The Ashtray

When I took a poetry workshop as an undergrad, I remember reading this poem about how we will eventually forget everything, even the most memorable events no matter how good or bad.  There was this section about 9/11 and how we'll forget about that too. In some sense , I think them poem is right. Every year on its anniversary , 9/11 is less significant with decreased press coverage every year. For the first time in 12 years, 9/11 felt like a normal day for me. I didn't have any flashbacks or anxiety of an impending attack. It was almost like nothing ever happened, like if my childhood was normal and scarless . A week ago, I watched a documentary that showed news clips of the first few hours after the terrorist attacks. After all these years, I thought I grown some immunity but when I saw people jumping out of the towers, I completely lost it and I was a confused, anxious, mortified, 12 year old girl in the 8th grade, contemplating my steps on my way to school.  For a few seconds, that moment was raw as it was 12 years ago when I stared at the tv silent, holding a full plate of breakfast in my right hand. The documentary played an audio clip of someone stuck in the towers, moments before the tower collapsed. He was talking to the 911 dispatcher and I could barley make out the words but he rambled something about the windows.   You could hear his voice trembling;mid-panting, mid- panicking, foreshadowing what came next. Loud crackles immediately overwhelmed the background as the panels ripped from the ceiling. Almost on cue, the film began to play a visual clip of the falling towers  in sync with the audio and the man screamed and gurgled. It was so loud that it became as dense as the metal bending behind him and even though it only lasted about two seconds, the milliseconds of the audio played even longer in my mind. I  placed my hands in front of my face and yelled, I can't, I can't . I started crying and the guy I was dating placed a hand behind my back and told me it was okay. He apologized for the film, saying that he didn't know I was going to react the way I did. I told him that I didn't know either. When I remembered how the towers fell, I pictured my mothers cigarettes, lighted and standing upright, burning slowly in levels and though they appeared to be standing on their on, I knew that somewhere two fingers held them in place.