Ground Zero

A businessman pauses to look at the rebuilding.

A viewing hole in the netting around the site.

A man peers through the netting surrounding the site.

People pause to reflect on the rebuilding.

We're back now from NYC, Kingston and Toronto; we had a ball.

It was good to be in New York. As a young NYU psychology student, I lived on W. 85th, park block, and the street is unchanged except that the sapling trees once zealousy watched over by a photographer named George, who used to blow a shrill whistle anytime my dog, a whippet named Clint, peed anywhere near them, are towering now. I was surprised to find Johnny's, a used book seller and neighbourhood institution, still still exactly mid-block on Columbus. Same awning, even.

On a sobering note, it was particularly painful to visit Ground Zero, the site of the destroyed World Trade Centre. One reflects on good, on evil, on hope and dreams shattered, on terrorism, on the scope of the overwhelming destruction. One thinks about the vast numbers of people lost on 9/11, and in such pain, and wonders in what ways some of them might have changed the world had they lived. Would a mother's influence on her young daughter have prompted her to go to medical school? Would a dad have encouraged a son to go play another ballgame after losing? Our footprint in the world is always larger than we realize, our influence subtle but full of impact. Losing all of these people, these moms and dads and brothers and sisters, is the loss not only of them as sisters, as aunties, as husbands, as sons, but of so much potential. I think of the babies soon to be born and consider how their lives were irrevocably altered.

I want to say to everyone: Have your family photographs made, because you never know when it will be too late.

My then-husband, Gary, and I used to work in the Towers. He was up on the 50-somethingth floor of Tower 2 working in international finance, while I toiled selling luggage in the basement. It's nearly impossible to connect the scar in the earth and the machinery crawling across it with that hub of industry and finance.

The small espiscopal St. Paul's Chapel is open again across the street. This was the sanctuary for the workers--where they came to find food and water and solace--where they came to have their feet rubbed. There are displays mounted of some of the memorabilia generated.