For my parents, it was when JFK was shot. I thought it would be when the space shuttle Challenger exploded, I thought that would be the point in time that would be forever burnished on my generation, the “Where were you?” question that could always spark a solemn memory.
I drove out of my subdivision this morning and saw flags at half-mast. There had been a bitter debate within our Home Owners Association on where the flagpoles would stand (they were moved from near the main road back to our clubhouse/tennis courts). I was a bit puzzled about the flags at half-mast and headed on to my appointment. He was late (standard), and I wondered to a USA Today stand outside of the Starbucks that was our meeting point. The article about seven years having past brought it all back.
The economy was much like it is now back then; not exactly, but it was slowing down. I’d finished a phone call with an executive at Raytheon who I used to work with (his office was in Washington, DC). My home office was outside of our living room seven years ago, and I wondered out of the room and glanced at the television for some reason. I don’t even remember why it was on nor what our morning ritual was then. Smoke was billowing from the World Trade Center, and no one knew that the world had changed. Then the second plane hit and the tears streamed down my stunned face.
It wasn’t even like it was yesterday. It was just a moment ago.
Most people like to have some connection to a famous or tragic event (how many people were there when Joe Namath won Super Bowl III?). The father of the husband of a friend of my wife died that day, which is to say I had no personal connection to the people who lost their lives. I worked in Manhattan but never ventured to that neck of the woods, spending my time in the Garment District or Queens or dare I say the South Bronx or Junior’s in Brooklyn.
It was just a moment ago.
The New York Times audio-visual tour of Hangar 17, containing fallen infrastructure and vehicles from the debris of the World Trade Center.
It was just a moment.
Tags: 9/11, World Trade Center
September 13th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Well written. Expresses it all for a lot of us.