Truth and Beauty
““The flames jumped,” She said. She didn’t seem alarmed. No one did. The waiter looked at us suspiciously and I promised him that we had no intention of skipping out on the check.”

I read through this excerpt a couple of times trying to find a line or two that moved me emotionally. There were a few. Not many but a few. I think that this is one of the only ones that both moves me and serves as a thumbnail of the emotions that were reflected for months after the attack. Mainly suspicion and awe. When I was reading this I could just imagine the waiter’s look, but it isn’t the check he’s worried about. He’s worried that he’s got two terrorists in his restaurant.

“History is strangely incomprehensible when you’re standing in the middle.”
I’ve never been part of a major historical event, but I think everyone has seen some really weird stuff happen on the street, or on airplanes or wherever it may be and, when things like that happen, they are always out of context. I won’t get into the details of the story but I thought I was about to witness a rape on the subway and it turns out the two people involved were life long friends. There is a human tendency to watch or hear things occur and try and piece it together after the fact. Doing it in the moment would be next to impossible. Especially with something as traumatic and world changing as 9/11. Try to reason through why planes are crashing into buildings would be like standing on train tracks trying to figure out why the approaching car is honking at you. Your blinded and wondering, “why it doesn’t just stop.”