Why are people "celebrating" if they weren't directly affected by 9/11?

[HockeyMom]

I would like to try to answer another poster on this question. My answer is too long to post in his thread. Besides, I think it may be on the minds of others, and I will try to answer from my "indirect" experience.

While 9/11 was directed at the entire United States of American, it did happen in New York. For those of us born, raised, and living in NYC, and the entire state, this was OUR backyard. Some people may not like that, but it is significant. I can remember back during the Cold War in grade school having drills hiding under my desk because the Russians were going to bomb us, as in NYC.

My first job out of school was a few blocks from the Towers. I saw it when it was just a big hole in the ground every day going back and forth to the subway station from work. A few months after 9/11 when I went back there, it was again a big hole in the ground. Yet, this time it was not a promise of the future, but a graveyard where thousands of people had just died. Do have any idea what that felt like? No, no, "direct" involvement

I was subbing at the time of 9/11 and at home on Long Island. I watched in horror on the TV all day. Some of my coworkers, and children, were not so lucky. Two teachers did not come to work the next day. Their husbands were among the missing. One little girl's PARENTS did not come home either. Beautiful little 6 year old. All these people were dead. That little girl went to live in another state with her GrandMa.

There was a roadside market near where I lived and bought fresh veggies. The Mom and Dad wanted to retire and have their son take over the farm. They decided to wait a while instead. Their son was a broker and went back to work at Cantor Fitzgerald. He had a wife and two little children. His remains were not identified for many months. According to his sister, he jumped from the 104th floor. Very, very sad, how two people's decision changed the fate of their son.

And speaking of fate, what of the "fate" of others? One of my husband's childhood friends, and an usher in our wedding, decided to take the day off from work and play golf. He was supposed to be at work that day, but wasn't. Many of his coworkers perished that day. Do you know how many times this man said to us, "Why ME?" Another of my husband's friends and former coworker, who we went out with frequently, got a late night call to go to a meeting the next day (9/11) in New Jersey. He watched the Towers fall from the highway. The Data Center where he worked was decimated, killing everyone in it, except HIM. Again, he said the same thing, "Why ME?" How do you answer your friends when they say this? This experience affected both these men for many years.

These are my "indirect" involvements with 9/11. While I know this cannot even come close to those who actually lost loved ones on that tragic day, if this is only second hand involvement, believe me, it's quite enough. I feel a lot more at peace today with the death of Osama Bin Landen than I have in almost 10 years ago.

[MineralMan]

1. We were all affected. Yes, we were.

[Bold Lib]

2. It's a feeling of national pride. Just like people

celebrate "their" football teams victory. They are not directly affected by the victory but they feel a sense of pride for "their" team.

[valerief]

3. That's why I'm not "feeling it". I'm not a sports fan.

I'd be pleased about OBL's death if I knew what it meant for the average person. How will our lives improve/diminish? I'm looking at his death practically not fanfully.

[uppityperson]

5. That is so NOT why I am happy. I wouldn't care who killed Osama. No "national pride" here that

USA happened to be the country whose people killed him. Not. at. all.

None of my family or friends were killed on 9/11. Several were trying to fly that day and weren't able to since the attacks were happening. However, most of us have been affected by all the bullshit that has happened since in response to the attacks. And I feel an ending to that horrible day 10 yrs ago. Even if no family/friends were killed, still I mourned for all who were.

National pride? Not in the least. "my team killed him"? Not in the slightest.

[bainz]

4. Theodore Bundy

Same reason. Sometimes we drop our flags and unite against a common enemy. This one even seems suspect to me, but it is still a cause that a lot of people can unite over. At the end of the day, we all need enemies.

[brooklynite]

6. If there's a mugger in your neighborhood who preys on old ladies...

...are you saying you can't be happy that he's caught, even if you never got mugged yourself?

[aquart]

7. That wasn't very indirect, actually.

People you know.

Much further removed for me. Kind of a wonder that I didn't know anyone directly. Maybe passed the head of Cantor Fitzgerald at some of his family weddings or funerals but never met him.

It was the land. It was the debris on Warren Street, with the sign laying in the rubble, where I'd worked for a decade in my stepfather's business. That was MY subway exit, at the WTC, with the really good bathroom upstairs in Borders Books.

Why do people think it's only the people that we mourn? Those were my streets, my stores, my freedom. Cordoned off. Unapproachable. Forbidden.

(A week before I'd bought a salt and pepper shaker in the WTC concourse. I kept it on my desk in front of me for a year, wondering what happened to the people who sold it to me.)

The day the E train began running all the way to the WTC again, now Ground Zero, I almost couldn't make myself get on the train. I thought, we can do this tomorrow, next week. I was afraid of sitting on a subway train. So I made myself get on. I'd had a nightmare, much earlier, of riding that train, getting off at the WTC...and static. Nothing there but television like static. So I made myself ride the train for real, all the way to that stop, where part of the floor and the original stairs were all that was left that I could recognize.

That arrogant rich brat took my streets from me. I agree with the Daily News: Rot in Hell.

[HockeyMom]

I understand that

That big hole in the ground was a part of my youth. They torn down all those buildings I used to know to put up those towers. I was pg with my first child when we first went to Windows on the World. We took our kids when they were little to Windows and the Observation Deck. They went, but I couldn't go outside. Vertigo, or whatever. I could look from inside, but not outside. I get the same feeling on top of the Empire State building, or Statue of Liberty. We took some friends of my daughters from Alabama just two weeks before 9/11 on a tour of the city. We went to all the landmarks, except the Towers. I don't know why, but I just plain didn't want to go there then. In hindsight, a premonition? Anyway, creepy when I think about it.

I do know what you mean about the land, but you cannot separate the people from the "land". Besides the people I knew, there is a big part of my life, and it's memories, tied to there.

[HockeyMom]

8. I understand that

That big hole in the ground was a part of my youth. They torn down all those buildings I used to know to put up those towers. I was pg with my first child when we first went to Windows on the World. We took our kids when they were little to Windows and the Observation Deck. They went, but I couldn't go outside. Vertigo, or whatever. I could look from inside, but not outside. I get the same feeling on top of the Empire State building, or Statue of Liberty. We took some friends of my daughters from Alabama just two weeks before 9/11 on a tour of the city. We went to all the landmarks, except the Towers. I don't know why, but I just plain didn't want to go there then. In hindsight, a premonition? Anyway, creepy when I think about it.

I do know what you mean about the land, but you cannot separate the people from the "land". Besides the people I knew, there is a big part of my life, and it's memories, tied to there.

[HockeyMom]

9. Sorry for double post

[aquart]

11. Took me over six months

To walk into another outlet of the store I bought the salt and pepper shaker from and ASK if their people had gotten out. They told me they had.

Know what makes me cry? The Tunnel to Towers Run.

[lame54]

10. and who would that be?

[yawnmaster]

12. Because many were affected directly...emotionally. eom