Twenty-three years … 9/11

The vicissitudes of life create pathways of a present tense of existence.

One asks have I performed this or that task? Met the needed deadlines? Balanced all of the varying strands to ensure that I am reasonably on point in concert with the strains and stresses of any given day?

There are, however, those moments when free in mind and spirt I will walk along Brooklyn Bridge Park and in glancing up notice the sky. It is when I cannot help but gasp at the absence of my twin towers of memory.

They were the locating beacon points of the City I love. The edifices that always startled my imagination when I looked up to grasp their presence rising above the city scape.

And they always were a grand surprise. Whether shrouded in mist with the early glow of light on a rainy evening, or majestic as I would walk in and amongst them. Marveling at their symmetry and the quietude of the plaza where they stood so gracefully.

Their loss is also incalculable. So many lives snuffed out on the day they fell and in the succeeding years as first responders have succumbed to 9-11 illnesses.

But there is also the loss of how wars played out in their name leading to yet more death and destruction and a sense of existential threat and imbalance I would argue the USA has yet to recover from.

Were we to enable the symbol of symmetry again, we might, perhaps find ourselves. Understand that while we must defend, we must also have the balance of sure-footedness. That existential threat can be overcome by letting go of our attachment to fear of the unknown. That by embracing our past and our present, we can feel more confident in our future.

I still ache for the towers because they are my memory of place, not from some nostalgic sense, but for a sensibility that embraces the surprise and joy of seeing an old friend made new again. Their absence is also the symbol of a kind of anger and tactic of terror I eschew at every turn. Yes. I understand the politics of terror. It is out of a very old play book. What I have always hoped for and continue to strive for though is a world where such plays are no longer necessary. Perhaps I remain naive to think that such things can exist–but in my city of memory they do exist as two giant towers to the sun that bring light and a boundless sense of joy into being.

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