2008 Woodie Awards
New York After 9/11
Nicole Curtis
Issue date: 9/6/06 Section: Opinion
This summer I made my home at 35 Fifth Avenue New York, New York. Every morning I woke up in the blistering heat and humidity and looked down eight stories at the West Village hustling below me. There was nothing else in the world like walking through Washington Square Park on the way to the subway station just the city, my iPod, and me.
I could not get enough of New York. On July 7, 2006 at 8:30 am I logged onto New York Daily News.com and was horrified to read that the FBI had uncovered a plan to bomb the Holland Tunnel and flood Lower Manhattan.
The Holland Tunnel was literally less than two miles from my apartment. I got on the subway that morning suspicious of everyone. Every unexpected stop the train made, I felt my heart race. Every unusual announcement sent me into a raging panic. Thoughts of the entire underground system exploding and a siege of water rumbling into my train car flooded my mind.
For the first time ever I thought, "This is what it's like to live in New York City post 9/11." For the next couple weeks, my sleep was bombarded with nightmares. In some, I was running through the streets of the Financial District as the Twin Towers fell behind me. In others, I was trapped in the buildings inhaling smoke and ash forcing myself awake in my sheer terror.
I remember the gaping hole in the skyline so visible as I took the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. The loss remains a scarring visual. To be honest, I couldn't help thinking about it. It seems there's a little bit of 9/11 fear in all of us, no matter what state or city we live in.
Otherwise, why would we be so disturbed and intrigued by films like Flight 93 and World Trade Center?
I think there is a piece of us that wants to remember the tragedy, especially as we face a war that so many have begun to doubt.
There's a significant piece of this nation (and it's growing daily) that wonders if war was, in fact, the answer.
What have we gained five years later? Who can we say we have become? Five years, that's only 1,825 days. Clearly not time enough for change when you count it that way.
Are we more afraid? More violent? Less feeling? More feeling? What is the state of this country? Perhaps it is still too soon to tell. 9/11 was not the beginning of our conflict with the Middle East; it was the beginning of the conflict within us as a people and a nation.
Who do we believe? Who do we trust? 1,825 days may still be too soon to tell.
I could not get enough of New York. On July 7, 2006 at 8:30 am I logged onto New York Daily News.com and was horrified to read that the FBI had uncovered a plan to bomb the Holland Tunnel and flood Lower Manhattan.
The Holland Tunnel was literally less than two miles from my apartment. I got on the subway that morning suspicious of everyone. Every unexpected stop the train made, I felt my heart race. Every unusual announcement sent me into a raging panic. Thoughts of the entire underground system exploding and a siege of water rumbling into my train car flooded my mind.
For the first time ever I thought, "This is what it's like to live in New York City post 9/11." For the next couple weeks, my sleep was bombarded with nightmares. In some, I was running through the streets of the Financial District as the Twin Towers fell behind me. In others, I was trapped in the buildings inhaling smoke and ash forcing myself awake in my sheer terror.
I remember the gaping hole in the skyline so visible as I took the ferry to the Statue of Liberty. The loss remains a scarring visual. To be honest, I couldn't help thinking about it. It seems there's a little bit of 9/11 fear in all of us, no matter what state or city we live in.
Otherwise, why would we be so disturbed and intrigued by films like Flight 93 and World Trade Center?
I think there is a piece of us that wants to remember the tragedy, especially as we face a war that so many have begun to doubt.
There's a significant piece of this nation (and it's growing daily) that wonders if war was, in fact, the answer.
What have we gained five years later? Who can we say we have become? Five years, that's only 1,825 days. Clearly not time enough for change when you count it that way.
Are we more afraid? More violent? Less feeling? More feeling? What is the state of this country? Perhaps it is still too soon to tell. 9/11 was not the beginning of our conflict with the Middle East; it was the beginning of the conflict within us as a people and a nation.
Who do we believe? Who do we trust? 1,825 days may still be too soon to tell.
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