The postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.
September 11th, the Most Like a Normal Day It Has Been Since 2001
Well, it was normal in that I wasn't thinking primarily about what happened on the day in 2001 for the first time since 2001. September 11, 2012 began with my supporting an internal conference in Bangalore virtually, from my home office in Montclair, New Jersey. I was online from 11 pm, September 10th to 9:10 am September 11th.
There was a 75-minute break and I took a walk from 6:40-7:16 am. It was the first freezing morning -- relatively freezing. Had to be in the high 50s or low 60s and I just walked fast with my hands in my pockets, a baseball cap and sweatshirt. I warmed up by the second half. My iPod kept me company and I sang along. Thought, what a beautiful if cold morning. Registered that it was September 11th, but not in a haunted way.
By 10 am, I fell asleep, awoke at noon for a few minutes and then fell back asleep till 4:15 pm. For the first time, I ushered in the day pre-dawn and slept through a chunk of its daylight. It felt so good to get six hours and I could have slept some more, perhaps, but I want to fall asleep tonight, so made myself wake up. I checked my work e-mail for a few minutes, responded to a couple of meeting invitations and then made lunch and read much of "The New Yorker".
Then I continued reading *perks of being a wallflower* till Pat wanted help with grilling. Weird and somewhat touching to read the thoughts of a fictional teenage boy.
We sat on the deck in our double-rocker, talking about the upcoming Master Gardeners conference at Rutgers and how Pat was invited tomorrow to speak about Master Gardener volunteer opportunities at a class for Master Gardeners-in-training. We looked up at the sky at one point.
"What a beautiful day today is."
"Not as beautiful as that day."
"Right, the sky's not as bright blue."
"Right."
Showing posts with label September 11. Show all posts
Showing posts with label September 11. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Monday, May 2, 2011
Memories of 9/11, 2010-2007 & 2001
The postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.
News from 11ish pm (ET), 1 May 2011, Reminds Me...
There is no rejoicing, just remembrance:
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2010/09/beautiful-riddance-of-sin.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2009/09/yesterday.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2008/09/live-from-austin.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2007/09/today.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2001/09/todays-events.html
I have 2002-2006 entries as well, but have to add them as multiple screenshots as time allows in the coming day(s). The entry from 2008 makes no mention of the 2001 events and I like that. Hope that September 11th can go back to its former non-significance from now on...but this September will be the 10-year anniversary, so we'll see.
News from 11ish pm (ET), 1 May 2011, Reminds Me...
There is no rejoicing, just remembrance:
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2010/09/beautiful-riddance-of-sin.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2009/09/yesterday.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2008/09/live-from-austin.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2007/09/today.html
http://sarahsiegelstories.blogspot.com/2001/09/todays-events.html
I have 2002-2006 entries as well, but have to add them as multiple screenshots as time allows in the coming day(s). The entry from 2008 makes no mention of the 2001 events and I like that. Hope that September 11th can go back to its former non-significance from now on...but this September will be the 10-year anniversary, so we'll see.
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Yesterday
The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.
...Passed Relatively Averagely
This might have been the first year, where I didn't reflect in writing on my experience/memories of September 11, 2001 on the day itself. Is eight years later long enough for it not to be top-of-mind? Yes.
Is eight years later long enough for me to have let it go and forgotten it? No. During my commute yesterday, on National Public Radio, a reporter interviewed the author of a book about Port Authority employees who saved several floors' worth of people before dying themselves.
And then at 8ish pm, after my overdue haircut and dinner with my mom in Stamford, we drove past the shopping center, where we stocked up on groceries during that day in 2001 -- once I reached her from New York City, where I was working at the time. As I write this, I can still see the black cloud that was in my rear-view mirror the whole way up Madison Avenue from the IBM building on 57th.
Eight years later, my mom is still alive, thank God, and will be 84 on November 20th, God willing; Pat and I spent six months, living in India for my work -- which had its share of terrorism while we were there; I'm in an altogether different mission at work; I completed most of a Masters program; my partner Pat had successful surgery for pre-cancer in her colon; my sister and mother survived breast cancer; I learned to live with Otosclerosis; I became a blogger and micro-blogger; more of a routine swimmer; reunited with a number of friends due to Facebook; celebrated Pat's achievement of Master Gardener certification, including touring her national-treasure workplace, the Presby Memorial Iris Garden, with her; gave up, trying to give birth to a child; stood by helplessly as a friend's new baby passed away; have seen our nephews and niece, growing up sweetly; adopted two cats who are sisters; so far, thank God, have remained employed during this economic upheaval; paid for nearly half of the 15-year mortgage on our home; went on a Western Caribbean cruise with Pat and friends; went to Israel with my mother on a Hebrew University alumni trip; and Paris; Beijing, Shanghai, Bangkok, Madrid and Rome for work -- and Pat was able to accompany me for the trip to Paris and to one of the trips to Rome; became excited about Web 2.0 and Virtual World environment possibilities in a way I didn't think could top Web 1.0, which I was really excited by from 1995-2001; and more, so...
Life has certainly gone on, since September 11, 2001, and mostly, positively. Thank you, God.
...Passed Relatively Averagely
This might have been the first year, where I didn't reflect in writing on my experience/memories of September 11, 2001 on the day itself. Is eight years later long enough for it not to be top-of-mind? Yes.
Is eight years later long enough for me to have let it go and forgotten it? No. During my commute yesterday, on National Public Radio, a reporter interviewed the author of a book about Port Authority employees who saved several floors' worth of people before dying themselves.
And then at 8ish pm, after my overdue haircut and dinner with my mom in Stamford, we drove past the shopping center, where we stocked up on groceries during that day in 2001 -- once I reached her from New York City, where I was working at the time. As I write this, I can still see the black cloud that was in my rear-view mirror the whole way up Madison Avenue from the IBM building on 57th.
Eight years later, my mom is still alive, thank God, and will be 84 on November 20th, God willing; Pat and I spent six months, living in India for my work -- which had its share of terrorism while we were there; I'm in an altogether different mission at work; I completed most of a Masters program; my partner Pat had successful surgery for pre-cancer in her colon; my sister and mother survived breast cancer; I learned to live with Otosclerosis; I became a blogger and micro-blogger; more of a routine swimmer; reunited with a number of friends due to Facebook; celebrated Pat's achievement of Master Gardener certification, including touring her national-treasure workplace, the Presby Memorial Iris Garden, with her; gave up, trying to give birth to a child; stood by helplessly as a friend's new baby passed away; have seen our nephews and niece, growing up sweetly; adopted two cats who are sisters; so far, thank God, have remained employed during this economic upheaval; paid for nearly half of the 15-year mortgage on our home; went on a Western Caribbean cruise with Pat and friends; went to Israel with my mother on a Hebrew University alumni trip; and Paris; Beijing, Shanghai, Bangkok, Madrid and Rome for work -- and Pat was able to accompany me for the trip to Paris and to one of the trips to Rome; became excited about Web 2.0 and Virtual World environment possibilities in a way I didn't think could top Web 1.0, which I was really excited by from 1995-2001; and more, so...
Life has certainly gone on, since September 11, 2001, and mostly, positively. Thank you, God.
Friday, September 4, 2009
City Gates
The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies or opinions.
Same Sex Stares
While I'm (still) in grad school part-time, it's such a luxury to have time to read more than one book for pleasure in a row. That's mostly what I've done this week -- read.
*The Gate at the Stairs* was my treat of the year. I don't know that anything else will thrill me in the same way, i.e., through its cleverness and pathos....I adore that combo.
The book I just completed, *Same Sex in the City (So Your Prince Charming Is Really a Cinderella),* was anthropologically interesting because I'm a 44-year-old lesbian in a 17-year, monogamous relationship while the essayists in that book all were in their 20s and 30s, and still fundamentally figuring out how to find and recognize love. It also made me realize that not all that much has changed since I came out in the '80s. In fact, perhaps the only difference is that straightened, long hair has replaced what we called "big hair," which was gelled-up, squiggly-wavy long hair.
If I weren't a lesbian, *Same Sex...* would not have been as compelling, and if I weren't a Lorrie Moore fan, a story about -- spoiler alert -- a heterosexual couple in a troubled marriage and their adoption odyssey hardly would have attracted me. As it was, I was able to appreciate both books for what they gave me (Spoiler Alert: Don't read the rest of this if you don't want to know key plot-points of each book):
Same Sex Stares
While I'm (still) in grad school part-time, it's such a luxury to have time to read more than one book for pleasure in a row. That's mostly what I've done this week -- read.
*The Gate at the Stairs* was my treat of the year. I don't know that anything else will thrill me in the same way, i.e., through its cleverness and pathos....I adore that combo.
The book I just completed, *Same Sex in the City (So Your Prince Charming Is Really a Cinderella),* was anthropologically interesting because I'm a 44-year-old lesbian in a 17-year, monogamous relationship while the essayists in that book all were in their 20s and 30s, and still fundamentally figuring out how to find and recognize love. It also made me realize that not all that much has changed since I came out in the '80s. In fact, perhaps the only difference is that straightened, long hair has replaced what we called "big hair," which was gelled-up, squiggly-wavy long hair.
If I weren't a lesbian, *Same Sex...* would not have been as compelling, and if I weren't a Lorrie Moore fan, a story about -- spoiler alert -- a heterosexual couple in a troubled marriage and their adoption odyssey hardly would have attracted me. As it was, I was able to appreciate both books for what they gave me (Spoiler Alert: Don't read the rest of this if you don't want to know key plot-points of each book):
- A yearning to write more, which I always feel after reading something great and/or something I relate to
- A better understanding of mixed-race discrimination; the adoptee is half-Black, half-White
- Some sympathy for today's lesbians, determining their happiest possible futures
- Memories of my early-days of being out in my 20s, in Chicago
- Delight from the rich word-play talent of Lorrie Moore
- Recollections of the early days post-September 11th
- Happy sense of familiarity during descriptions of Green Bay, supper clubs and other midwestern phenomena
- Double appreciation for Pat -- with her Green Bay heritage and as the perfect solution to my 20s, 30s, 40s...forever-companionship-need
- Gratitude for my Jewish heritage, as I think culturally -- and of course, this is just a generalization -- a disproportionate number of Jews express ourselves publically in writing, and that's perhaps why Lauren Levin's and Lauren Blitzer's *Same Sex* book got published, rather than just remaining a case of, "You know, we really ought to write a book..."
- A better understanding of what it's like to be half-Jewish, half-Christian, since two of Moore's main characters were, and since Lauren Blitzer wrote that she was
- A reminder that people of all classes struggle, e.g., one of the *Same Sex...* authors threw herself a giant coming-out party at a premier NYC hotel, and that did not mean she did not suffer any loneliness or was exempted from searching for love.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Today
The postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.
...Is My Friend Gail's Birthday
That's how I like to think of September 11th, but I can't help thinking of it in more macabre terms, being far from where we typically live -- about 12 miles away from Manhattan. Pat told me that she saw on TV that it's raining in New York City today.
"Good," I said, "that it's not a picture-perfect day, like it was six years ago."
Pat continued, "During the news, they interviewed some Americans, who were saying, 'People from other countries just don't understand how difficult this day is for us,' and I thought, 'No, they're thinking, now you know how we feel -- we, who've had terrorism in our countries for years.'"
At work earlier, I thought: Yes, I'll tell my whole story, if anyone asks, "Were you in New York City on September 11th?" In fact, I was working there that day, but at the IBM building at 57th and Madison Ave., rather than downtown; yet, I tasted a bit of the day's nightmare.
No one asked. No one even seemed even to notice the date. I guess Pat had a point! Or maybe they were being polite and not bringing it up?
Survivor's Rut
I remember when our neighbor fell through a glass door and cut his face this past Spring. When I saw him, I did not ask him to recount how it happened, as I knew that he'd have to re-live it in order to narrate it. That seemed too cruel. My insight came because I had that re-living sensation after a car accident during an ice storm this past April; so many concerned people asked me to detail it for them. I could have gotten past it more quickly, if I hadn't had to keep narrating it.
Same thing with September 11th. If anyone in India had asked for my story, I'd have offered it, but it would have taken a toll.
And I think of a colleague here, who's also on assignment for another company, for whom that bridge in Minnesota that fell several weeks ago was part of her daily commute; if she hadn't been here, and had been on that bridge instead that day....
Life is Good While It Lasts
Leaving dinner at the clubhouse tonight with Pat, I thought about a different loss that we transformed into opportunities for other adventures. More than the anniversary of September 11th, by dessert, I was thinking about it being the four-year anniversary of my deciding to stop trying to become pregnant; by the time I was 38, I had tried IUI via an anonymous donor nine times over 1.5 years.
God had other plans. Finally, on Rosh Hashanah four years ago, I faced that I wanted to stop trying. If we had had a child, I do not believe we'd have had the wherewithal for me to take this assignment, and for Pat to accompany me.
Speaking of Rosh Hashanah, it's time to pack for our trip tomorrow.
Please God, let 5768 be a year of good health for our loved ones and us. Amen.
...Is My Friend Gail's Birthday
That's how I like to think of September 11th, but I can't help thinking of it in more macabre terms, being far from where we typically live -- about 12 miles away from Manhattan. Pat told me that she saw on TV that it's raining in New York City today.
"Good," I said, "that it's not a picture-perfect day, like it was six years ago."
Pat continued, "During the news, they interviewed some Americans, who were saying, 'People from other countries just don't understand how difficult this day is for us,' and I thought, 'No, they're thinking, now you know how we feel -- we, who've had terrorism in our countries for years.'"
At work earlier, I thought: Yes, I'll tell my whole story, if anyone asks, "Were you in New York City on September 11th?" In fact, I was working there that day, but at the IBM building at 57th and Madison Ave., rather than downtown; yet, I tasted a bit of the day's nightmare.
No one asked. No one even seemed even to notice the date. I guess Pat had a point! Or maybe they were being polite and not bringing it up?
Survivor's Rut
I remember when our neighbor fell through a glass door and cut his face this past Spring. When I saw him, I did not ask him to recount how it happened, as I knew that he'd have to re-live it in order to narrate it. That seemed too cruel. My insight came because I had that re-living sensation after a car accident during an ice storm this past April; so many concerned people asked me to detail it for them. I could have gotten past it more quickly, if I hadn't had to keep narrating it.
Same thing with September 11th. If anyone in India had asked for my story, I'd have offered it, but it would have taken a toll.
And I think of a colleague here, who's also on assignment for another company, for whom that bridge in Minnesota that fell several weeks ago was part of her daily commute; if she hadn't been here, and had been on that bridge instead that day....
Life is Good While It Lasts
Leaving dinner at the clubhouse tonight with Pat, I thought about a different loss that we transformed into opportunities for other adventures. More than the anniversary of September 11th, by dessert, I was thinking about it being the four-year anniversary of my deciding to stop trying to become pregnant; by the time I was 38, I had tried IUI via an anonymous donor nine times over 1.5 years.
God had other plans. Finally, on Rosh Hashanah four years ago, I faced that I wanted to stop trying. If we had had a child, I do not believe we'd have had the wherewithal for me to take this assignment, and for Pat to accompany me.
Speaking of Rosh Hashanah, it's time to pack for our trip tomorrow.
Please God, let 5768 be a year of good health for our loved ones and us. Amen.
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