If you were old enough to remember watching it (in person or on TV) in real time, it still lives inside you. And “it” is trauma.
I’m not sure there’s been an event, in the history of our planet, that traumatized so many, so quickly.
The Kennedy assassination was awful – & though it was the young charismatic leader of our country, “Camelot,” it happened to one person.
The Space Shuttle Challenger explosion comes to mind…a country fixated on the first teacher ever going to space, w 6 other astronauts. And while tragic, we sadly knew there was risk blasting off in a rocket ship.
I think what was so traumatic about 9/11, was that it happened on the clearest of days, in September, without much else “going on.” It wasn’t Thanksgiving season yet…it wasn’t Holiday time in NY w the store windows all dressed up. It was just like any other day…& it was something (at least as civilians) we never expected. Not in a million yrs.
And then it did happen.
I was in my first couple of months of work out of college. Olympic Tower, the NBA league office, wall windows staring – straight shot, down 5th Avenue. A front row seat for it all.
I remember most every second of the day, like it was yesterday. But the most traumatic of the images, was watching the first tower collapse, thinking this could only happen in a movie. How many innocent lives were just lost? How many hero lives lost?
And while it’s all traumatic, I use what I’ve learned thru therapy. Focus on the good. The selflessness of first responders. The way our city & country felt so united those next few months. How we built back – w a tower even stronger.
Traumatic events can break us. But they can also give us the foundation on which to grow & become even more resilient. We Will Never Forget.
