You don't forget but you move on. And as the anniversary approaches, it's hard not to look back. And yesterday evening was full of looking back. I went to a preview of Nine Innings From Ground Zero last night, a documentary that will air next week on HBO. It's about how people focused on the Yankees in the days after 9/11 to help them forget, for a time, and I highly recommend that those of you who get HBO watch it when it airs. Anyway, I came home from that and then started watching "The Center of the World" on PBS, about the rise and fall of the World Trade Center.
Needless to say, I spent a good chunk of the evening with tears streaming down my face.
What struck me, though, was my need to see images of the towers still standing. Every time an image of the World Trade Center flashed on the screen, part of me wanted to stop the program and just look at it. And...I don't know. Pretend that they're still there. Hug them. Gaze at them in wonder and awe. Take them for granted.
The PBS program ended, naturally, with the collapse of the towers and the immediate aftermath. And I could tell the program was wrapping up and I sat there, hoping that they would show the towers again, lights on, lit up against the New York skyline. And they did show it. And so instead of going to sleep with the images of the towers collapsing, instead of hearing a radio announcer watching the second tower fall, I fell asleep to an image I saw countless times growing up: lower Manhattan, World Trade Center intact. It was comforting, even if it was an image of a world that no longer exists.
Current song in my head:
"Hallelujah" by Jeff Buckley