Three Years Later

Three years ago today the world changed. I still remember that day, but then again, don’t we all? It’s our generation’s version of “Where were you when you found out about Kennedy’s assassination” but in my opinion, this was so much more. Though since I wasn’t born during that time, I might not truly understand the feeling people had that day. I just know how I felt three years ago today.

Well its three days later and its time for a confession. I’m ashamed of my actions that day. I remember being in the computer lab at school when someone first mentioned it and I thought they were talking about a movie or something. Anyway I was working on an assignment and at the same time I was trying to go to cnn.com but I was having limited success so I though that was a problem with the server at the school. Then the webpage came up of the World Trade Centre. I remember my initial reaction. “My god, someone hacked CNN." My mind could not grasp the concept that what I was on the webpage was real.

Then I ended up down in the student lounge and they had a TV on and everyone was watching and then I realized that this was real. The planes had crashed into the towers. I saw a friend and he told be about the towers coming down and I didn’t believe that part. It wasn’t until I saw the towers actually crashing to earth on TV then I started to believe. Until that point, it seemed like an action movie and not reality.

Well soon after my classes ended I headed for work and I listened to people on the bus talk and it seemed to me that they just didn’t get it. I felt so empty inside and these people were talking like this was an ordinary event. I remember a woman talking about “When things got back to normal”; I just wanted to scream that things were never going to be back to normal. I wanted to say that the world has just change forever.

The worst was these two stupid white trash pieces of shit talking about it like it was action film and I wanted to scream but like before, I did nothing.

That what my day was basically, doing nothing but my usual routine. I felt like I should have been doing something else. Something important but I didn’t know what. So I acted like a lemming and did my job and listened to my boss talk about the customers being inconvenienced because the courier’s planes weren’t allowed to fly.

I don’t know if there really was something I could do but I’m still ashamed that I did nothing.

Perhaps I felt different from everyone else around me because I had been to New York and it was a real place to me. Not somewhere where people hear about but never go to. I had walked the streets of Manhattan. The two towers were real to me because I saw them. They were real, and New York was something I had experienced. So perhaps I felt a bond and a connection with the people of New York that day.

Actually New York has always interested me. It always appeared to be such an exciting place to be but that day I shared their sorrow. But I did nothing.

My 2 bytes