I’ll never forget

This article in USA Today inspired me to do what I have not done for six years.  Articulate and write down my memories of that fateful day so that I never forget how I felt or what I saw.  Not for sympathy, not for sensationalism, but because I subscribe to the theory that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

And so, I remember…

… a cool breeze on a beautiful fall day

… the normal subway ride to work

… thinking it was ”just” a prop plane

… the gasps and cries from coworkers

… desperate phone calls

… evacuation

… desperation

… walking alone, even though the streets were teeming with people

… bloody, sooty faces, ashy, dirty clothes

… surreal pizza lunch with friends who escaped

… weeping with joy

… weeping with sadness

… vigils and candlelight

… quiet and darkness on the streets of New York

… the smell

… the posters – on the subway, in the parks, on the lampposts, everywhere

… the never-ending news

… the desire to forget it all as if it never happened.

But it did, and I can’t.  And just because I’m getting on a plane today, and smiling, and calling a friend on her birthday, and going about my day doesn’t mean I am forgetting.  It just means that I’m living.  With all that I remember.

I’ll never forget.