September 11, 2002

Today, I am writing about the first anniversary of September 11th. I guess I could tell you my story of what I was doing when...but to be honest, it wasn't very different from most people's stories. And I think a lot of them can express what I went through that Tuesday better than I could anyway.

But on the first anniversary of September 11th, I had recently moved back to Brooklyn after a year and a half of living in Manhattan. My grandma, Betty Jo, had died a few weeks earier and I was still reeling from that loss. So, remembering and mourning, and missing someone loved was very fresh on my mind.

I remember walking to Flatbush Avenue to run errands or something. And the sky was super clear blue, just like the year before. Except this day was windy. Incredibly windy. And the streets were quiet. It was as if every New Yorker was walking around wrapped up in whatever they were remembering. And what each one was remembering was so singularly awful that it all added up to collective silence. Every store I went into, the people were whispering. And on Flatbush, they were mostly whispering about the wind.

One woman said that the wind was all the souls of the people who died. Blowing down the streets because they were sad and angry and didn't want us to forget them. And that's really what it felt like. Clear blue sky, no clouds, but fierce wind. And then all I wanted to do was be home in my new apartment. I didn't like the idea of walking through all those souls.

On my way home, I thought, "someday it will be 10 years from September 11, 2001". And I wondered what that anniversary would feel like.

And here it is. Here we are. Ten years later.

I don't really have an answer.