shortly

[gfrancie]

After a nice sized margarita I am rather relaxed.
*sighs*

It was another beautiful rainy day and I never realized a quiet little post about September Eleventh would cause so much talk.

So, we got through another day.
I don't really talk about this much, but um...when I watched everything happen live, there was something that kind stuck in my memory for good.
It was the image of seeing people actually jump from the windows. They seemed so tiny and light...like small insects.
I sometimes have nightmares about it. Really awful nightmares about the whole event.
That morning. it was about about sixish when I was lying in bed, half-listening to the radio and they said something about the twin towers being hit by a plane.
I thought it sounded odd, I went into the living room and turned on the television and watched as one tower was on fire.
They were discussing whether it was an accident and then all of a sudden, live right there on the television the second plane just hit.
Just like that.
I felt absolutely nothing for a moment. It reminded me of a fairly traumatic moment in my life and how it left me numb for a bit.

Thomas Hobbes who wrote a terrific political piece called "Leviathin" (I think everyone ought to read it) once said, "Life is nasty, brutish and short."
A bit of a cynical point of view to some, but in some respects it can be quite light. If you view it with the attitude of making it a little more fair and a little kinder for your fellow man. Even if for a brief moment.

I just wish so many could set aside the politics of the moment and just breathe.

Comments

[lisah.livejournal.com]

I watched it on TV while on the phone with my friend who lives in NYC and was supposed to be in a meeting in the second tower that morning. His alarm didn't go off and he was late to work, thinking the entire time that he would be fired. Everyone is his office died.

I still have problems dealing with the images, it brings back a lot of memories. I spent most of the day on the phone with him, and to hear it from the perspective of someone who lost a large number of friends and actually SHOULD have been there himself...it really struck me. I am one of those people that just wants to remember in the privacy of my home, with my wonderful fiance, and try to get on with our lives. Mine was forever changed, so was my friend's. He is still having problems with it to this day. I did talk to him...and it was hard.
I agree with you wholeheartedly.
Let's all just breathe.

[gfrancie.livejournal.com]

amen.

[closh2.livejournal.com]

I was getting ready to go to work when I heard. It was the most surreal event I've ever seen. I had to go through the day teaching kids who were scared to death that family had been hurt, and didn't know what was happening. I had to try and stay calm and help the young ones (3rd grade) try and go thorught their day in a normal way. It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do.

State of nature

[morsefan.livejournal.com]

Thanks for adding me to your friends list, by the way. I'm a pal of ekdogg's and I've been enjoying your journal for some time. Am I remembering it correctly that Hobbes was referring to life in the "state of nature" when he said it was "nasty, brutish and short?" Of course, any situation where there is so much social breakdown that people are flying planes into buildings sort of qualifies as a state of nature. Not wanting to contribute to your sleep disruption, but John Waters of the Irish Times (aka father of Sinead O'Connor's daughter) had just the best bit of commentary on Sept. 11 I have yet seen. He focused on a couple holding hands as they were jumping out of a window, and the whole column is a set of questions trying to put flesh on what was arguably a senseless act: Did you talk to each other as you were falling? Did you plan to jump as you were going up the elevator? Were you in love? Did you have other families? Etc., etc. He develops them into these very real people who had complex lives, just like "us." Very searing.