9/11/09

UPDATE: last year I did a little photoblog about baseball on 9/11. Baseball as healer? is what I called it. Just in case you are interested. Back to the blog-

I wasn't going to write a blog today. So many people have and will say it so eloquently and I don't really have anything to add.

But sitting at home, reading some blogs and watching some videos, I remembered a book of photographs that I bought from here is new york. During the months after the attacks, I traveled to manhattan several times; not to go to ground zero necessarily, but somehow to make it real in my mind. I don't think people understood my motives, and you might not understand them now, but there it is. I didn't take many of my own pictures, and I can't find the ones I did take. maybe it's better that way. I always felt that taking pictures somehow detached me from the situation, and I wanted to make it a part of me so I would never forget. (I know that it was a part of my political transformation.)

So the book of pictures I have on my lap now takes me back. They move me beyond measure. if you are interested-hereisnewyork.org

So where was I that day? In Philly, at work. We spent most of the day in front of the TV, transfixed. No I didn't lose anyone that day, but I mourned for all of those who did, and for all of us. But I was also mad as hell-those motherfuckers!!!

Although I roamed the city in those days in the aftermath, taking in many memorials-Union Square, the little church downtown, and all, the memory that haunts me the most is the missing signs-all over the city. Coming up the escalator from Penn Station onto the street-hundreds of them plastered everywhere...

Dedicated in memory of all those who perished on 9/11-in New York, Virginia, and on a field in western PA. And to all of those who fight for the cause of freedom.

To all my friends who lost someone that day-I'm so sorry for your loss. This must be such a difficult day for you-I am thinking of you.

Thank you and God bless America-the noblest experiment of mankind on this earth.