Facing it

I don't know if this [what? feeling? complex? neurosis?] has anything to do with what Josh was saying yesterday, but Sunday was the first time I had been to "Ground Zero" since before September 11, 2001. And it was on accident, on my way to a wedding in Jersey, transferring to the Path train at the completely rebuilt WTC station (which I purposely avoided last time I went to Newark "Liberty" Airport even though it meant taking the very long way around).

From the station you can see the...well...the hole in the ground where the buildings once stood, through open meshwork panels with NYCentric slogans printed on them. You are in the fucking hole. The station is beautiful and clean and it is even sunny, airy, fresh feeling. People are snapping photos, taking video.

It hadn't occurred to me that I would be there. I stopped moving. I moved when I found the escalator beneath me. I cried. I couldn't help it. I sniffled up quickly and stood on the platform joking till the train came. I boarded the train and sat with my back to the hole. We pulled out of the station. I breathed.

On September 11, 2001 we were living in Long Island City, Queens, near the East River, with a stunning view from our kitchen of the Empire State Building and half-way down the length of Manhattan. From the waterfront park a couple of blocks away we could see all of the island. We'd been in the neighborhood a little more than a week. That's where I was standing, on Pier 4, when the towers fell and for a long time before that watching them smoulder. Crumple. First one. Then the other. No TV screen between me and it. I heard it. Smelled it. Got it in my eyes. A woman fell to her knees next to me and nobody moved to help her. We moved back to Brooklyn a few months later. I didn't want to look anymore.

I just wasn't ready to see it. I don't know if I'll ever be ready.

Can't write it either. Can hardly read it.