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Five years ago today at 0600 I was sitting in the lineup at a wave called Sewers when a couple of guys who had just joined the sparse crowd began talking to each other about the plane that had “crashed into the New York convention center.” I asked them to tell me what details they knew of this accident on the West Side of Manhattan at what I know as the Jacob Javits Convention Center. One of them said “I don’t know, but a little while ago a plane wiped out into one of the towers.” As he said this my heart stopped… not the convention center, but the World Trade Center. I must have turned white because he asked what was wrong as I paddled for the shore.
When I was eighteen or nineteen I had a terrific crush on the twenty-nine year-old woman who owned a (back then the only) skateshop in Manhattan; it was called Soho Skates and she was Anne Zemitas, a stunning pale redheaded beauty. When I finally got up the nerve to ask her out she laughed and said sure. I was a broke kid but figured to make up for my lack of funds I’d make a picnic of the date so when the day arrived I told her to meet me at The World Trade Center. By the time she arrived at the plaza I had spread a gingham tablecloth over one of the stone benches, opened a bottle of red wine, and prepared French bread and Caprice salad for dinner. When we were finished eating we took the elevator to Windows of the World at the top of WTC 1 and watched the sun set over Jersey.
Years later as I stood in my wetsuit crying watching the towers come down, the memory of my childhood in the shadow of the towers flooding back to me. There was an orange sculpture in the corner of the plaza that we used to skate, my Boyscout troop camped on the roof of WTC 2, and of course my first real date. Besides a deep sorrow I felt a tremendous anger, making it all the worse was my utter feeling of helplessness. Why had these people done this to me, us, America; and how could I avenge myself, my country, and its people?
Today these questions remain unanswered for the most part. I am fortunate enough to have surrounded myself with wise and caring friends, one of whom reminded me on that day five years ago that the anger and resentment building up in me would kill me if I didn’t quell its hunger for revenge. He suggested that I look at my country’s part in this, America’s treatment of other countries and the feeling of helplessness felt by those who hate us. Did this painful introspection help? Some, and some was just enough to lessen the overwhelming pain.
There is no happy ending to my story. The tragedy of the events of September 11, 2001 will always haunt me and I am fairly sure that on each anniversary, like today, at some point in the day I will cry. Five years ago I not only lost an icon of my youth, but was forced to look at my beloved county and its treatment of the world and its peoples as a whole.
I believe in God and believe there is a reason for everything, but it still hurts.
When I was eighteen or nineteen I had a terrific crush on the twenty-nine year-old woman who owned a (back then the only) skateshop in Manhattan; it was called Soho Skates and she was Anne Zemitas, a stunning pale redheaded beauty. When I finally got up the nerve to ask her out she laughed and said sure. I was a broke kid but figured to make up for my lack of funds I’d make a picnic of the date so when the day arrived I told her to meet me at The World Trade Center. By the time she arrived at the plaza I had spread a gingham tablecloth over one of the stone benches, opened a bottle of red wine, and prepared French bread and Caprice salad for dinner. When we were finished eating we took the elevator to Windows of the World at the top of WTC 1 and watched the sun set over Jersey.
Years later as I stood in my wetsuit crying watching the towers come down, the memory of my childhood in the shadow of the towers flooding back to me. There was an orange sculpture in the corner of the plaza that we used to skate, my Boyscout troop camped on the roof of WTC 2, and of course my first real date. Besides a deep sorrow I felt a tremendous anger, making it all the worse was my utter feeling of helplessness. Why had these people done this to me, us, America; and how could I avenge myself, my country, and its people?
Today these questions remain unanswered for the most part. I am fortunate enough to have surrounded myself with wise and caring friends, one of whom reminded me on that day five years ago that the anger and resentment building up in me would kill me if I didn’t quell its hunger for revenge. He suggested that I look at my country’s part in this, America’s treatment of other countries and the feeling of helplessness felt by those who hate us. Did this painful introspection help? Some, and some was just enough to lessen the overwhelming pain.
There is no happy ending to my story. The tragedy of the events of September 11, 2001 will always haunt me and I am fairly sure that on each anniversary, like today, at some point in the day I will cry. Five years ago I not only lost an icon of my youth, but was forced to look at my beloved county and its treatment of the world and its peoples as a whole.
I believe in God and believe there is a reason for everything, but it still hurts.
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