Wednesday

Sept. 12, 2001

after

It seemed weird to make the past hand above be 11Sept. The future?

I am unaffected. My phones work. My always on Internet access has not been down. I have received emails from South Africa and Israel that are basically 'sympathy to all Americans.' The sun is shining. I couldn't get to sleep until after two. This morning tears welled up in my eyes. I'm a pretty good crier. I cry at sappy movies. But this was the first time the tears started to come. I didn't dream. Once I woke up and thought I'd been dreaming but the dream was like a video of spots of light. I woke up and didn't want to get up. I wished that waking had made yesterday a dream. It didn't.

I tried to work again but occasionally the tears came. And a spacy numbness. My colleague was worried about a marketing video that began with a dramatic shot of a tall office building. Another colleague said he told his children, "It looks like a movie but it is real. Some children's daddies won't come home." He said he was afraid we'd just get accustomed to things like this, seeing them. Of course, we've seen horrors from afar. Even in our own country...dramatic earthquakes, riots, fires, tornados. Near here a few years back a tornado ripped grass out of the ground and hair off the cows. But two 110 story buildings brought down. Intentionally. Enough with the hate and the silly religions. You know who you are. Stop it. But they won't. It's the history of mankind. The weapons just change.

At lunch, SuRu and I ate at Whole Foods. I was pleased to see that the very old guy who picks up trash and wipes tables was back. I had feared for his health and well-being when he wasn't around for my last few visits.

If I'm going on this trip, I need a slightly different suitcase. Not really, probably. I just have a bag fetish. But I figure if I buy a new bag, then it will get cancelled. Hold that thought.

I stop by the parents after work. They are headed to church for a supper but they tell me every detail of their trip to Salado. I show Mom that the problem she is having with the TV in the office is that the cable box requires the TV to be on channel three. (On the phone: "It's all wavy and flipping over." "Is it on channel three?" "I don't know, I can't really see it." "I'll come fix it.") I try to explain that she accidentally put the TV on channel two. That that will happen if she misses the volume button. Etc.)

Our water has been off most of the afternoon because they are, in fact, fixing the leak that's been spitting water out of the street for two weeks. So SuRu, FFP and I go to Fonda. They have water pressure. We eat and drink. People are somber. Business is light. FFP says the markets aren't opening until Monday. I can't believe it. Planes didn't fly again.

What is monumental? What matters. Time to figure it out. I find out I'll be a great aunt again. Neither this unborn child nor my great nephew Jack will remember September 11. Just as my nieces don't remember the Kennedy assassination. But it will matter if only they realize it. I wasn't alive when we dropped atom bombs on Japan. But it matters greatly to me even now.

I stay away from TV while I write this entry and read many, many online diaries. People who write them need to write this day. Some took their own pictures in Manhattan, some suffered far from the fray. Every individual voice, though, told us something a little more than the newsmen could reveal.

I didn't know what picture I might put here. I thought of a skyline picture of NYC with the towers from an old ebay postcard. But selling old postcards is apparently considered taboo there just now. Old postcards of the towers and the Pentagon, that is. That's one reaction, I guess. Anyway, the Royal Cafe and Drive-In is probably gone, too. But it probably just languished into dust and isn't an icon. And, quite frankly, when I stumbled on this on ebay, it made me feel safe and young like I never will again.

I heard people were flying flags to show their spirit. Nothing wrong with that. Here is the flag of the new South Africa. The many colors have a symbolism I think you can guess. Hold that thought. For them. For us. For the world.

Meta:
Many journalers posted, many close to the disasters....

JUST TYPING
What, after all, is the use?
We all die and for all our striving...someone else decides how and when.