Advice On Remembering 9/11

posted on 09/27/2009

It's hard to know how to describe what 9/11 was like for those who lived in New York City on that fateful day. I know for me, it put the reality of the holocaust and any other horrific event into a clear vivid picture of what these people must have gone through and how for years and years after, relatives relive the events over and over again in their minds -- trying to make sense of it all -- trying to image what possible good could come out of so much tragedy.

I was there during the mayhem of 9/11 - shaken from a night's sleep by an earth shattering noise that literally threw me out of bed. My apartment was two blocks away from the World Trade Center site; on that day, as all the tenants in the building gathered on the roof to see what tragedy had just occurred -- little did we know how cruel human beings can be and how much devastation could occur in just a few short hours. Most of us saw the second plane hit, and most of us witnessed sights that in a lifetime could never be processed totally. And we were the survivors, displaced from our community for months to come -- yet we survived. We saw people falling from the towers before they went down, and emergency caregivers, policemen and firefighters entering the towers to save lives, only to have their lives taken when the buildings collapsed.

We were on the roof, covered with soot -- frightened and transfixed by the rainstorm of papers and debris that floated through the air as the buildings came down. I can only describe it as watching a picture in a picture on a television station -- witnessing the horror and in a big way living it -- because we were there.

Years later, New York City still comes together on 9/11 to honor those innocent victims that were murdered that day. I sometimes get angry when I see tourists standing in front of the site, snapping photographs -- smiling and delighted to capture the moment of "having been at the Trade Center Site." But then, why shouldn't people from all over the world be curious? We, as humans, are always drawn to tragic stories and historical events that have taken thousands of uncounted lives. They come because, to this day, it is a tragic reminder that all is not right in the world. And the tenants in my building; we still gather each year on the roof of our building that was spared any major destruction to pay tribute to those who lost their lives and to pray that something so horribly cruel never befalls our beautiful city or any other place in the world ever again.