On this tenth anniversary of the day our world changed, Band Back Together remembers the sacrifices so many made on September 11, 2001 .
We celebrate the spirit that the American people possess that allowed us to learn and grow from this national tragedy.
Our thoughts and prayers are with those who lost loved ones and those who continue to give of themselves protecting our country from those who want to cause harm to our people.
If you want to share your memories of 9/11 or how it's changed you, we will be taking submissions all month. Submit them as you normally would.
Today, we Band Together to remember 9/11.
I wrote another post, an account of my day on September 11, 2001. I'm glad I wrote it, as I haven't before and I needed to recollect all that happened to me that day. But I need to write this too. I am freaking the fuck out.
Not in a spastic, howling at the moon kind of a way, but more in a slowly, seemingly insignificant, over time kind of way. It's not something that has shown up on my closely watched depression-o-meter that's been firmly in place since the mid-to-late 90's. There has been a general feeling of unrest, of restlessness, of wanting...something. I attributed it to the stress of moving back and forth between two states, being without my husband for much of that time while single parenting as well as just the general underlying stress of being a person that has had a lifelong struggle with depression and anxiety.
In the back of my mind somewhere pretty much at all times -- the fact that the ten year anniversary has been rolling around like an abandoned soda bottle on the floor in the back seat of the car. It started to rise more toward the surface the closer we got to September. In May, my dear and lovely friend got married in style to a dear and lovely man and I was over the moon for them and their happy, lovey, fantastic lovefest. But I was in a state of desperation to get there, to make it happen. As much as I love my friend, as much as I wanted to be there for her and for her day, I just yearn for New York. I just ache to be there.
For months I've been seeking out New York related or themed movies, songs, clips. This morning my husband said, I guess you only like your New York necklace (a little silver apple with the skyline of NYC cut out of the inside. The skyline before 9/11) now because you haven't taken it off in months. I have taken it off twice to get massages, but other than that it's been around my neck.
This feeling, this intense need to be there goes further. I have this guilt associated with the need. Guilt for not being there, for not standing alongside my fellow New Yorkers as this anniversary washes over us. And then there's the anxiety. The dread. The panic. There's the feeling sad much of the time without knowing why. The heightened irritability and lack of patience with my sweet little boy. The desire to withdraw, to be alone in a darkened room with constant distraction and outside stimulation.
I feel on the edge, on the verge. Of what exactly, I'm not sure. I am tense, jumpy and on guard. I am sadder than I could have imagined and I'm fucking scared. Of another attack? Maybe. More likely of having to again re-experience that day that ripped so many lives from us and that also ripped away our security in this world, our sense of trust that when we wake up everyday the sun will come up, the buildings will still be standing and the world will be as it was the day before.
I also feel like a total fucking poser. I didn't lose anyone that day. I was in Manhattan, yes, but I didn't suffer any physical hardship or ill effect. I didn't have to jump out of a building or walk over a bridge or be pulled out of the rubble of a collapsed building.
But I lost something that I can't define with words, that I can't exactly put my finger on. Something that I feel I might be able to find if I were back in New York.
Maybe this is what people with PTSD feel like. Can an entire nation suffer from PTSD? And how do we get past it when the ground on which we walk isn't to be trusted anymore? I know the answer is time, but the problem is I can't make time go any faster.
27 hours to go. Just another day in September.
