Eleven

"What is past is prologue."
-William Shakespeare

It has been a while since I wrote here.  This is going to change soon as I am going on a journey.  I will be joining a delegation to Japan and the journey starts tomorrow in Washington, DC.

Besides announcing I am going on a trip for two and a half weeks that I fully intend to blog every step of the way, it's also the impetus for this post.  In tearing through rooms, trying to find world adapters and inflatable travel pillows (you'd think I travel enough that this wouldn't even be an issue), I happened upon something that made me stop dead in my tracks.

See, the funny thing about being busy is not noticing things like dates.  I can honestly say that in the past year and a half, I've been a slave to every calendar that I've come across. Specifically, that means I don't know what the actual date is unless it's either important, I need to fly, or someone's birthday.  Since I've been working on a campaign for the past year and a half, dates are a blur.  And though I've been fortunate to have a slower summer than I've had in years, it's still the case that I know dates for things that are going to happen, but not necessarily what the date is on any given date.

So imagine my surprise when I look at the calendar yesterday and realize today is the 11th.  For folks that survived New York or DC those days, they understand that sometimes that realization is like a knife that stabs you or sometimes it just is what it is.  You never know which one you're gonna get.  

This year, more of a, "huh" feeling.  Last year was complete torture, verging on the traumatic.  Just this past weekend for the Labor Day parade, I was driving south in Manhattan when I noticed the lights were on.  I was so confused until I realized we had passed into September.  And that was it.  No horrible reaction, no gut twist.  Almost welcome, in some ways, because at least I was reminded of the day that way instead of seeing the WTC on fire on TV like last year, which is jarring and almost cruel.  Last year's 10 year anniversary was like getting punched in the gut every time I'd turn on the TV.  It's part of the reason that last year, I escaped in the best way I could - by being at Harry Potter World at Universal Studios with another friend who was trying to escape as well.  Sure, it sounds silly, but seriously, the range of emotions is always unpredictable.  

So fast forward to yesterday, as I'm ripping through things in my house and I happen upon my journal from 2001 - intended to be a journal of my Coro Fellow year that should have started at the beginning of September.  Instead, it begins on September 20, 2001, where it reads:

"I meant to start this earlier, before all of this craziness began. A journal or journey of my year with Coro and finally becoming a 'New Yorker' in the [truest] sense.  Unfortunately, it starts out with a cataclysmic event. It will be more interesting, but perhaps through this, we can find the positive side of tragedy. Much like everything else, there is a balance.  Where to begin? Forget everything prior and start with now..."

It's really funny what happens when you get older. Things get more in focus the further they get away from you.  This is one of those moments in my life and history that probably will sit slightly unfocused while everything else around it becomes more clear. 

Every year, as time and distance separate that day, I always marvel at how far away it is, though I can still feel that day if I decide to conjure it up, just like it was yesterday.  But some details are getting fuzzier.  Some details suddenly emerge as if they've been hiding around the corner.  But while it holds an obvious place in history, it has a significant place in mine as well.   I was a young, 22 year old, fresh out of college and interested in taking on the world, starting with New York City.  This event shook me out of whatever la-la land I was living in.  

And it is still one of the significant reasons I've stayed in New York (though I left the city) since.  Because I decided it was important for me to be in a place that would inspire me after such a tragedy.  Important for me to commit to New York.  Funny thing is, I found the best way to do it was to move to its Capitol instead of staying in the city.  You can take the girl out of Upstate...

The rest of my journal then is a pasted montage of things.  The first thing after that intro is the email I wrote the night of the 11th, when I sent an email to friends and family that I was alright, but somehow ended up writing a novel that then went around the world to people I had never met.  People have asked to read it.  With trepidation, I hesitated putting it here.  But I also recognize the significance it had on me and others.  So, in a moment of catharsis, the email in its entirety is posted below this one.  So anyone has the option of reading it or not.  

The pages after that are filled with emails and responses from friends and family that day and afterwards.  Almost as if I needed the reminder that there was a lot of love after something like that.  And I can't help but still feel very lucky and warm to have that love still in my life.

But, as goes Shakespeare, so does this event in history and in my personal history.   It was the beginning of my adult life - forcibly pulling me from the safe haven of my educated life into real world.  Staring down the hall of my 33rd year, looking back, this is where the color in my life changed and came into more focus.  It's where I truly learned the lesson of being humbly thankful that I wake up every morning.  It's where I learned that life is entirely too short to waste any minute not doing what you want to do.  And my years after were spent finding what that was and every day since, I have the privilege to wake up every day to a job I love.  It was the beginning of the road that brought me to where I am now, the fork in the road that was unexpected. 

It was the prologue of who I've become.  For that, I will never forget.  And will always be humbly thankful.

September 11, 2001 Email

I've been asked for this a few times, and so, as promised, here is the email I sent to my friends and family the evening of September 11, 2001.  It started out innocently enough, with me wanting to tell my friends and family that I was alright.  But I couldn't help trying to tell them what it was like that day, since I was placed at FDNY Headquarters in Brooklyn.  I knew I had a unique perspective and felt that it was a "real" story that they could rely on through all the news coverage.  This is grammatically edited but otherwise, this is the email in it's entirety, that I sent out:

September 11, 2001 

9:30 pm 

East Harlem, New York City 

It was an unusually nice morning.  Crisp, with a nice breeze flowing through - I finally thought that the heat would begin to break.  It made me feel good, like it was my first real day of work for this fellowship. I needed to get into work by 8am, so I left the apartment at 6:45.  Needless to say, with delays and what not (normal for NYC, that is), I didn't get into the office until about 8:20am. 

After getting settled, Matt and I were chatting when we heard the alarm and the sirens.  he turned to me and said, "There's a fire somewhere, they just got called."  For some strange reason, I glanced to the window behind me and to the right, I saw the Twin Towers looming in the distance, the first tower billowing smoke out of the windows.  Immediately, I felt a chill and said, "Holy shit, the World Trade Center is on fire!" 

What happened next is already sort of a blur, but I'll never forget it. 

Almost after that, I though to myself, "How interesting that I happened to be placed at FDNY Headquarters when a fire breaks out at the Twin Towers." 

We shuffled into the boss' office, where he had a walkie-talkie to the Mayor and we quickly realized that we were sitting almost in the control hub of this disaster.  There was quick talk of us possibly going out with the wave of firefighters from Brooklyn to observe when the news hit that it was a plane that flew into the building.  Assessing the damage, Matt and I sat there silent as we realized that something quite unbelievable was happening.  It was then that the second plane hit the other tower.  We immediately realized that it wasn't just a coincidence.  All the people in the room were repeating over and over one word as this strange day unfolded: Sabotage. 

The building sirens went off as they secured the perimeter of the building, not knowing whether or not they were going to hit other government buildings.  All available firemen and EMT's in the building were called to the lobby as they were soon dispatched to the scene. 

We watched hopelessly murmuring as the towers continued to burn, torn between the TV screen and the window, watching it all unfold.  Then, as we were lost in a flurry of activity in the office between finding phones that worked and people rushing in and out of the office, the absolute unbelievable happened as we watched the first tower begin to crumble on the TV screen, quickly turning to the window as we watched the only visible part of the building, the antenna on top, sink through the clouds of smoke that turned from thick black to grey.  Immediately, I wondered if my best friend had made it out of her building in time (she lives two blocks south).  I started to head towards the phone to try to contact her, but I was too numb to move. 

The second building was teetering, they were saying on the news.  But we couldn't tell anymore by looking out the window.  The smoke had already started to move southeast into Brooklyn and all we saw was black smoke pushing the grey down. All I know is that we were praying for a miracle, that it was all just a dream.  The fire alone was crazy - the firefighters couldn't get the hoses up that far, the water break wouldn't even allow them a chance to fight the fire due to the heat in the pipes.  The building collapsing?  Dear God, it was just too much to take in.  Especially the fact that the crackle over the walkie-talkies was the guys at ground zero, yelling at each other through the channel, trying to figure out who was where and who was still alive.  We sat there, trying to figure out if there was a chance that the firefighters had gotten the workers out of there in time, that there was a good hour for them to have tried their damndest to get as many out as possible.  Then it sunk in that many of our guys were lost. 

As that realization started to sink in, the second tower collapsed.  And the numbness I had felt just fifteen minutes before could not compare to what I was feeling now. 

For me, personally, I was a strange mix of emotions, as most New Yorkers.  For starters, I know that I had only been there for half a day, but I was feeling so close to all the firemen and there was that incredible sense of loss.  Just a week before, I had been in the Twin Towers, rushing through the mall on the ground to the subway.  I had told myself that I needed to come back and do some shopping. 

After about five minutes of feeling the intense emotion of helplessness, loss and numbness, I ran to the phone and tried again to get my voicemail, to call my friend and my grandmother.  I was able to get on for about two minutes before the phone went dead. 

The next few hours play like some strange cryptic poem of something - the flames, the crackle of the walkie-talkies, people rushing in and out, hearing snippets of what was happening on the ground.  Some strange dance that I never wanted to be a part of, but couldn't help watching.  They brought in lunches for the building at 2.  That's the only time that I really remember between when it first started and the time that I got home.  Bush on the TV, the Pentagon.  I wanted to scream, cry, get down on my knees and pray to God or whoever she is for some end to it all, or to sit in a corner and wish it all away, but I was there, listening to the men who fight fires and save lives crackle in and out of the radio, watching the news coverage and helpless inside a building that could be next.  Truthfully, I didn't think I was in much danger, but it was daunting. 

All I kept saying over and over again were the things they had said to us the day before.  "These guys are the bravest of the brave, they run into the face of death when called.  There is no other job in the world where you can find men who love their jobs and want to do their jobs.  These are incredible men." 

Immediately, another quote came to me, "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance."  But who would ever think that someone would fly a plane into a building full of innocent workers?  It was just the tip of the iceberg of questions for me. 

Somewhere in the middle of that, I managed to get a hold of my friend.  She just called - this morning, she was thrown out of bed by the impact of the first place.  Running downstairs, she saw the second plane land in the tower, people jumping - it's too horrible to mention.  She got out just before the second tower collapsed, her cellphone and wallet the only things she could grab as she left her apartment, and her cat behind. She is not injured, but obviously shaken up - anyone in the city and saw it happen is.  My roommates had just gotten off the train when they saw it happen, two blocks north of the towers.  They are all fine, too. 

An EMT came into the office where we had assembled and said, "Funny that today is rescue services day? September 11th? 9/11?"  It had never even crossed my mind.
As the day continued in this horrible fashion, Matt and I began to wonder how we would get home.  They had closed off all entrances into Manhattan, I was thinking that I'd have to walk over the Brooklyn Bridge and more than 125 city blocks home when they told us of the backup plan (like I said, we were in the middle of the communications hub, though the phones were sometimes working).  We figured out our plan of attack in terms of getting home, but doubt clouded our minds when we heard the EMT's discussing how the trains had stopped because building #7 was about to go and how they were stopping all service to State Island because that's where they had started bringing bodies. 

Again, I'm not trying to scare anyone or make you more upset than needs to be - it's just that there are details that I will never forget for the rest of my life, images that burned into my memory and retinas forever.  Everyone that I've talked to has asked what happened, so for all of you, I'm telling you once so that I don't have to repeat myself.  It has been one of the most harrowing and scariest days of my life and I am grateful that most of you have tried to contact me and have thought of me.  I owe you some bit of detail, some rendering of the day as I saw it unfold.  And for the rest of you, just to let you know what it was like here. 

It took two and a half hours for me to get back home.  I managed to catch a train headed for Manhattan (the only one offering both way service) and caught a bus to 14th street, where I had to wait for another. 

As I waited for the bus, I was about to go into kill mode.  I was busy on my cellphone, desperately trying to get through to my family, locate people, check my messages - to no avail - but as I waited, some yuk came up to me and said, "Hey, can I borrow your cell phone to call my mommy?"  He walked away, laughing.  The people around me were as flabbergasted as I was.  I wanted to throw something at him and yell, "Hey, asshole!  I was at the FDNY Headquarters just now - do you know how many people they lost trying to get people home safely to their families?  You're lucky as hell that you're still alive and you don't even notice it, you dick!"  It made me angry as those eople who passed the cameras today and waved and smiled like goofs.  Maybe that's how they deal with it, but it was completely inappropriate when there's destruction and suffering happening all around you. 

But I'm home.  And I'm safe.  I presume.  I'm more than bothered, I'm shook up, and I don't even know where to begin.  As I read this again, I wonder how I even managed it - but it's just one of those things that I feel needs to be done.  It hasn't exactly made me feel better, but it's helped me get through these past hours, so even if you have read this far, thank you. 

As I sit here, I'm just remembering some details.  It's strangely quiet and uneasy here.  Sirens blend in with the sounds of buses rushing by.  News just hit that an estimated 200 firefighters are lost.  The cloud of dust still hangs over lower NY, covering it like a bad omen or reminder.  The dust in the subway as soon as we crossed over into Manhattan was thick, I can't imagine what it was like on the street.  You could smell the building from Metro Center in Brooklyn.  It reminded me of what the SGA office smelled like after the fire last year.  But much thicker.  Every whiff of the air was like a weight.  Just catching a waft of it made me feel darker each breath. 

The questions remain.  I just talked to my friend again, she saw her apartment building on the news, they cleaned the area and it's still standing.  She's hoping to be able to salvage some clothes and prays that her cat is still alive. 

Why?  The same question we asked after Pearl Harbor, Oklahoma City, and Columbine.  What now? I worry that we may retaliate in the wrong manner, I worry that we might not retaliate in the right way.  Something needs to be done, but it's not easy to simply point the fingers without realizing that somewhere down the line, we are to blame, too.  And no one ever wants to admit that.  But it's true. 

My roommate brings up a good point.  The scarier though heavy on our minds is whether or not this is over.  Could it continue in NYC?  Or will it spread to every American city until they get their point across?  As crazy as this may sound, I really enjoy my neighborhood up here in East Harlem.  To many, East Harlem sounds like a bad place - people have a bad stereotype about the area.  If you call a place where kids play out in the streets until 9:30 at night where families and friends sit on the sidewalk and talk and listen to salsa, where there are BMW's next to Mercedes, where the father and son stickball game is played in the middle of the street a bad area, then go righ tahead.  For once in my time here (an entire month), I am content with the stereotype.  But I can't be so sure. 

Tomorrow, I obviously won't be going to work.  Even if I wanted to, which I do, I don't think that my body or mind would be able to bear it.  As I left work today, they had started compiling a list of those missing.  I really can't stand the thought of being at the office tomorrow when the names pour in and the loss is further assessed. 

I will, however, be waking up at 6am to go to the hospital to give blood.  I don't know if you can, but if you have some time and you can, give blood.  At this point, it's the only thing that we can do. 

If you have gotten this far, thank you for even reading.  I thought about each and every one of you today as this tragedy fell and I thank God that I have this many friends who care enough to just call or email.  It really helped me through the day. 

If there ever was a time for prayer, it would be now.  So pray to God, whatever you see him or her as being, and say a prayer for the victims, for the cities, for the country, and for ourselves. 

I miss and love all of you and I will see you soon. 

Love, 

Keeza

 "I find hope in the darkest of days, and focus in the brightest.  I do not judge the universe."

-Dalai Lama

I can't help but be a little philosophical these days.  Well, to be honest, for the past few months.

Since I've been deployed to New York, I've come almost face to face; nose to nose with my past, my present, and my future; who I was and who I am and who I hope to be.  Bear with me.

I find that I have these persnickety and persistent thoughts - all revolving around when I first moved to NYC almost 10 years ago, and the events that followed.  It's like I can't shake it, I can't help but run into it - and after last night's events, I am compelled to finally try to find the proper perspective and reflection.  Because it almost feels to me like it did in the days and months following September 11th.

I've been more involved with the organization where I was a Fellow in 2001.  I have been living in the building just south of the WTC site.  I pass my friend's old and still empty apartment two blocks south of the site where I used to spend a lot of time in the years leading up to that fateful day in September.  It was the Tribeca Film Fest this past week - and I took full advantage of it, seeing a movie every night, realizing the origins of the festival itself every time.  I participated in Coro Fellow Selection Day, peering over the East River at the skyline I grew to love and feel was as important to me as my own skin.  Every day, I look up, with fascination, at the Freedom Tower, getting taller and taller each week.

And I have been living in my past for the last two months, almost as if watching it through a looking-glass, the perspective of almost a decade crashing on top of me as I've been forced to reflect on who I was and who I've become.  And inevitably, who I want to be.

I will admit I can never complain about my assignment.  I think I have the best in the world, spending time in the best city in the world.  And I've thoroughly enjoyed living here full-time again, feeling like I just put on my favorite old coat for two months.  You know, that really warm and comfortable feeling when you just feel like all is well and life is good, despite how hectic the last two months have been.  I've retreated back to my New York shell, walking briskly up and down the streets, muttering under my breath to the tourists, reveling in taking the train or riding my bike to work every day.

But this time, more than any other time, I have been more and more keenly aware of September 11th and it's reverberations in my life.  I can't explain it any better than I have before, other than perhaps being right here, so close I can smell and hear the workers on the site, that may be creeping into my subconscious.  I was just a few blocks south of here last year for a few months and I didn't have that kind of feeling now.  Perhaps the spirits are interjecting.

I'm not sure I can explain this.  Other than I could be going through that phase where in my 30's, I feel like I'm looking back at my life and it's trajectory and where I am and how I got here and if it's where I want to be.  But it's odd and ironic that I find myself here once again and face to face with something I'd consider to be one of the most influential in my life, that changed and scarred me and it's just everywhere I turn.

So put this frame of mind around what I'm about to explore next.  Because this is already what I was grappling with when I heard the news that Osama Bin Laden was dead.  After having the most perfect, quintessential, New York Sunday.

It was definitely a strange feeling.  Lightheaded, elated, almost like the floor was yanked out.  Surreal.  And as the news started to sink in, I realized where I was sitting.  And it seemed right to crack open a beer.  And then it seemed the emotions just started flowing and I started to tear up.  It became clear to me that I needed to go around the corner and be at Ground Zero as soon as I heard what the president had to say.

I literally was waiting for him to finish so I could go.  I was out the door as soon as he was done.  I even grabbed the wrong keys as I left, realizing it halfway through the elevator down and after calling the super and grabbing the keys, I was on my way. 

Hopping up Albany street, I turned to head up Trinity and as I turned left, I saw three firemen, standing silently in a doorway, turned towards Ground Zero.  A small group of people had gathered at the corner beyond them - I could just make out their silhouettes against the lights of the site. I jogged over to Church and just turned left.  Some cars had started to honk.  An ambulance turned on the lights and drove by with the windows down and EMT's were fist pumping into the night.  A solitary man stood wearing a hoodie (it had gotten pretty cold) and holding a candle in front of Century 21.  As I got closer to the Millennium Hilton, I could see a crowd begin to form.  Meeting Jess outside, we hugged and held on for a bit.  We just knew we couldn't figure out what we were feeling.  And we headed toward the small group that had assembled.

People had started to chant, "USA, USA."  In general, they were just excited, but it started out small and almost quiet.  Before we knew it, people were just coming from everywhere.  TV crews started to assemble.  After collecting Steve, we found a place to stand and just observe what was happening.  The crowd was getting bigger.  And louder.  And the "USA" chants kept going.  The American anthem started to be sung and flags started to fly.  It was almost as if you blinked and suddenly you were surrounded by hundreds of people, the crowd swelling together, people pushing to get to the "front", though no one really knew what the "front" was. 

It started out peaceful enough, but then the crowd started getting rowdy.  Somehow, there was a successful moment of silence before things started to get a little more surreal.  Someone started and everyone joined in loudly as the crowd started to sing, "Na, na, na, na - na, na, na, na - hey, hey hey, goodbye." 

And suddenly, I wasn't feeling very celebratory anymore.  I was actually pretty upset.

It occurred to me in that moment that we were celebrating death.  We were celebrating the perpetuation of the cycle of violence.  I was so conflicted about being happy we finally accomplished the mission we had set out for but here we were, at Ground Zero, singing, "Hey, hey, hey, goodbye"?  That just seemed wrong.  Out of place.  Disrespectful.  Not to Bin Laden.  To Ground Zero.  That seemed intolerable to me.  Sure, celebrations were needed and necessary - almost cathartic, but so did reflection and respect.  Especially in that space and in the shadows of where the towers once stood.  I felt almost sick when I started to think about it again.  But yet, there I stood, waiting to see what would happen next.

I suddenly was transported to nine years ago, having a conversation with my roommate and fellow Fellow, Vivian, upon the announcement that we would go to war with Afghanistan.  I remember saying to her that I was upset we were going to war.  That I understood it, that I was glad we were going with NATO and a world force, but that "war was not the answer, it should have been the last resort."

Vivian just looked at me and said, "Well, what else should we do?  They came after us, isn't this what happens next?  What do you think should happen now?"

And I had nothing.  I know I hated GWB, but that had nothing to do with this.  I could only blankly say, "I'm just waiting for the day that we stop reacting to violence with violence.  I'm not sure what else to do and I pray they know all the details we will never know and they will be smart about this, but what just happened here, this kind of destruction and death - war will be more of that.  And when will it ever just stop?"

I think of what she said then and it suddenly echoed in my ears.  What else should we do now?  And then the "F*ck Bin Laden" chant started and I just went blank.  Steve turned to Jess and I and just said helplessly, "And there it is.  They're coming after us."  And I suddenly was very, very disappointed.  A few minutes later, two guys climbed a streetlight, which, under normal circumstances, would have had the police scrambling to get them down. And I felt jubilant again because they weren't making any moves towards the people crawling up there at all as one of them had an American flag and started waving it.  One was handed a sign that said, "Obama 1, Osama 0" and the crowd went wild.  I even screamed for it. 

Later, when I left, taking a very roundabout way back home, I came across a Fire Chief, lighting a candle under a picture of the fallen Firemen from the firehouse he was standing in front of, speaking quietly to a young man who was asking about the experience.  Along the wall, there was a brass fresco commemorating the fallen and that day.  Busboys were getting off of work and bringing flowers to lay under the memorial.  The firemen who had been standing there just hours before when I first passed were gone.  And I could feel the emptiness starting to take over again.

Just like that, all night.  Back and forth between excited.  Upset.  Celebratory.  Disappointed.  Confused. Conflicted.  Empty.  And swelling with emotion.  All at once.  I felt like I either wanted to scream or cry or just sit in silence.  I couldn't figure out which.  But I also couldn't tear myself away from the scene or our place on the street, that as long as I was there, I was doing the right thing, being a part of this.

And it hit me that I was looking for reflection.  To pay my respects to the dead.  To honor those serving our country.  And dear God, for some piece - any piece - of closure I could possibly get.  Going home would feel like a capitulation, I was a part of this moment and fate had brought me here, the same way it had brought me to Metrotech Brooklyn so I was there at 8:30 am, just before the first alarms started to go off.  Something felt right about begin there, no matter what was going through my head.  And my soul.  Because all I know is an ache started in my chest that hasn't gone away yet.

It hit me today that I've had this feeling before.  And it was 10 years ago, in the days and aftermath of 9/11 that started the week after it happened and Matt and I stood at Ground Zero, looking at the mangled wreckage and the firemen and rescue operation.  That strange ache that would start in my chest and move to my throat and back and forth.  It was back.  And yeah, it was different reasons then than now, but here I was, still conflicted, still wanting peace and respect, but so proud of how we responded, proud of community, proud of our country.

This is the hurt that has yet to heal.  I didn't even really know anyone all that well who died that day.  I just know the effect it had on the people around me, the people close to me, the city I lived in, the country I love and I am finding, 10 years later, that I'm still trying to figure out the full effect it had on me.

Some of it was good.  Really good. The fire that it lit to commit myself to the recovery of this city, the feeling of community, of resiliency, of the human spirit.  The devotion to the work I have committed myself to.  And yet, the wounds still hurt, they are still deep, and still raw. 

We all have our stories of that day.  We all have stories of last night.  We all have different feelings, different hurts, different perspectives about everything related to it.  All are valid.  All are real.

Yet, I still think, "What happens next?"  And like the night of 9/11, all I can do is pray.  And wait and see.  And find a way to live with the ache that has returned with a vengeance. 

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