9/11: A Small Tribute

I was fifteen when the World Trade Centre was attacked, too young to understand the impact such an event would have on the world I was stepping in to. I still remember where and when I was when someone told me what was happening, standing outside my air cadet hut on a cold September evening I had no idea what terrorism truly was or what it would become over the coming decade. I was young, naive and living in a small UK town, isolated from what was happening so far away. I’ve talked to people who lived in New York on that day, read the books and watched the documentaries but I’ve no idea how to process all that and won’t even try to sit here and write that I understand. I don’t. As a society, I don’t think we will ever understand that unless we live through it.

Years later in the UK we would feel a little of that terror with the 7/7 bombings. The fear that can only come from people afraid to jump on the bus to go to work, who are suspicious of every one around them – a fear born of the knowledge that it could, and has, happened.

This blog went around in my head for days. I wrote a lot, I deleted it and restarted. I wrote a lot again, repeated the delete. I’ve no idea how to write a fitting tribute to those who died on September the 11th 2001 or those who still suffer to this day. The world will unite today and, for one fleeting moment, we will feel the strength we felt a decade ago as we stand together, united for one cause.

Now, moving on from the heavy side of things: Go out, use that freedom that people fight for and enjoy the day.

The NY skyline, as it should be