September 11, 2001

I rode the Long Island Railroad to work, as I did everyday, from my mother's house. I was generally late, and so I caught, I think, the 8:56 train. On the way, people's phones started ringing. They started looking out the window. I started looking out the window. There was smoke coming out of the World Trade Center buildings, clearly visible from the train as you approached Manhattan.

Someone near me said into her phone that a plane had hit the building, but I remember thinking it was an accident.I walked to work and found the small staff at the NGO I worked at around a TV. Two miles or so north of the World Trade Center, we could see the buildings out the window about as well as well could see them on television. We listened to the commentary. We heard about phantom attacks on Congress as everyone was thoroughly in shock and confused.

My boss was supposed to fly to Bangladesh that day--something that didn't happen as every plane in the country got grounded. He said, "Everything is going to change now." I didn't believe him.
We saw one building fall; I watched a twinless tower.

Then the other one fell.

I said, "It really hit me when the first building fell." One of my coworkers made a nasty comment to me, implying that I was insensitive. Maybe I am, but she's a dick, I now think.

My friend who I had lunch plans with says that we should cancel them; walk south with a coworker; try to give blood at St. Vincent's but the line is too long; subways and trains and traffic in and out of New York shut down; walk as far south as we could get (Canal Street); she takes pictures along the way.

We go back to work. The Long Island Railroad gets restored in the afternoon. I go to Penn Station and get on the train. I get off in Flushing and my mom drives me the rest of the way home from her office. On the way, building number 7 falls. I am not sad; I am traumatized and fucked up.

On September 12: I stay inside all day. I watch tv. Incessant TV. It reminds me of how I watched the election coverage of Bush vs. Gore.

On September 13, I go back to work. I walk to the Long Island Railroad Station. Even 12 miles or so away, two counties over, I smell whiffs of acrid smoke.

--- five years, two wars, and a reelection ---

September 11, 2006

I woke up late in my apartment. My mom called me to see if I had got home safe the night before and then to yell at me for going home so late :) I decided to quit my bookseeling gig so I could do the work I had been avoiding for the past few weeks on another project. I also decided I would go in late that day.

I saw booths for AM New York, a local free paper, and they all had pictures of President and Laura Bush laying wreathes at Ground Zero. I looked at them with a fair amount of bitterness.

I did some work at home, got ready, went to the pharmacy, hopped on the train, and arrived at the bookstore. I told my superior that I wouldn't be coming back after that day and then worked for about four hours. I left at 8.

I went to pick up my copy of Hungry Tide from a friend's house in the East Village. I stopped to deposit a check at the ATM. There were two Black people panhandling inside, which annoyed me.

As I was putting my docs into the ATM, I caught the White man next to me loudly saying to no one in particular that these "niggers" were annoying him. I snapped at him. He snapped back at me. I loudly and angrily told him to "Fuck off." I think he used some racial slurs against me.
I went, smug but scared, to the women panhandling and talked to them. The man continued to yell at me and threatened to knock my teeth in. I said, something like "what are you going to do, beat me up in front of 15 people?" He told me to "Go back to NYU." He continued to unleash a torrent of offensive words at me and told me not to leave, but I calmed down a little and felt I should keep my mouth shut and just go. As I left, he knocked on the glass and gestured threateningly.

After about 100 feet, I saw him following me. He continued his torrent of abuse and told me to suck his dick. Terrified but still angry, I started heading towards an uncle in a store. I feel terrible about this now.

The man caught up to me and I turned around to face him. He accused me of having a "Napoleon complex" and picking fights with people I couldn't back up. He asked if he had "called me a nigger."

I said, "By your standards, I probably am."

Then he said, "Yeah, you are." and something like "You're all the same."

I went in the store. As I was doing so and inside, he proceeded to call me:

"nigger"; "sand-nigger"; and "poonjabi"; and probably a few other things that I've blocked out. I said, bitterly, to him, "Happy 9-11."

I took my phone out for a second time and he said something like "Go ahead, call the police. I'm 9th precinct." I said, "give me a your name and your badge number." He responded with another belligerent, loud retort that I can't remember. Eventually he left the mouth of the store I was then in.

The Bangladeshi uncle said to me, "There are crazy people everwhere." I said, "I'm crazy too," in Bangla. He said, "Are you from India?" in English. I said yes in English. Then he said in Bangla, "You shouldn't talk to people like that or you'll turn into one of them."

I think that was the wisest thing anyone said to me that day.

---

I left the street and saw the belligerent White man walking in front of me with his back to me, about 30 feet ahead. I turned away and walked in another direction, humiliated from my need to adjust. I felt like crying, and I was terrified and panicked.

I got to my friend's house, spilled my guts, and she made me tea. She told me it was good that I didn't cry in front of the guy.

September 12:

So far, I stay inside all day. I still have 6+ hours to see if this is what I'll do.