email920.xml

email920.xml

born-digital

email

unknown

yes

2002-09-20

> From: "Mike Daisey"

> Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2001 3:25 PM
> Subject: 9/11/01, pt 2
>
>
>
> I am writing this from my home in Brooklyn after
> leaving Manhattan. I have
> signed up for a time slot to give blood later this
> evening and have a few
> hours available before then.
>
> After my last posting I made my way east through an
> urban
> moonscape--everywhere there is ash, abandoned bags
> in the street, people
> looking lost. I managed to get a cell line out to
> Jean-Michele, who is still
> in Seattle, and she helped me navigate with online
> maps as I plotted my exit
> strategy.
>
> Bizarrely, I caught a taxi crosstown. I was standing
> at a corner, I©m not
> even certain where, and a taxi was sitting there. A
> very pushy woman, whom I
> will always be thankful for, barged her way into the
> cab. In a moment,
> without thinking, I climbed in too. The driver, a
> Pakistani guy who had an
> improbable smile, immediately took off.
>
> The ash blocks out the sun downtown--it©s like
> driving in an impossible
> midnight, and even more impossible that I©m in a
> cab, with this woman who
> won©t stop trying her cell phone and another man, my
> age, who looks like
> he©s been crying. Maybe he just has ash in his eyes.
> I know I do--I feel
> like I will never see properly again, though that©s
> probably just trauma. I
> don©t even know where the driver is going. The
> crying man got someone on
> *his* cell phone, starts explaining what he©s seeing
> out the window. It©s
> like having a narrator traveling with us--I only
> notice the things that he
> is describing as he describes them.
>
> God bless that taxi driver--we never paid him. He
> let us all off, and I
> think he got out as well, near the Brooklyn Bridge.
> There are cops
> everywhere, people are herding themselves quite
> calmly, mutely, onto the
> bridge. We all walk across the Brooklyn Bridge,
> which is unbelievably
> beautiful, the wires and stone of the bridge
> surrounding us and the bright
> sun ahead, passing out of darkness.
>
> No one is talking to each other, but there is a
> sense of warmth. Everyone
> has their cell phones out, fishing for a clear
> signal. Those who catch them
> talk hurriedly to families, friends, people in other
> cities, children in
> their homes. It is comforting to hear their voices,
> telling how they are
> okay, shhh, it's okay, I©m okay. As we walk out into
> the sunlight, I am so
> happy to be in this company, the company of people
> who are alright, those
> who walked out.
>
> I was in the city today to turn in some of my book,
> I had stayed up all
> night writing and I was so worried--is it ready,
> have I done my work? Those
> questions seem small today--not unimportant, but
> smaller, in a new
> proportion. I kept thinking of how much I have left
> to do in my life, so
> many things that are undone, people I haven©t spoken
> to in years. It's
> overwhelming to feel everyone around me thinking the
> same thing, the
> restless thoughts trickling over this bridge as we
> come back to Brooklyn.
>
> From the Promenade I stand with hundreds of others,
> listening to radios,
> watching the plumes of smoke and the empty holes in
> the skyline. People
> stand there for a long time, talk to one another in
> hushed tones. Someone
> hands out a flier for a vigil this evening, which I
> will go to after I give
> blood.
>
> What can be said? Just this: we will emphasize the
> horror and the evil, and
> that is all true. It is not the entire story. I saw
> an old man with
> breathing problems and two black kids in baggy pants
> and ghetto gear rubbing
> his back, talking to him. No one was rioting or
> looting. People helped each
> other in small and tremendous ways all day longSa
> family was giving away
> sandwiches at the Promenade. Everyone I talked to
> agreed to go give blood.
> If a draft had been held to train people to be
> firefighters there would have
> been fights to see who got to volunteer.
>
> No matter how wide and intricate this act of evil
> may be it pales in
> comparison to the quiet dignity and strength of
> regular people. I have never
> been more proud of my country.
>
> md
>
>

9/11/01

9/11/01, pt 2