 Coping
with the 9.11.01 Aftermath
A Letter from a Grandfather to His Grandchildren
by Anonymous Author*
Elisa and David and whatever
other grandchildren I may soon have, I want to tell you about my feelings and
what I learned during the terrible week of September 11, 2001. You’ll be able
to read this letter yourself before too long, but you are not prepared to come
to terms with it today or anytime soon. In a few years you will understand what
I felt. In the meantime, you will have read the children’s books about that day
and what followed it, and you will have heard and seen Mr. Rogers talk with the
children about it.
Any American could write such
a letter, and indeed many people across the world could do so. But only I can
tell you about what was in my heart in that week. If you want to, you can share
this letter with your friends and loved ones after the war has ended.
What I want to tell you is not
the story of the tragedy and how I saw it unfold. All of us told each other
those stories. It healed us to explain to each other what we were doing when
we realized that America was under attack. It helped a little bit to recount to
each other our shock and terror when we saw the second attack plane nearing the
towers. Many of us will retell those stories of horror all our lives. We will
retell them to ourselves each time we try to sleep. Many of us cannot stop
thinking of the many people leaping from the burning buildings or of the
firefighters rushing up the steps of those buildings. Or of what the people in
the towers thought as they saw the airplanes coming straight at them. Those
are stories of the deepest sorrow, and they will be with us forever.
Instead of being a story of
terror, the message of this letter is of hope for a nation and its people, a
message about their goodness and their kindness to each other. It is also a
story of victories, not on a battlefield or in a cave but in the human heart.
At the Denver International
Airport on Friday morning, as I tried to get home from a meeting, I began to
understand how the nation was bearing this tragedy. We bore it with nobility,
kindness, and purpose. We also did it with steel in our hearts. We did that
because we are a great and good people.
Lines of would-be passengers
stretched throughout the DIA terminal. People waited two or three hours only to
be told that they could not take a flight that day. Not a single person reacted
with anger or rudeness. They responded with gratitude to the saddened airline
personnel who were doing their best to help them. American Airlines had posted
an illuminated sign that said “Thank You for Your Patience.” We needed no
thanks. We would have uncomplainingly stood on line for hours for days, in
quiet; some of us probably did just that.
The quiet of the terminal was
the first thing that I noticed when I arrived there at 6AM on Friday. People
were talking with each other, but in such subdued voices that no one had to
strain to listen to another’s grief and hopes. Or to another’s speculation as
to when he could get home. That solemn quiet persisted for days: on Sunday
morning, as I passed through the terminal of the Hartford-Springfield Airport on
my way home, long lines of people stood at 4:15AM hoping to be able to return
home, again almost in silence. Only at DFW was it noisy, and that was mostly
because of public announcements trying to link people with those looking for
them.
That Friday most churches,
synagogues, and mosques held services of prayer and remembrance at noon. As
noon swept across the country, bells tolled and people filed into a house of
worship to pray. I went to the Sixth Street Congregational Church in the Cherry
Creek section of Denver. On the altar were the newspapers announcing the
attacks on America, with candles standing beside them. There was also what
looked to me like an apple but may only have been another candle. There were
boxes of tissues in every pew.
We prayed in unison. We
listened to the 23rd psalm, a text holy to three religions, Judaism,
Christianity, and Islam. We spoke together the fake but true words of “Chief
Seattle.” We sang hymns of comfort. One of our songs included a bass response
in the refrain. I think that I was the only bass in the congregation, or at
least the only one willing to risk singing the bass line. I hope that I got at
least two or three notes right.
This was no ordinary worship
service. Mostly we talked with each other. People told of their shock and of
their fears. A reservist worried that she, a single mother without family in
the Denver region, would be required to leave her five year old son in a
stranger’s care. I expect that she faced exactly that dilemma the next day.
And I expect that she now is again serving her country and that people have
responded to help her.
Terror was not our theme in
that service: mostly the people told each other of their hopes. Of the hope
that came from the sermons given by ministers, rabbis, priests, and Muslim
clerics during the service at the National Cathedral earlier that day. Of the
music that lifted our spirits then. Of the hope that the war that we had
entered would end with the betterment of the lives of the peoples who had
attacked us. Of the hope that the sacrifices of that week and the sacrifices
that we all knew would come over the next months or years would lead to peace
for all the peoples of the world.
People were connected that
week as never before. As I walked on the streets of beautiful Cherry Creek,
people passing me would ask “How are you?” People would smile at each other for
no apparent reason. When I checked out of the Fairfield Inn at DIA for the
second time, the desk clerk told me “I love you.” The flight attendant on the
last leg of my journey home came around to speak to each passenger and to wish
us Godspeed.
American flags were flying
everywhere. The airports flew dozens. Motorcycles sported them at the rear.
The door to the cockpit on my MD80 displayed a flag. Lawns were covered in
flags.
I did not see these flags as
jingoistic. The flags were not statements of a hating anger, although a holy
anger is needed now. They were symbols of comfort. We are a people who have
taken comfort in our flag from the beginnings of our nation. Our national
anthem is about the comfort that Francis Scott Key took when he saw that the
Star Spangled Banner still flew. The flags comforted me, as did the words and
actions of the President. I took comfort from the President’s calm and resolve,
and from the fact that after learning of the second attack, he resumed reading
to the Florida children.
Most of us became ill in some
way during that week. Almost none of America slept that Tuesday night.
Wednesday, my own illness was the onset of severe tremors in my hands. I was
shaking not with fear but with sadness. A bit of advice: don’t order soup when
you have the tremors.
There were so many things that
happened that week which led me to tears. That still move me to tears. One
thing moved me to sobs. It was that people could speak their last words to each
other across great distances. Many, many people called their loved ones and
friends while in the burning buildings. Many knew that they could only say
goodbye. But it was not the tragedy of that parting which so moved me.
Instead, it was gratitude: I was grateful that there had been opportunities for
loved ones to give comfort to those who were doomed. That must have meant so
much to those who died.
Not everyone responded with
kindness and nobility. There were looters and scam artists. There were those
who financially profited from people’s fear.
Two television preachers,
Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, proclaimed that God was angry with America –
angry with its lax morals, its sanctioning of abortion, its having turned away
from God in every way. Their hatred and rage stunned me. Those men are
America’s own version of the haters who attacked our country. If they are right
that God was vengeful with America on Tuesday and used the terrorists as His
vehicle to smite us, then I want nothing to do with that God. If they are
right, when I die I would prefer to go to Hell, where those there will evidently
be far the better people. Let Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell join their blood
brothers, the terrorists, in Heaven with their malign God.
Why could not these men
instead have said “In the deepest sorrow, God permitted some of his children,
acting on their own free will, to make these attacks. God hopes that those
sacrifices will lead good men and women throughout the world to act to remove
the conditions that created such monsters.” Why could they not have said that?
It might even be true.
I came to an understanding of
God during that week, although I’m still not sure that I am a believer. I had
always doubted the existence of a benevolent Supreme Being, not really because
such a belief requires a faith in things unseen and unknowable. It was one
thing that I did clearly see which most caused me to doubt God: it was
the problem of evil in the world. How could a good God permit that? The answer
came to me as simply and clearly as it could, and I don’t know how I learned
this: God permits evil because He gave man free will. We choose our own paths.
Some of us choose badly, and some of us choose evilly. God must be deeply
saddened this week by the choices of some of His children.
At each airport, I noticed
what I think were Muslim families, inferring that by the modest clothing that
the women wore. There were too many Muslim families in the airports. There was
a very large four-generation family of Muslims preparing to fly somewhere. They
had many bags apiece; it looked as if they were moving their household
belongings. I think they were fleeing. They might have been fleeing from their
fellow citizens or they might have been fleeing from what they feared was about
to happen to America. Or both. Either made me sad. I knew that they had
reason for either fear. And if they were simply our guests, we had violated not
only their rights but also a teaching of our religions: to treat a guest well.
There was a young Muslim
couple standing alone and forlorn at a gate that I passed. They looked so sad
and afraid. As I passed them, I said “God bless you.” They appeared stunned
and did not reply. But they hugged each other. Their fear was overwhelming.
They were surrounded by a massive police presence. Why should they feel fear?
Perhaps it was our police of whom they were afraid.
When I returned home to the
little state that had lost so many of her citizens, I noticed that the name of
the pharmacist at my local drugstore is characteristically Muslim. I hope that
he is not living in fear in this rural corner of this little state. I read
today in our campus newspaper of harassment of many Muslim students on our
campus, and that Muslim students were already returning home, often at the
urging of their parents.
I recalled that in planning
the 2000 Census, some Arab-Americans had asked that they be counted as a
separate ethnicity, to recognize their growing numbers. Others had opposed
doing this, fearing that the information would be used to track them down some
day. The Census had already been used once before to hunt down American
citizens, the Japanese-Americans.
The most important thing to
know about this week is that this was a week of victories, not just a week of
tragedies. There was the enormous victory of the passengers and flight crew
crashing their doomed plane into the Pennsylvania countryside rather than
letting it continue on its evil mission. There was the victory of the
firefighters, police, and paramedics rushing into the burning buildings. There
was the victory of the rescue workers who soon followed them, trying to dig up
the bodies of their comrades who were crushed and burned when the buildings
collapsed. And there were many, many small victories. Every American born on
that terrible day will owe a debt of thanks for the small victory won by those
who persisted in doing their jobs in maternity wards while the world fell down
around them. Every American owes thanks to himself and herself for having the
character to persist under the most trying circumstances, doing their jobs while
in mourning.
When I finally flew back home
on Sunday morning, we came up over the ocean along the coast. The night was
cloudless. I could see the great cities shining all the way up the Northeast
coast. Our cities are beautiful from the sky at night, even when you know that
the sky has been used as a means with which to wound them.
When the plane began to bank
to land at Hartford, I thought that we were probably alongside New York City. I
asked my seatmate what that city was. He replied “New York City” in the same
tones as he would use in saying the name of his daughter as he rocked her to
sleep
There was blackness where the
Hudson and the East Rivers converged into New York Harbor. Somewhere down there
lay the wreckage of Lower Manhattan. For days, I had flashed on the second
airplane or the crumbling buildings every five minutes or so, and each time I
had reacted with disbelief. It could not, just could not, be real. Since
seeing that blackness, I know it is. But there was not total blackness, for the
dark space was dotted by the small lights that served people working to rescue
lives and recover bodies. This was a victory.
All of the cities had little
blinking lights circling over them. I believe that those were the fighter
planes protecting the homeland, the AWACS radar planes guiding them, and the
fuel tankers there to keep the planes aloft. We had not anticipated, indeed had
not believed, that we would ever again need to use our military force to protect
the homeland, but it was a victory that we had the power to do so.
The airports were filled with
police of various kinds. Their massive presence, there so soon, was a victory.
There were also young soldiers in uniform. It did not look to me like they were
there as police, as they had no weapons. I think they were there to fly off to
war. They were smiling, buying the silly things, the junk food, and the sex
magazines that young men and women buy. These soldiers were themselves
victories, because of their training, their youthful strength, and their
willingness to give their lives to protect their country. I saw many young
civilians whom I expect will soon be resolutely joining the young soldiers.
They will be standing together in preparation for war.
It will probably be these
soldiers who pay the highest price in what is to come. It had always been
possible to attack the Pentagon; any group, not just these cowards, could have
done it. For 50 years people have worked in that building to prevent war. When
they have failed, they have suffered. It is they who most deeply know what it
means to kill and destroy, what it means not just on their side but also on the
opposing side. That must be why I have never met a military person who does not
hate war. We let them down by permitting this to happen. We will have a
victory through their sacrifices.
Elisa and David and my other
grandchildren, I pray that when you are old enough to read this, America and the
world will again be at peace. I pray that the scourge of terrorism will have
been eliminated from the world. I pray that the great pain which caused that
terrorism to arise will have been eased. I pray that the leaders of those who
did this will have been arrested, not killed outright, and that they will be
imprisoned in isolation for life to contemplate their crimes. I pray to see
them stand before the Federal District Court in Lower Manhattan. And I pray
that there will be no further acts of terror on Americans, but I fear that that
prayer will have not been answered.
God cannot and will not
directly answer those prayers. They are just me talking to a Supreme Being who
can help me bear this. There will be no miracles. If God has miracles up His
sleeve, we sure could have used one last Tuesday. Or, really, back in the Dark
Ages, when this all began.
What will happen will depend
entirely upon what we each do. God is not going to step in. Whatever happens
must be and will be the result of the choices that we humans make now. Only
that degree of freedom to do wrong permits us to have free will. That is the
great gift that God gave us. It is also the heavy burden that we bear.
If my last prayer is indeed
unanswered and the war continues on American soil, the American people will bear
it, and they will win.
Elisa, this Sunday, the 23rd,
I will come to Westchester County to celebrate your birthday. It will be a
joyous occasion, even though the adults will all know that less than fifty miles
from us there is a place of great grief and tragedy. It will be joyous because
we have your life and your hopes and dreams to celebrate.
Perhaps when you are old
enough, you will journey to Afghanistan or Sudan or Iraq or Palestine on a
mission to help their people. Perhaps you will find young democracies there.
Perhaps you will find growing economies. Perhaps you will find the Holy City,
Jerusalem, jointly governed by men and women of the three faiths of Abraham. I
strongly believe that you will find a noble religion, Islam, leading its people
to peace among themselves and with others. I hope that you will find underway a
Marshall Plan for the poor Muslim world, led by America and its partners among
the industrial democracies and the rich Arab states. If that is what you find,
then September 11, 2001, will have been the day on which the healing of the
wounds of the past and present began. And God might indeed have permitted this
to happen because He hoped that we would see the way to achieve this.
Love,
Poppy
September 18, 2001
*Author is a
Professor of the University of Connecticut
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