[Cloud9]

I was in Manhattan. I lived on 14th St. and 3rd ave. I woke up to my suitemate running into the room saying, "Yo, the twin towers exploded." I said, "haha, that's very funny," and she said, "I'm serious, come look." My roomate and I first turned on the tv and sure enough, it was true. Then the report that a plane hit the Pentagon came in, and we started freaking out and crying. I basically thought we were screwed, that there were 100 planes flying over the country looking for targets. Then I remembered a news story I had seen a week before about a terrorist leader and started shouting, "I know who did this! It's that guy, something laden, bin laden, it's him I know it!"

We then ran downstairs, went outside and saw the towers burning. The streets were filled with people walking uptown in a steady stream, or standing in the streets staring at the towers. It was so much more horrible to actually see it happening in real life than on the tv, larger than life disaster before your eyes on a sunny day. All I could do was stare, and then I started worrying about my friends. Many of them lived in a dorm on Waterstreet, a few blocks away from the towers. My boyfriend worked downtown on campus. My friend's father worked in the WTC. My family on Long Island must have been freaking out. I ran back to try and contact people, but I couldn't get through to anyone, and all cell phones were useless. My roomate and I decided to stay where we were rather than migrate with the throngs below into brooklyn until we knew more about what was happening.

Then on the tv I saw the first tower falling. roomie and I ran to a neighbor's room below us that had a balcony and looked at the huge clouds of dark smoke and debris rising from the collapse. A little while later I saw the second tower fall. There are no words. It just didn't seem real, it was like all those action movies that I always scoffed at as being "so unrealistic." Two of my guy friends showed up. They were also numb.

We went back to the room. It was weird, even after all that, no one showed any emotion. I guess it was shock. We joked about it being the apocalypse, talked about classes...and then one of my friends excused himself and threw up in the bathroom.


Much of the rest of the morning is a blur. Once things died down a bit I went downtown to find my boyfriend. He worked at the NYU student gym. I entered, and saw that it had become a refuge for the students that were evacuated from the Wall Street area. The entire gym, courts, exercise rooms, etc., was filled with mats and makeshift bedding. And students. Some dirty, some bleeding, and all of them traumatized. Many of them had a close-up view of the towers. Most had a clear view of people jumping from their dorm window. I heard one girl screaming and sobbing that as she fled from ground zero, body parts had fallen on her. I found my boyfriend, who had been drafted into helping with the chaos and would be there until evening. We left and walked through Washington Square Park, where I had always been able to see the towers peeking over the arch. Then through Astor Place, silent and dusty. You could smell the smoke very strongly even there, and the air was dense and dirty.

As evening came we walked around outside again. Union square was turned into a huge chapel, candles everywhere. It was covered in candles. From a block away it was like the park was glittering. Candles and people. Lots of people, crying, staring, embracing. But as I walked, a new fear struck me. I worried about the backlash of angry people eager for a scapegoat. Looking for anyone to take out their pain on. I knew they would find it in Arabs, in muslims, even in Indians, anyone who was brown or wore a turban. I worried about one of my sisters, who is Indian. I later heard that she had been harrassed, and people had thrown vegetables at her. I overheard a friend saying that he wanted to go to the local gas station with a bat and beat up the muslims who ran it(I quickly slapped him and told him he was an idiot).

I went to bed and felt...I don't know what. Cold, sad, empty. The clouds of smoke were still there the next day, and the next. And then it was as it the towers had never existed, and everything and about them and that day was just a fantasy I had made up.

I've heard that everyone who was in NYC that day suffers from Post Traumatic Disorder, and I think it's true, even two years later people just don't really talk about it. I never thought about it, only the issues that surrounded and had emerged out of the event. This year somehow I was drawn to open those memories again, to affirm that it really did happen. Maybe because now the fiery political speeches are past, the tourists gaping at the hole and buying souviners at ground zero are gone, the endless media frenzy has died down, the ornate ceremonies are over, and now we can really just quietly reflect on what happened. I dunno. Anyways, that was my experience.