I was in 2nd grade when the twin towers were hit. I remember all the children in my class one by one being picked up from school. I had no idea at that point what was going on, but I was so jealous. I wanted to go home early from school. Eventually, my Aunt picked me and my cousin up. She told us about the towers as we walked home. I could see the thick, montrous black smoke of the fallen towers from the street I lived on in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. We went inside and turned on the television. Report after report confirmed the devastating aftermath of the attack.
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My mother was in Manhattan, for she was a secretary at the Wall Street Journal. At the moment the towers were hit, she was just arriving, walking towards her job that was located in a building right across the street from the twin towers. But what she saw bewildered her. Hoards of people covered in white ash were running in the opposite direction of where she was headed. She asked one of these people what they were running from, and they frantically responded that the twin towers had been attacked. After learning this, she walked to my Grandmother's job in midtown Manhattan. They later arrived home safely.
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Looking back at this recollection of my 2nd grade self, I have to admit I wasn't traumatized by these events personally. But in retrospect I can see now how it had affected all those around me. On the ten year anniversary of September 11th, Paul Simon sang Bridge Over Troubled Water at a memorial service in New York. As I watched it on the news, the lyrics filled my heart with warmth. What I suggest, through the healing of old traumas and in the handling of new wounds, is that we make ourselves a bridge to others, a source of stability in an uncertain world. This is described so beautifully within Simon's song: "When you're weary, feeling small, When tears are in your eyes, I will dry them all, I'm on your side, Oh when times get rough, And friends just can't be found, Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down, Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down." Through every unexpected tragedy, if we come together as a community, the most horrific pain will inevitably shrivel in the light of sefless love.