Almost A Movie

The day the towers fell, I remember being excited. Now you must understand this from a fifth grader's perspective. I had just arrived to my small middle school after vomiting in a trash can on the yellow school bus. This was a ritual that I had every day of my young life. Getting up early and then sticking my head in a plastic container as my stomach bounced with the hills of the countryside. But that day of school, instead of expecting long division and memorization of words that I would soon forget, I got to watch TV. What child wouldn't like that? It was almost like a movie to us. The planes and the fire and the reporters. None of it seemed real. The teachers around us even added to the drama. They cried with their hands over their mouths, wiping mascara down their cheeks in long black streaks. What was playing on the screen, was projected onto us. We were a captive audience; ready for the next burst of flame, the next scream or falling body.

By the time the next year came around and people were still searching through the rubble, I remember exclaiming "I watched that happen!" None of it was real to me. Not even when I got to go see the memorial site in New York City my senior year. It's not now. I feel a great ache, a great longing to link some kind of pain with those people that died that day. As an American, I believe that in some small way, I do. It was an awful tragedy that so many died on our soil and I support our troops to the fullest extent. But I suppose that I don't connect properly with this day of remembrance because of the way that I originally experienced it. It was a movie, a terrible show where everyone in the country got involved to put it on. I still have faith in our country and support those who fight to keep us safe, but never do I want to experience something like that again. I want to truly feel for people that I haven't met because this isn't just some kind of performance that we are all putting on. This is life and life is filled with many different pains and joys that we can all relate to.