6 Years Ago; A Retrospective.

Six years ago today tragedy hit our shores. It was a Tuesday morning at 7:22 am and I was late. I had just woken up, and I needed to be at Aaron Brothers by 8:00am to open the store. I managed to pull myself out of bed and made my way out of my room down the hallway and into the kitchen, I saw my mother in watching TV in the living room. She was getting ready for work while watching the news. She told me there was some sort of accident in New York, an airplane had crashed into a tower. I am embarrassed to say my "pressing" needs to make it to work by 8:00am eclipsed any concern for this matter. I gave my mother a peck on the cheek and ran out to my car. The car ride down Mountain Ave. was smooth, before I knew it I was pulling into the parking lot of the Gateway Center on Central and Arrow. I knocked on the glass doors for someone to let me in. I had manged to be only a few minuets late. I greeted my coworkers as we made our way to the break room in the back. I asked the two of them if they heard about the accident in New York, they told me they had been watching it on the TV in the back. We were slowly getting the store ready when the second plane hit, I happened to be in the break room. I want to say it hit around 8:15 Pacific time, but regardless of the time it hit it was horrifyingly numbing. My brain did not process what was happening, and in many ways I still cant understand what how and why it happened. A second plane hit the other tower...How can this be and accident? It could not have been an accident. After this the day is a blur of frustration, anger, fear, doubt, and grief. Even now reflecting back on the day I can't recall much after 11:00am. I have spotted-memories through out the day; an offensive fax from the president of Aaron Brothers, a phone call about my night class being canceled, a myriad of news casts, and no airplanes flying over (my parents house was near an airport so air traffic was an expected thing).

What is so shocking to me is how detached I was from the whole situation. It was ashamedly easy for most of us Californians and West-coasters to go back to our normal way of life within a few days of the tragedy, aside from some limited air traffic inconvenience. In many ways I was separated from the actual stench of this travesty by the glass of the television screen, and drowned to the point of apathy in a sea of news telecasts. I hate to say that its true but i want to be very candid about this. All I could do was pray, and that I did. I know that is a very powerful tool, but I feel bad I was unable to any more. My heart still goes out to you who were directly effected, and especially those who lost family and friends.