September 11

Just typing those words makes me shudder. Why does it feel as though it were just yesterday? I remember, as all Americans do, exactly where I was when I knew what was happening, although I remember not understanding it. Rather than discussing 9/11 again, I want to focus on what has happened since then. Americans were softened, scared, and caught off guard. We clung to each other in an attempt to reclaim the safety we no longer felt. A war started, and we were supportive, angry and vehement, we wanted blood. Once again, this was an attempt to reclaim something we felt was now missing. Then we began to turn, one by one, the more aware or more cynical citizens first, and began to hate the war, to resent it and all who supported it. We felt misled. We felt as though we had been reduced to sheep, duped and fooled into something that we were told would quell the pain, the anger, and the fear, and we became bitter and resentful. Once again, this was an attempt to reclaim something we had lost.

What America lost on September 11, in my opinion and among other things, was our innocence. No longer would the term "American" mean what it did before "the fall." Like the Fall of the Bible, we entered a post-lapsarian world and reacted in stages to the grim reality we faced. It was something more sinister and more psychological than pain, coldness, and hunger. It was a fall that had us challenging our sense of self, our relationships, our culture. Suddenly we did not know who we were, and we wanted someone to blame. We needed to know who offered the apple, and we needed to send that individual to Hell.

Was it hard to believe that the apple may have been offered by us? (Which I am not saying I necessarily believe) Or is it harder to admit that there was no apple? The question I am asking has very little to do with politics or nations, and everything to do with humanity. Did we face our greatest fear that day, did we face the apathy of our peers? Did we accept the grim fact that humans, in fact, are capable of such disgusting and terrible actions? Did we turn to one another in an attempt to blot out all of that hatred, (but it was so much worse than hatred, this apathy) and try to overwhelm it with love? Did we realize the futility in this pathetic facade?

How far I have come since 9/11...on that cruel morning I was a High School senior, getting ready for first period honors English, my favorite class and the sole reason I got out of bed in the morning. It was cold in the pre-dawn of 5:30 a.m. I was a much different person than the person reminiscing on this moment today. I still retain some of my latent cynicism, but much of it has gone by the wayside, thankfully. I was pessimistic (yes, more pessimistic) and my motto was, "if you're not pissed off, you're not paying attention. Fast-forward through my final year of high school, four years of trials, heartbreak, and the slow but necessary process of finding myself at college, one year of life after leaving Eden and joining world of work, and you have the person in a blazer and slacks, typing away at an office computer. Would my self today even recognize that self six years ago?

I hope not, although sometimes I miss her.