We woke up yesterday to the news of this earthquake in the Indian Ocean that has, so far, killed 22,000 people. It brings me all the way back to September 11, 2001. I got on the subway in Brooklyn that morning and when we stopped at Wall Street, a man got on the train. He sat down next to me and told us that missiles (from Brooklyn, he said, but that’s another story) had hit the World Trade Center. A couple of stops later we were under the WTC itself. I still can’t believe it. And there was smoke and people screaming and crying and getting on the train. And some not getting on the train. And then we moved on and I didn’t know what to do. At 14th Street the man from Wall Street got off and I went all the way up to 116th Street and I went to class, if you can believe it, at least for a few minutes, and then we were watching TV, and then we were trying desperately to get in touch with our friends, our family, and then I was walking 60 blocks to a friend’s apartment and then, finally, I got back on a different subway and made it all the way home to Brooklyn. Where our car was covered with dust from those buildings. Where papers littered the streets. Where the smell of the burning went on and on for, I don’t know, was it two months? Three? And I woke up crying, wondering what separated those people that jumped from the people that didn’t have to. And after that thunder, or sirens, or a helicopter could all make me shake.
And when it started to fade for other people in other places, it went on for those of us in NY (and, I imagine, in D.C.). There was the burning, of course, and I wore sneakers every day in case I had to run and I had a number of panic attacks on crowded subways. And there was the hilarious (not really) time I noticed an unattended bag on the train and tried to get off at the next station, but a man said, why should you leave, let’s throw the bag out (because, uh, never mind the folks on the platform, but anyway) and just in time its owner a few seats away perked up. And it was after that that I stopped wanting to live in NYC, in Brooklyn, forever. Because I did not think I would ever, could ever feel safe there again.
And elsewhere around the world? Life went on. It just went on. People watched on TV like I watch the aftermath of this earthquake, but it was just so far away. It was like a movie. It did not feel real.
God and even there, all the small things continued to matter. That’s what was so strange about it. On Tuesday this thing happened but on Wednesday we were back in class and on Friday, I think it was Friday, we had a statistics exam. And on Monday, recruiting resumed. And, I mean, none of that was supposed to matter anymore. Hey, shouldn’t this, this thing that happened just downtown, just last week make it less important which end of that bell curve we were on and which interview for a summer internship we landed? It did. And it didn’t.
And so now I sit here and I think, my god, 22,000 people have already died in Asia and there will surely be more. And I think about all of the American soldiers and, my god, the Iraqi civilians dying in this war that cannot, that will not be won. And I think about diseases and car accidents and people that don’t have enough money for the basic necessities in life, and these women in the blogsphere who’ve been through years of infertility and miscarriage after miscarriage after miscarriage and I think, gosh, this really puts things into perspective, doesn’t it? And it does. And it doesn’t.
I still sit here, cozy in my bed, with my laptop and wireless internet, my husband watching TV and playing with the cats downstairs, all of my loved ones safe and healthy in their homes and I manage to feel glum that I’m not 17 weeks pregnant. What’s up with that?
Thank you for this beautiful post. I don’t know what else to say, but that a lot of bloggers have been writing about the earthquake and aftermath, and yours is the first post that moved me. Thank you.
You are the first person that I “know” that had a first hand experience with the 9/11 tragedy. My gosh, I can’t even begin to imagine how you felt. I was sick for weeks about the attack. Not in the way you were. I didn’t have to look at the debris and smell the burning, but I did watch/read everything I could about it. I had nightmares and I would cry every night watching the news.
Now, what I find weird is that I don’t feel the same way about the tsunami victims. Maybe because they are too far away that I can’t relate. They are far. You are not far. They are just some people in another country. Sad to say. Maybe it is because it was a natural disaster. No help to blame mother nature. It couldn’t have been avoided. There is nothing anyone could have done. The attacks were different.
The day of my d&c I was in denial. I wasn’t sad. I kept thinking that hey…there are worse things in the world that could happen to me. I could lose my husband. I could die of cancer. Big deal…a baby I didn’t even know died.
Now I think it is a big deal because it is a piece of me that died. Maybe that is why you feel glum. Maybe we won’t be healed until we hold our baby in our arms.
Thanks for sharing your experience. So many of you on the east coast have endured so much pain. We have no idea.
New Yorkers know a lot of things now that the rest of the country truly doesn’t want to know. I can’t imagine your experience, having been so close.
We know people and we know of people who perished that day. Two of my cousins dodged bodies falling from the sky. Like you, my brother tells of his odyssey crossing the river that night, covered in soot. My sister recalls Alan, who perished in Tower One, who was at her house just the Saturday before. I spent the day frantically accounting for the whereabouts of family and loved ones. Here in Boston, we too mourned many lives lost. I drove down that Friday and saw the light of the fires still raging; I was stopped in traffic for 2 hours for a candelight vigil – everyone was out of their car; many were sobbing.
A year later while visiting Vegas, a cab driver started a chat about 9/11 with Sal and me. His absolute nonchalance and lightness about it astounded me -like you said, it was as if it never happened for him, or was as if it happened in some far-off land with no impact on his life whatsoever. His ignorance infuriated Sal and drove me to the point of tears. I realized then that a good portion of our country just didn’t get it…they weren’t close enough to feel it personally.
Your post is truly eloquent. Thank you.