It may seem odd, but I have only recently grasped the immensity of September 11, 2001. I was young and naïve that fateful day, around nine years old. My only other encounter with death before this was when one of my distant relatives passed away and I was taken to her funeral by my parents. I didn’t understand what was happening at the funeral, and death was unfamiliar and uncomfortable. My idea of death, influenced by my Christian upbringing, was one of joy. The only story of death I had ever heard was the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and my nine year old Sabbath school teachers never went into detail of what a crucifixion actually was. As far as I knew at that time, Jesus went away for a couple days and came back with some holes in his hands. Death was just that simple to me, one minute someone was here and the next moment they weren’t. No pain, no suffering, death was clean and pure.
On that tragic morning, I knew something was happening. The first plane didn’t hit until I was at school, but the news wasn’t relayed to the students as fast as the teachers new. I began to hear people whispering, seeing looks of deep sadness and shock, but I was never told what had happened. In fact, I spent the entire day in a blissful ignorance. Nobody ever bothered to sit me down and explain the loss of life that day. I was simply in my own bubble, happy and unaware of how quickly death can tear a nation apart. That is all I remember from the actual day of the attack, my feelings all seem so vague and disconnected to me now. I can barely remember what I was doing that day, or how everyone else was felt about the attack. My unawareness muddles the entire day for me, and that deeply disturbs me.
My disturbance stemmed from my former inability to connect with others and empathize with my own nation. I didn’t know and I wasn’t given an explanation. The worst part is that I never bothered to find out why; I just simply was too ignorant to ask that question. For years, as each anniversary would pass, I would simply move aside. It all felt so distant to me, the signs and the flags. I never cried when I heard the national anthem, or when I saw firefighters raise an American flag. I didn’t understand why others did and I felt resentment towards myself that I wasn’t able to feel these emotions as strongly as others did. My mom would put those yellow ribbon magnets on the back of the car, I would only sheepishly look away when she would turn and smile at me, expecting the same rush of affection for that ribbon that she no doubt had. Even when I was privileged enough to visit the memorial inside the Pentagon where another plane had hit, I didn’t understand. My respect for those who suffered loss that day was enormous, I wanted to know and feel the way did. I was just incapable.
That changed recently, in fact my disconnectedness changed only a few months ago. My family visited New York this summer, and while I had visited Ground Zero before, I finally understood what had occurred here. That was because I finally had grasped the terrible idea of what death was, what death had done to these people. My bubble had been popped long ago with the deaths of close family and friends. I had experience a loss, while in no way comparable, that had cut straight through my heart. I had witnessed my brother stare vacantly at the wall when he heard one of his closest friends had overdosed. The memory of my dad wailing other his mother’s casket haunted me, death had finally enforced itself on my life. It was at that moment, staring through a fence at the current construction of the new building at Ground Zero, when I understood. Pain and empathy flooded through my body and soul. These people had experienced something I could never imagine, a pain so deep that it was irreparable. My understanding only grew when I visited the museum dedicated to the victims. I saw the personal effects of victims and heroes, the things they valued. I began to picture who these people were, how I probably would have enjoyed meeting most of them. The same pain I felt at Ground Zero stuck again, going deeper than before. I wanted to know these people, to bring them back. I couldn’t ask for that though. That idea that death was all joy and salvation, the one I learned in Sabbath School, was gone. The knowledge that had now replaced it was far more realistic, and terrible.
Even now when I see videos of September 11, I continue to feel that pain I experienced this summer. It’s not a bad thing, because I finally understand what I didn’t that day back when I was nine. My sense of pride in my country, admiration for those who died trying to save others, it makes sense now. I don’t seek for those same feelings I see reflected in others, because I now share them. It can be terrible burden to have, but I would rather share it with others than not share it at all.
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