Remembering 9/11

Like so many people, today I'm remembering that fateful morning 10 years ago when tragedy struck the world.  I was at work, toiling away in the Publications Room on our first issue, when the first student came in.  Then the next.  The things they were saying seemed impossible.

We continued to watch reports and video footage throughout the rest of the day.  Images of the planes crashing, the towers crumbling, and the people.  Throughout it all, I couldn't stop thinking about the people. I truly felt like I was living a surreal experience, living in a world that wasn't really my own.  I went home that night utterly exhausted.

While I'm a pretty light-hearted, "uppity" person most of the time, I tend to internalize those suffocating feelings I just don't think anyone else will understand; perhaps that comes from years of hiding my feelings as a kid.  I can also be pretty empathetic, so over the next few weeks, my thoughts about the people and the tragedy and the "what ifs" seemed to tear me apart.  I generally read my comics to escape from reality, but what the world was experiencing seemed straight out of a storyline with villains and heroes and events far too fantastic to ever be considered reality. I really had no way to process it.

And then DC Comics decided to confront it for me. Anchored in "the city"itself, they knew the impact this event was having on everyday people like you and me, and they knew we needed a way to make sense of it all.  Artists and writers from all corners of the DC Universe joined together and quickly put out the DC 9/11 Tribute book.  In it's 213 pages, sectioned out thematically (Nightmares, Heroes, Recollections, Unity, Dreams and Reflections), these amazing men and women assembled a way for readers of all ages to process and remember the event and honor those who lost their lives on that unforgettable day.

Today, I have chosen to avoid the media covering hours of memorials and tributes.  While I respect the need for our country to do so, the sights and sounds of that day still give me nightmares. What I will do, and what I invite you to do, is take some time to read  the DC Comics Tribute to 9/11.  It's available online, it's a user-friendly interface, and it just may help you understand the events from a perspective you have never considered.

I'll always turn to my fictional heroes to help me through the hard times, but DC helped me to remember that I can turn to the real life heroes too. They may come in the most unlikely and unassuming of forms, but they are out there every day, defending our country, teaching our children, healing our sick, and telling our stories.  And while they are always there for us when we need them, it's important to remember, that they need us too.