Sinister: And yet again.

[Azzie]

What a time for an introduction to the list. I've been lurking shamelessly
for around five months (and must confess I adore all the mails), and haven't
said a thing 'till now. I suppose I need an outlet at the moment.
This has been a horrible day for everyone. And here I add to the wave of
depressing mails, from yet another point of view; my own.

I found out by way of an intercom message in school that the WTC had been
hit by a plane. We're in Florida, and so there have been no vigils,
silences, or speeches.
French teacher doesn't give a goddamn and keeps us up with vocabulary. Kids
are joking. All 17-18 years old and thought to be mature enough to handle
situations in a respectful, compassionate manner. They're enjoying the idea
of clouds of smoke from the destroyed towers as hilarious as a scene from a
video game. I don't care if it's an example of American youth on a whole or
not, but it certainly is in the pristine-upper-middle-class-suburbs of good
old Central Florida. Because of this, I don't think it's anything
large-scale at the time-- a small plane knocking off a chunk of rubble from
one of the towers perhaps, and so I go to my next class. As said, I can't
comprehend kids laughing and carrying on about a loss of life in the greater
numbers.

The TV is on in my fourth-period class-- I can see a large, dark plane
flying straight and low into the line of symmetry with the towers, smashing
into the side and disappearing, exploding. It's unreal; it's imaginary. I
start to cry. My classmates look at me as if I'm crazy-- I don't give a
damn. People will come in tomorrow, bragging in a very
suburban-privileged-male fashion about their new car stereos, and their new
bench-press weight, and school will go on as normal, but with a hokey one
minute of silence, though I'm in the gym in the morning, and won't be able
to see it. It's horror to think of young adult Americans not understanding
loss and thinking themselves above human emotion, such as grief and sadness.
God forbid you be laughed at for showing any.

I huddle with two good friends and start wailing, I can't control it and don
't wish to, they join with me as the first tower comes down. It's the most
bizarre, unbelievable, horrific thing I've witnessed in my life. I not
caring most about family who live around the area, I don't care what special
reasons I have for tears; I'm disillusioned. I'm thinking of the sheer
terror of it all, the lives lost, and, frankly, I don't think I need to
justify this.

People are hurling themselves from the windows for a hopefully quicker
death, holding each other's hands, breathing in and jumping, knowing they're
about to die; people waiting for the collapse; the plane smashing through
steel and concrete, all passengers now dead-- all from unidentified, inhuman
men threatening with knives. People are waving shirts out of windows in hope
of rescue which won't come. They'll most likely be gone minutes later. The
largest symbol of commerce, and NYC, and human achievement have been
demolished, imploding to an ever-billowing cloud of mess and smoke, like a
terrible snowstorm, fogging glasses to as far as New Jersey. The Pentagon is
not a pentagon anymore, a gaping hole where it's said-to-be impenetrable
side once was. The fires are still roaring. Groups of Palestinians are
whooping and hollering in the streets and passing out candy. For, God knows,
the reward to those who wage the eternal war must be unimaginably grand.
While in America, thousands of children have lost parents. Parents have lost
children. People have lost friends, husbands, wives, siblings, neighbors.

I grew up several blocks from the WTC, it is a mark of my childhood. I've
been there every day for years, adored the sheer size of it and its
perfection, never imagining this would happen.
I can't cry anymore. It doesn't seem real.

I'm saddened for humanity. My day was a blur; I'm shaken. I will never see
the world through the same eyes. Life has changed as we know it.

I hope all you and yours are safe. Please don't lose hope for the country!
Take care, keep strong, and may God (or whomever does control fate) be with
you all.

-Love and etc,
   Azzie
   http://www.livejournal.com/users/azzie/


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