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nine-eleven
I think that one of the reasons that 9/11 affected so many people so drastically is that it demanded that we completely overhaul our conception of the magnitude of evil of which a human being is capable. Before people on an airplane were turned into missiles, before thousands of others died for the sin of getting to work on time that day, most of us were content to believe that our world could never be such a bleak or savage place. Not here on our island. Not on this brilliant, blue day.
It broke my inspiration. I stopped… progressing for a while, a sort of zombie of my former self. I stayed in, drank with friends, ate familiar foods, cloaked myself in comfortable homogeneity. It was a year before I could think of it without getting all misty-eyed and even then… I didn't know what to do with it. The first anniversary passed and everyone I knew were in different locations and I just wanted a drink. Of the familiar. But I ended up alone.
I got to work on the second anniversary with a nagging fear of a repeat performance. I didn’t want to end up polishing a bottle of wine off alone, wallowing in my own patheticness.
And then I read this.
And I got a crazy idea. What if… I didn't mope tonight? What if I tried something new? Something sure to be awful – a terrifically bad idea, I mean, who goes on a blind not-date on a national day of mourning, but something drove me there that I just didn’t understand yet.
Last night, the cab spun us home in the wee hours of the morning, and Alex and I took our usual positions of me sleeping in the backseat while he held my hand and looked out the window…
I’m so glad I went.
comments (5)
yeah I would have to say we pretty much partied our asses off last night. what a night. BTW will you e-mail me some pictures? I didn't take any! and I really want to post some on my site for all 5 of my readers ;-)
ciao
1 | jocelyn | September 12, 2004 04:48 PM
hope you got my pics okay, sent from gmail. had excellent time and I think I had my first major hangover ever....
2 | michael | September 12, 2004 10:49 PM
I didn't mope either. I went to an outdoor concert and had a great time. I waved my flag, I drank with friends, and I enjoyed my evening.
It doesn't mean I have forgotten.
It doesn't mean I don't care.
I think maybe we need to have different ways of mourning, remembering, and healing.
But that's just me, maybe.
3 | Helen | September 13, 2004 05:28 AM
That was a beautiful tribute. Thank you.
4 | Leslie | September 13, 2004 12:45 PM
It took me over a year to start leaving my house and going out again, this despite having a boyfriend. It wasn't that I was scared, I just didn't feel like it and I just wanted the familiar, just like you. I think many others felt like this. I feel like last year's blackout jolted NY out of its homebody state.
5 | Karol | September 14, 2004 05:58 PM