Words cannot express the sickness I felt in the pit of my stomach as my train rounded the Raratin Bay this morning, bringing into sight of my naked eyes that which I should never have to see. An earlier announcement told us that PATH trains were not running. Fine. Then I heard bits and pieces of planes crashing into towers, which I assumed to be a terrorist attack at an airport. The next three words I heard brought it all into focus:

World Trade Center.

Two hijacked airliners were driven into each of the twin towers that have defined the New York skyline since their creation — the result of the most vile act of terrorisim the world has ever seen. (Stories on MSNBC, CNN and NY Times).

By the time the towers were in view from that train window, one of the two towers had fallen while the other was engulfed in a mountain of smoke and debris. By the time I next saw the skyline on my way back home, just the smoke remained.

Now I’m a confirmed Roman Catholic, but I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not adimant about my religion. It didn’t matter at that moment, becuase once my eyes gazed the hell that was unleashed, I clasped my hands and started to pray for all those who just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time.

The word that best described the moment was "sureal". It just wasn’t happening. It couldn’t happen. I heard one man say "That’s what they said in ’41". He couldn’t have been more right at any moment in his life. If my country were to ask me today to fight the foe responsible for this attack, I would gladly serve even if it meant my life was to be sacrificed. I can finally relate to how those who wittnessed Pearl Harbor felt.

The ride home was just as sureal, with those who had access to radios keeping the rest of us on the train informed of what was going on, and everyone trying to piece together all the stories they had heard and sights they had seen, searching for the hows and whys. "Thank god I’m alwys late for work", I heard one passenger exclaim, and I had to agree. I had missed my intended train this morning by all of five minutes; a train that would have left me in the city durring this disaster. I work only a few miles from ground zero.

That train couldn’t get me home fast enough. I had many people worried about my well being, and I needed to put them at ease as fast as possible. Oh how I wanted to cry out in rage, but the tears wern’t there for it. Then the conductor came on the PA system: "You people should feel lucky. We’re probably the only train running in this state." I felt no such luck. There are god knows how many people who were in those towers will never get the chance to go home again.

So say a prayer tonight, no matter your god or lack there of. Say it for those lost today, who can no longer pray, for their families whose suffering has just begun, and for the world we live in, because it’s a world in which an act of pure hatred like this can occur.

Pray for us all.

Tags: International, New York City, Personal

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 11th, 2001 at 2:03 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.