Saturday, September 10, 2011

Ten

I was in high school when 9/11 happened. A senior. Specifically, I was in Economics, listening to leather-faced Mr. Loverro drone on about concepts that no one will retain two months after escaping his classroom. This was a teacher who simply was out of steam. A guy who kept a picture of his in-construction hideaway home in upstate New York on his desk where a normal person kept a picture of their wife or kids or whatever.

He wasn't the nicest guy. He just didn't care anymore. A decade earlier, this was different, as my sister had him, and was a fan of his style of teaching. To me, he was like an angry Italian alligator, with a bratty son who, for whatever reason, went to my high school, as well.

That said, he made the very first joke about 9/11 I ever heard. That very morning. It wasn't Gilbert Gottfried and some woman in the audience shouting "Too soon!"

It was a brown, shriveled old man saying "Well, I guess those people didn't see that coming ..." and he laughed to himself.

My fiance is watching E! News showing famous people talking about where they were when 9/11 happened. Marion Cottilard was in Paris. Matt Damon was in his "apartment" and went outside and saw it happen.

Elisha Cuthbert is spouting words of wisdom. So is Snoop Dogg.

How heartwarming.

I had nightmares for weeks after it happened. Images of being in one of the towers, on a lower floor, and looking out the window and seeing a plane strike above me, hitting the opposite tower. I remember being scared. I remember being sweaty.

Of course, I wasn't there. I was in high school. But these dreams were strong, they were vivid, and I've always wondered if they weren't some kind of "remote viewing" or something like that. I don't know if I necessarily believe in all that paranormal mumbo-jumbo, but it's hard to rationalize something that seems so real, though you have no actual frame of reference for it happening.

In the time following 9/11, for a couple years, I guess, I had a chip on my shoulder any time anyone would mention 9/11 or remotely joke about it. I would get pretty pissed. Now, I joke about everything. My mantra would later become "if we can't laugh, then the terrorists have already won". I'm not one to joke about 9/11 all day long or anything like that, but if Seth McFarlane, a guy who would have died in the attacks can joke about it, then that gives the rest of the witty world the green light to joke about, too.

Loose Change is a documentary that will either make you think or make you laugh. I still don't know if I understand the title of the doc, but it was pretty impressive stuff. Seeing blasting caps from the rubble of the WTC, for example. Powerful evidence for the argument of "Bush did 9/11" or "whoever" did 9/11, whatever the scapegoat of the week is.

We wouldn't have my all-time favorite TV show without 9/11. "Rescue Me" is a gritty and beautiful urban black comedy set against a post-9/11 backdrop. Denis Leary has cashed in some of his finest performances on that show. And he has aided in softening my hatred of the Red Sox, as he is from Boston.

I don't know how I feel, 10 years later. My generation was initially called "The 9/11 Generation", but we're now "The Facebook Generation", and I can stomach the latter more than the former. I feel nothing when I think about 9/11.

Not in the sense that I'm a monster and am not sad for all the people and families of loved ones who died, but when I think of the events, I think of the possibilities that could have come from it. The artwork. The material. The unity that was gone one short year later. The bonuses and raises NYPD and FDNY should have gotten but didn't. As if being an NYPD or FDNY officer wasn't hard enough already. Those guys should be the highest paid civil servants on the planet to begin with, let alone for having the balls to run towards and into a collapsing building when everyone else is running away.

Instead, Suffolk and Nassau cops are the highest paid. For busting kids smoking weed in the woods. And giving tickets. That's bravery in Long Island's eyes.

I guess I feel nervous. It's a decade later. I'm older (and more handsome every day, thank you very much), not much wiser. Engaged to an amazing girl. Moved into our apartment, more or less. Have a job I love. One part-time job I like. And a part-time job/passion that I love almost as much as my fiance.

Things are okay right now.

Things felt okay 10 years ago, too.

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