Rebuilding

Six years used to seem like an eternity. Six years ago I was in Philly. Six years ago I commuted three hours round trip for work. I was still in my 20s. Unmarried. I could stay up until 2 a.m. and get up at 5 a.m. with little problem.

These days, six years ago seems like a blink.

I watched it all unfold on TV while standing on a treadmill in the corporate gym, 45 minutes outside of Manhattan. Gina, working at the Philadelphia Inquirer’s website, IM’d me and said there was a plane crash. Check out CNN. What I saw made me gasp. I caught the live coverage just as the second plane disappeared and left a fireball in its place.

My brother. Jeezus. Who else is there?

The phone. Nothing but an automated voice telling me the circuits were overloaded. Fuck. I finally got through to my mom, who said that she had heard from Pete, that he was OK. He had been on the subway from Queens when it happened, heading to work.

They were just at work, too. The guy in the yellow dress shirt and dark pants, his left foot tucked behind his right knee as he falls 100 stories to the ground. Turn the photo upside down and he’s like Superman, heading skyward to save a damsel in distress. An angel. Floating. But he’s not. He’s just a guy that had to make a decision that morning, from his office in the sky: stay or leap into nothingness.

Me? I don’t have a story. I wasn’t there. Didn’t see anything first hand. If you want the truth, never in a million years did I think I’d be writing this. I’ve complained to Gina that the memorials, the corporate ads chiding me to never forget – it’s all too much. Never forget? Fuck you. But sitting here, today, avoiding the coverage, the news, it’s like I’m overflowing. The display on the phone even sets me off: Sept. 11 10:57 a.m.

I really can’t explain the profound sadness that I feel on this day. Where we are, what we’ve become. I don’t deserve to feel this, to feel sad. I have a home, a child, a wife. It’s so much more than so many others. And somehow, somewhere, that day left a mark. A chunk is missing.

Yeah, I don’t deserve to cry. But somehow, I just can’t help it.