, these are dull in the extreme; there's nothing in them on which you could pin either a yellow commemorative ribbon...or a white feather.)

At the time I was twenty-four and between jobs, living with my parents. The temp agency which had been trying against mighty odds to stick me somewhere (I was an indifferent admin assistant, showing up for jobs whenever I felt like it, taking long lunch breaks, and just generally being a less-than-desirable temp) didn't have an interview scheduled for that day, so I woke up late (sometime between nine and ten) and stumbled downstairs.

Normally I would have headed my shameless freeloader arse straight for the kitchen to get some breakfast. That day, though, I went straight into my folks' bedroom and turned on the TV. I'm not sure why I did that; in some remote part of my mind, I may have been curious about the weather schedule.

I didn't have my contacts in, and the analog TV picture came on and came into resolution very slowly. It took a few minutes to register that I was seeing a pair of buildings on fire. It took a few minutes more to realize that they were in New York. It took a few minutes more to realize that they were the twin towers. After settling on that, I hung around until the teletype at the bottom of the screen flashed something about airplanes (I didn't read the whole message).

My first thoughts were, "Oh...I guess someone accidentally flew a plane into one of the buildings...kinda like that B-25 flying into the Empire State Building in 1945." By that time, the teletype had flashed past, and I had to wait another minute or so before the operative word "terrorists" appeared.

Naturally I was shocked, but I can't say it was profoundly so. Just a mild sort of dismay. (Had I been in New York, the dismay might not have been so mild.)

From there, I wandered over to my sister's house, and with her and her husband and their three kids---two nieces, one nephew---I watched the towers fall down. At some point I called my friend Alex on the phone, thinking that maybe he hadn't heard of it (which didn't make a lot of sense even at the time, but I guess I just wanted to talk to someone outside my family circle).

After it was clear the towers had collapsed, I went home, changed clothes, drove over to an Arby's and picked up some lunch. I tried to do something constructive the rest of the day (reading, sleeping, playing guitar, etc.) but just couldn't commit to anything.

Later that day Mom and Dad got home from work, and we had dinner (vegetable & beef soup, I think). Some time later I went to bed, and slept without any trouble.

The next day is a blur, but I don't think anything significant happened.