Today is September 11th, 2016.
I don't normally talk about my birthday being on 9/11. It's a complicated set of emotions - how am I supposed to be happy on a day when our nation remembers tragedy? From the familiar grimace of someone learning my birthday for the first time, to being reminded every third or fourth time I am asked for ID - my identity is, in a strange way, tied to that crisp Tuesday morning 15 years ago.
September 11th is not about me. Well, it is in a very small way, but it isn't. And that's okay.
It was my 12th birthday, and I was in 2nd hour Social Studies when we heard. Our teacher, Ms. Schureman, turned on the TV and we sat glued to it in silence. We didn't understand it in the same way that our teachers did, other than knowing something was very wrong.
It is only with 15 years time that I'm starting to develop a better understanding of these events. A little over a year ago, we studied the collapse of the towers in our Structures course, and I spent 2 hours after class going down a Youtube rabbit hole of 9/11 news coverage. At first I felt almost guilty watching it - what kind of American wants to relive that day? Looking back, 12-year-old me had no idea what was really happening. But as of my past few birthdays, I often find myself trying to comprehend the chaos that would come to change so many things. I read an article today that started to articulate how I feel about the whole situation: "What It Was Like to Be 10 Years Old on 9/11".
http://www.bustle.com/articles/109825-what-it-was-like-to-be-10-years-old-on-911?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=owned&utm_campaign=bustle
My favorite line is the conclusion, because I think it perfectly sums up how much I feel like I have learned about the world and myself in the years since 2001:
"sitting here in this grown-up body in my grown-up apartment a hundred worlds away from the kid I used to be, I feel the exact same way I did then: sitting in front of a computer screen, trying to make sense of the senseless, and knowing that nothing I do or say ever will."
Two weekends ago, I visited the 9/11 memorial at Ground Zero for the first time. I ran my fingers over the names engraved into the bronze parapets of the fountains and listened to the water fall down into the void. As a student of the built environment, I often find myself struggling to understand the sheer magnitude and complexity of architecture - how all of these tiny bits and pieces are joined together and somehow order themselves to form the places in which we live. And then I think back to the feelings of that day, and how disordered and confusing it was because all of the pieces of so many things were all of a sudden not working in the way that they were intended, and everything changed as a result. The disorder, the uncertain and the unknown gripped us that morning, and shook deep fear into our lives.
In the weeks right after, I remember riding through my neighborhood and seeing American flags draped over the railings of front porches. I remember understanding in those moments - we live in a special place. Only more recently do I better understand that this special place we inhabit comes with a heavy responsibility - we make sense of disorder, we realign our strategy, and we push ourselves forward the best we know how.
I don't normally talk about my birthday being on 9/11. It's a complicated set of emotions - how am I supposed to be happy on a day when our nation remembers tragedy? From the familiar grimace of someone learning my birthday for the first time, to being reminded every third or fourth time I am asked for ID - my identity is, in a strange way, tied to that crisp Tuesday morning 15 years ago.
September 11th is not about me. Well, it is in a very small way, but it isn't. And that's okay.
It was my 12th birthday, and I was in 2nd hour Social Studies when we heard. Our teacher, Ms. Schureman, turned on the TV and we sat glued to it in silence. We didn't understand it in the same way that our teachers did, other than knowing something was very wrong.
It is only with 15 years time that I'm starting to develop a better understanding of these events. A little over a year ago, we studied the collapse of the towers in our Structures course, and I spent 2 hours after class going down a Youtube rabbit hole of 9/11 news coverage. At first I felt almost guilty watching it - what kind of American wants to relive that day? Looking back, 12-year-old me had no idea what was really happening. But as of my past few birthdays, I often find myself trying to comprehend the chaos that would come to change so many things. I read an article today that started to articulate how I feel about the whole situation: "What It Was Like to Be 10 Years Old on 9/11".
http://www.bustle.com/articles/109825-what-it-was-like-to-be-10-years-old-on-911?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=owned&utm_campaign=bustle
My favorite line is the conclusion, because I think it perfectly sums up how much I feel like I have learned about the world and myself in the years since 2001:
"sitting here in this grown-up body in my grown-up apartment a hundred worlds away from the kid I used to be, I feel the exact same way I did then: sitting in front of a computer screen, trying to make sense of the senseless, and knowing that nothing I do or say ever will."
Two weekends ago, I visited the 9/11 memorial at Ground Zero for the first time. I ran my fingers over the names engraved into the bronze parapets of the fountains and listened to the water fall down into the void. As a student of the built environment, I often find myself struggling to understand the sheer magnitude and complexity of architecture - how all of these tiny bits and pieces are joined together and somehow order themselves to form the places in which we live. And then I think back to the feelings of that day, and how disordered and confusing it was because all of the pieces of so many things were all of a sudden not working in the way that they were intended, and everything changed as a result. The disorder, the uncertain and the unknown gripped us that morning, and shook deep fear into our lives.
In the weeks right after, I remember riding through my neighborhood and seeing American flags draped over the railings of front porches. I remember understanding in those moments - we live in a special place. Only more recently do I better understand that this special place we inhabit comes with a heavy responsibility - we make sense of disorder, we realign our strategy, and we push ourselves forward the best we know how.
