story2057.xml
Title
story2057.xml
Source
born-digital
Media Type
story
Date Entered
2002-09-10
911DA Story: Story
Thoughts on the first anniversary of 9/11/01
I remember watching horrified with the world as the Twin Towers burned and then in unbelievable slow motion, crashed to the earth. I remember screaming alone in my TV room, no, no they didn?t do this, no no no. It is exactly one year later. It still seems unbelievable.
I had watched the Twin Towers being built. I worked on Wall Street and from my 26th floor office I saw them go up, floor by floor. Year after year they grew, and one day, amazingly, they were done. I commuted to work for three years through the basement of the buildings, walking out to the Plaza and to my office. Then one year I left NYC and moved to Boston, returning only for fun, like seeing friends, or going to the theatre and once, attending a wedding at Windows on the World.
This loss of life, this loss of community, was so enormous. The sorrow is so deep; the pain so strong; the death so pointless, so unnerving. I felt so powerless to do anything. I didn?t know what to do. I vowed to carefully read every single obituary in the New York Times because I felt I owed at least this to each one. I wanted to try to remember the dead, and give their deaths meaning and importance as long as I could. I felt grateful to not have known anyone killed on the planes or in the buildings. I read obituaries for eleven months, and then one day I read an obituary of someone I knew.. And then the significance changed again, and I grieved more personally for a lost soul I remembered from long ago
I was compelled to visit Ground Zero immediately. I had to look at this hole, at this devastation and searing horror. I wanted to see it straight on. So I went to New York two weeks later in September 2001. And I took these pictures that I send.
The pictures cannot possibly show the pain or destruction or magnitude of this event. And more than anything, they cannot reveal the horrible smell. The acridity of the air, intolerable to breathe, burning and searing ones eyes so you could not stay looking because the pain was so great and the smell of death and destruction so powerful, it was impossible to be there and feel alive. It was an intolerable act leaving an intolerable devastation. The fences were just going up and the signs of restriction and posters of the missing tacked everywhere. Cables had been laid down in the streets to restore electricity and water. Piles of flowers and caps and teddy bears and despairing love notes laid out waist high in memoriam. Dust and ashes covered everything, smoke spiraled to the sky from piles in the site. Businesses were shut. Long, long trucks rumbled by piled high with twisted messes of stone and steel. The wind blew endlessly through everything. People were totally silent.
Some nights I play tennis on clay courts. After the game the players must sweep the courts for the next players. Every time I sweep off the white lines with the roller brush gray clay dust billows up. I always feel sad. I always think of the dust at the World Trade Center and the spirits of those, loved by so many, who were wafted away into the sky.
Thoughts on the first anniversary of 9/11/01
I remember watching horrified with the world as the Twin Towers burned and then in unbelievable slow motion, crashed to the earth. I remember screaming alone in my TV room, no, no they didn?t do this, no no no. It is exactly one year later. It still seems unbelievable.
I had watched the Twin Towers being built. I worked on Wall Street and from my 26th floor office I saw them go up, floor by floor. Year after year they grew, and one day, amazingly, they were done. I commuted to work for three years through the basement of the buildings, walking out to the Plaza and to my office. Then one year I left NYC and moved to Boston, returning only for fun, like seeing friends, or going to the theatre and once, attending a wedding at Windows on the World.
This loss of life, this loss of community, was so enormous. The sorrow is so deep; the pain so strong; the death so pointless, so unnerving. I felt so powerless to do anything. I didn?t know what to do. I vowed to carefully read every single obituary in the New York Times because I felt I owed at least this to each one. I wanted to try to remember the dead, and give their deaths meaning and importance as long as I could. I felt grateful to not have known anyone killed on the planes or in the buildings. I read obituaries for eleven months, and then one day I read an obituary of someone I knew.. And then the significance changed again, and I grieved more personally for a lost soul I remembered from long ago
I was compelled to visit Ground Zero immediately. I had to look at this hole, at this devastation and searing horror. I wanted to see it straight on. So I went to New York two weeks later in September 2001. And I took these pictures that I send.
The pictures cannot possibly show the pain or destruction or magnitude of this event. And more than anything, they cannot reveal the horrible smell. The acridity of the air, intolerable to breathe, burning and searing ones eyes so you could not stay looking because the pain was so great and the smell of death and destruction so powerful, it was impossible to be there and feel alive. It was an intolerable act leaving an intolerable devastation. The fences were just going up and the signs of restriction and posters of the missing tacked everywhere. Cables had been laid down in the streets to restore electricity and water. Piles of flowers and caps and teddy bears and despairing love notes laid out waist high in memoriam. Dust and ashes covered everything, smoke spiraled to the sky from piles in the site. Businesses were shut. Long, long trucks rumbled by piled high with twisted messes of stone and steel. The wind blew endlessly through everything. People were totally silent.
Some nights I play tennis on clay courts. After the game the players must sweep the courts for the next players. Every time I sweep off the white lines with the roller brush gray clay dust billows up. I always feel sad. I always think of the dust at the World Trade Center and the spirits of those, loved by so many, who were wafted away into the sky.
I remember watching horrified with the world as the Twin Towers burned and then in unbelievable slow motion, crashed to the earth. I remember screaming alone in my TV room, no, no they didn?t do this, no no no. It is exactly one year later. It still seems unbelievable.
I had watched the Twin Towers being built. I worked on Wall Street and from my 26th floor office I saw them go up, floor by floor. Year after year they grew, and one day, amazingly, they were done. I commuted to work for three years through the basement of the buildings, walking out to the Plaza and to my office. Then one year I left NYC and moved to Boston, returning only for fun, like seeing friends, or going to the theatre and once, attending a wedding at Windows on the World.
This loss of life, this loss of community, was so enormous. The sorrow is so deep; the pain so strong; the death so pointless, so unnerving. I felt so powerless to do anything. I didn?t know what to do. I vowed to carefully read every single obituary in the New York Times because I felt I owed at least this to each one. I wanted to try to remember the dead, and give their deaths meaning and importance as long as I could. I felt grateful to not have known anyone killed on the planes or in the buildings. I read obituaries for eleven months, and then one day I read an obituary of someone I knew.. And then the significance changed again, and I grieved more personally for a lost soul I remembered from long ago
I was compelled to visit Ground Zero immediately. I had to look at this hole, at this devastation and searing horror. I wanted to see it straight on. So I went to New York two weeks later in September 2001. And I took these pictures that I send.
The pictures cannot possibly show the pain or destruction or magnitude of this event. And more than anything, they cannot reveal the horrible smell. The acridity of the air, intolerable to breathe, burning and searing ones eyes so you could not stay looking because the pain was so great and the smell of death and destruction so powerful, it was impossible to be there and feel alive. It was an intolerable act leaving an intolerable devastation. The fences were just going up and the signs of restriction and posters of the missing tacked everywhere. Cables had been laid down in the streets to restore electricity and water. Piles of flowers and caps and teddy bears and despairing love notes laid out waist high in memoriam. Dust and ashes covered everything, smoke spiraled to the sky from piles in the site. Businesses were shut. Long, long trucks rumbled by piled high with twisted messes of stone and steel. The wind blew endlessly through everything. People were totally silent.
Some nights I play tennis on clay courts. After the game the players must sweep the courts for the next players. Every time I sweep off the white lines with the roller brush gray clay dust billows up. I always feel sad. I always think of the dust at the World Trade Center and the spirits of those, loved by so many, who were wafted away into the sky.
Thoughts on the first anniversary of 9/11/01
I remember watching horrified with the world as the Twin Towers burned and then in unbelievable slow motion, crashed to the earth. I remember screaming alone in my TV room, no, no they didn?t do this, no no no. It is exactly one year later. It still seems unbelievable.
I had watched the Twin Towers being built. I worked on Wall Street and from my 26th floor office I saw them go up, floor by floor. Year after year they grew, and one day, amazingly, they were done. I commuted to work for three years through the basement of the buildings, walking out to the Plaza and to my office. Then one year I left NYC and moved to Boston, returning only for fun, like seeing friends, or going to the theatre and once, attending a wedding at Windows on the World.
This loss of life, this loss of community, was so enormous. The sorrow is so deep; the pain so strong; the death so pointless, so unnerving. I felt so powerless to do anything. I didn?t know what to do. I vowed to carefully read every single obituary in the New York Times because I felt I owed at least this to each one. I wanted to try to remember the dead, and give their deaths meaning and importance as long as I could. I felt grateful to not have known anyone killed on the planes or in the buildings. I read obituaries for eleven months, and then one day I read an obituary of someone I knew.. And then the significance changed again, and I grieved more personally for a lost soul I remembered from long ago
I was compelled to visit Ground Zero immediately. I had to look at this hole, at this devastation and searing horror. I wanted to see it straight on. So I went to New York two weeks later in September 2001. And I took these pictures that I send.
The pictures cannot possibly show the pain or destruction or magnitude of this event. And more than anything, they cannot reveal the horrible smell. The acridity of the air, intolerable to breathe, burning and searing ones eyes so you could not stay looking because the pain was so great and the smell of death and destruction so powerful, it was impossible to be there and feel alive. It was an intolerable act leaving an intolerable devastation. The fences were just going up and the signs of restriction and posters of the missing tacked everywhere. Cables had been laid down in the streets to restore electricity and water. Piles of flowers and caps and teddy bears and despairing love notes laid out waist high in memoriam. Dust and ashes covered everything, smoke spiraled to the sky from piles in the site. Businesses were shut. Long, long trucks rumbled by piled high with twisted messes of stone and steel. The wind blew endlessly through everything. People were totally silent.
Some nights I play tennis on clay courts. After the game the players must sweep the courts for the next players. Every time I sweep off the white lines with the roller brush gray clay dust billows up. I always feel sad. I always think of the dust at the World Trade Center and the spirits of those, loved by so many, who were wafted away into the sky.
Collection
Citation
“story2057.xml,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed December 15, 2025, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/7210.