Part of me wants to write and write and write, letting my fingers try to keep up with my whirling mind. Thoughts are fragmented at best. Another part of me just wants to write "I remember." and leave it at those two words.

I don't want to sound preachy. How can I tell someone else how to feel or to view today? I don't even know how to handle it. Have I even coped with the attacks? Even a year later I'm not sure I have. I bounce between deep sorrow for the all the lives lost and families ripped apart and then feel this deep sense of loss for myself, because on 9.11.2001 my world changed, as did so many others. I was yanked out of a deep naivety and the anger at having my happy little bubble burst is incredible. I've always heard the expression "Ignorance is bliss", but now I can say that I truly understand that. Yes, ignorance is bliss. But that state of bliss isn't always best. The ironic thing about that is that you don't actually know how blissful it is until you've lost that ignorance. I've never been out of the US. I'd heard of the Middle East, but never really paid attention to the politics of it. I confess I'm still at a loss. I was happily bouncing around in my life. Yes, I had bad days. Yes I had difficulties. My life wasn't all roses I guess, but damn, I knew that "stuff like that won't happen here in the US." Heck, for me places like Lebannon, Pakistan and Afghanistan only existed whenever I caught a glimpse of them on the news. People like Hussein and the other monsters were "way over there and can't get me here." "That doesn't affect me" and "We're safe here" were common thoughts to me a year and a day ago. I was more focused on the here and now of my daily life. The concerns a newly single parent has were more important to me than what was going on in the world. Osama Bin Laden may have been a new restaurant opening up for all I knew. I never connected the dots of the events leading up to 9.11.2001 .. the bombings of US Embassies, the attack on the Cole, the previous attack at the WTC. I always wrote them off as "Geeze, what gets into some people?" rather than "Are these warning signs of something even more devestating to come?"

I was stunned one year ago as I was shaken violently from that blissful state. Things for me changed in small ways compared to the way things changed for families who actually went through the ordeal. I didn't lose a family member nor a friend. I lost my ignorance, and I lost my innocence. I no longer take things for granted. I now make a point to tell those important to me that I love them. I no longer put off fun things in order to do the "responsible" thing. I've always known life is limited, but 9.11.2001 brought it all home to me.

I remember being scared that my brother, who is a firefighter, would end up going to NYC to help. Yes, it would have been a valiant, noble thing to do and I didn't want him to do it. I asked him about why he would go and his response was a simple one "Because it's the right thing for me to do." I can understand that. We all coped, or at least tried to, in our own ways. Steve is never ever without some visual reminder of his fallen brothers, be it a ballcap emblazoned with 9.11.01 or a tshirt with FDNY on it. He wears them with pride and as a badge, I believe. My mother had cried when a fallen firefighter's mother was interviewed on tv and said "There but for the grace of God go I".

I feel anger about today itself, about having to relive the events. I was just starting to feel less paranoia. I was just beginning to be able to fly again without this major attack of fear, without sitting there glancing around the cabin nervously wondering if there were terrorists on board with me. My oldest son wants to go on a class trip next June to Washington DC and I'm freaking out about it today. After the tidal wave of memories, I'm thinking "There's absolutely no fucking way I'm sending my child to a freaking bull's eye!" I'm supposed to fly to CA again in November and now I'm scared shitless to. Dying doesn't scare me. What scares me is the knowledge of what my family, my children especially, would have to cope with should something happen to me. Yeah, I know I could be hit by a bus this afternoon and they'd still have to go through it, but somehow that doesn't seem as bad.

I have had this little mental holding of breath (for lack of a better term) waiting for the other shoe to fall. Wondering "what next?". Although that uncomfortableness will probably never go away, it was easing a bit. Now, because of the flood of memories, it's back with a vengence like an iron fist around my heart. Damn, I want the world to leave me alone and just let me live my life the way I want to .. for it to just overlook me when the scenes play out. Do I want to be able to stick my head in the sand again? Yes. Do I want my false sense of security back? Hell yes.

Is it panic and emotion talking? Probably. Does that make it less valid? No. My brain logically asks "But if you give in to the paranoia, then who wins? Isn't that the whole essence of terrorism? To cause you to shake up your world and react while running scared?" Yeah, I know it is. My pride stands up and yells "Fuck that shit. They won't win." Then there's this soft voice that says "Who cares who wins? Does anyone win if we're dead? Who wins if I go against instinct and stand up to 'them' and we all end up obliterated in 6 months anyway? Don't you lose either way?" Hmpf, if I have to lose, I want to lose on my terms. If I'm going out, I want to spend those 6 months with the people that I love close to me.

I keep hearing on the radio and on tv that we should celebrate the good that did come out of the tragedy, and I guess there was good that happened. What I said earlier about my own views, of no longer taking for granted that I'll see or speak to a loved one again, certainly bears that. Families whose lives were changed for the better certainly have cause to celebrate. Joyous reunions and restarted lives are happy things.

But, in the back of my mind and in my heart, I'm mourning my own personal losses. Losses that compared to the grand scheme of the events are very very small. But they are my losses and are deeply felt.

So yes, I remember, but I remember selfishly. Probably not what the battle cry was actually intended to mean, but I do remember.


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Words and Images � bisa-pet