DAY ELEVEN:Sept. 21:
It's a dark, gray day in New York City. Rain has fallen, sometimes quite heavily, for more than 24 hours, greatly slowing efforts at Ground Zero. The Mayor has finally pronounced the words we all knew were coming: No more hope of recovering people alive. The morgue is empty, as no bodies are being discovered, either, and staff at the Medical Examiner's office are starting to go through the same reactions as medical workers in this town experienced last week, shocked to learn that the disaster was so esxtreme as to obviate the need for their skills.
Imagine, a disaster so fierce that the morgue is empty.
The "no survivors" finality is sinking in. It was hard, during last weekend's glorious sunshine and perfect weather, to focus on the worst case scenarios. But today brings dark skies, word that the death toll has topped 6,300 and will certainly exceed 7,000 and a final, true loss of hope.
Many of the young adults I work with or talk to are sick. They say they have headaches, flu, colds, fatigue: They are too young and innocent to know acute depression when it hits them. For those now in their Twenties a major shock and emotional boomerang is underway, as just two years ago they could realistically dream of becoming overnight Dotcom millionaires or hip hop stars, delaying hard-slogging career choices and life decisions indefinitely in favor of carefree lives of, if not genuine affluence, at least the possibility thereof. If they didn't grasp it, they could always argue it was a choice, and that they were shunning materialism or becoming a "Dotcom Man" because of some higher values or interests. It was an innocent, lovely time, no doubt.
When Dotcom crashed two years ago these youngsters all over New York started hustling, setting up web site companies or going to work for big corporations. There was a strong sense in the New York air, however, that the mega-crash that hit California's computer-related industries would never be as severe in Gotham, and endless opportunities remained. Indeed, New York City unemployment remained well below the national average, and any bright, hardworking, college-educated 20-something could, if he or she wanted, get a decent-paying job. It was all too easy to fill ones life with social agendae crammed with parties, raves, travel and fun. And why not? that's what being young is all about.
But the WTC disaster ends the Age of Innocence once and for all. Now the youth of our city, many of whom moved here from all over the world simply because this is New York -- the center of the universe -- are shattered. Nothing in their short lives has prepared them for such tragedy.
This morning, as I prepared in a "routine manner" to come to work, I had a sudden flash of Bach Mai Hospital in my mind. For an instant I was transported back thirty years, to my undergraduate college days and that moment when US B-52s dropped a sortie atop a North Vietnamese civilian hospital. My brother, Banning, was there, and filmed the charred and terrified patients. His footage aired on CBS Evening News, introduced by a sober Walter Cronkite who told American viewers that he could not vouch for the reliability of the film they were about to see, as the photographer was not a CBS employee, but here it comes, just the same, for your edification.
(It is an indication of how low the news media have sunk since, that everybody routinely airs video tape that was shot by ama- teurs, seemingly without questioning its authenticity at all. When was the last time a TV news anchor cautioned viewers that the sensational tape they were about to see might not be authentic?)
In my youth the bombing of Bach Mai and the US invasion of Cambodia were innocence-shattering events, though I don't think we, who grew up during the American civil rights struggles and Vietnam War, were ever as naively innocent as today's youth. Still, let's be honest: aren't all we Baby Boomers a bit startled when we see hippie footage from the late 60s and recall how truely and deeply we once believed that peace and love could reign over the world?
What now for the young people I see placing candles in memorials around Union Square, or signing condolence logs in front of their local fire stations? What now as Bush warns them of a long, protracted war ahead? What now, as troops are called up and some members of Congress talked of revisiting the draft? One worried mother told me her Brooklyn daughter hasn't slept for days because she cannot imagine war in her lifetime.
Here in New York the young people I talk to --- admittedly, a skewed sampling --- feel overwhelmed by the city's losses, and can't imagine retribution in the form of more death. They say that "something" has to be done, yes. But vengeful killing? No. I find most of them expressing views that are reminiscent of a handful of families who lost their loved ones in the Oklahoma City bombing. There, most the families strongly favored Timothy McVee's execution. But a minority said, "Enough killing. Enough. Do not execute the death penalty in the name of our lost loved ones." For some young people in New York City calling for a no to war in Afghanistan is a bit like opposing the death penalty.
So, another generation exits their Age of Innocence, and enters real world soul searching. It would have been nice if they could have been spared this pain, and matured slowly like fine Bordeaux. But, it seems, they are forced to be Beaujolais Nouveau, instead.
This morning, as I "normally" do every day, I bought my stack of NY newspapers from the news shop around the corner from my Brooklyn Heights home. The shopkeeper, who is Egyptian, has never been a gregarious fellow. I usually greet him in Arabic, and he long ago ceased being surprised and took to speaking back to me in his language, no more than that: just a simple customer/vendor hello. This morning, however, I noticed that he looked dreadful. The bags under his eyes were black and long, he was chain-smoking and his eyes were bloodshot. I was running late, but paused.
"Did you see President Bush's speech to Congress last night," I asked tentatively.
"Yes, of course," he mumbled.
"Did you notice the part where he asked Americans not to vent their anger against Moslems and Arabs living in this country? Did that comfort you?"
Suddenly he became very animated, and distraught. He told me that everybody in Brooklyn had been kind to him, he wasn't worried about anti-Arab sentiments. It was no problem, he said. What was making him distraught was that he couldn't sleep anymore, he couldn't eat, he couldn't enjoy life. Because Cairo had come to New York.
And then he told me of why he left his homeland a decade ago, during the time when Islamic Jihad was attacking and bombing and killing Egyptians right and left. He spoke of his daily terrors, simply getting from job to job inside Cairo. He spoke of not feeling free to express his feelings, even to say he was afraid, during the Jihad days.
"And now it is here," he said, with real fear in his eyes. "Now it is everywhere. Now no place is a safe place."
I said a phrase in Arabic that used to be a sort of national slogan in Egypt, meaning roughly the equivalent of what today's youth intend with the word "whatever". I asked him if he could use that phrase anymore.
"Never again!"Ê he declared.Ê Only "inshallah" is acceptable now, he explained, and begging for God's mercy.Ê I told him he was my brother,Ê and he accepted the gesture. But I could see it was of little comfort.
Today in Newsday one of our best young reporters, Mohamad Bazzi, has a blockbuster of a story from Cairo. He has discovered that the man behind Osama bin Laden is an Egyptian physician: the very one who engineered the assasination of Sadat and led the Jihad horrors that forced my neighborhood newspaper vendor to flee his homeland. It makes for shattering reading:
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/ny-wodoc212376902sep21.story?coll=ny%2Dtop%2Dheadlines
How do we process this in New York? How do we deal with these many many layers of grief and anxiety? If you haven't been to Ground Zero (which everybody within reasonable travel distance ought to see as soon as possible) you may have a hard time undertanding how the disaster continues to affect our economy. Think of this: stockbrokers and traders cannot drive into the NYSE anymore as the roads downtown are closed. If they live in New Jersey or Long Island, as many do, their train and subway options are complicated now, commutes are longer. OK, that's inconvenience, not shattering a stock market. But the kicker is that many have lost their offices, lost coworkers and now must unavoidably see the WTC carnage every time they head into the stock exchange. Talk of "rebuilding the economy" or patriotic investmentÊ rings hollow to them.
New York City, especially those of us who live south of our new Mason-Dixon line, 14th Street, is bracing for economic collapse. When the Twin Towers fell, the economy went with them. Or so it increasingly seems. All around me I sense apprehension, as New Yorkers try to imagine where this is all headed. The airlines and tourist industries are obvious, but what else?
My Santa Fe pal, Sandy Blakeslee, tells me that she flew a couple of days ago from San Francisco, and the pilot came back and shook every passenger's hand to thank them for having the courage to fly. Nearly every conference I was planning to attend or cover in coming weeks has sent out bulletins saying they are either cancelling their meetings, or indefinitely postponing them, all over the nation. I was supposed to be in Australia today, and next week addressing a biology meeting in Perth. What could be further from New York City? But the conference organizers, defiantly determined to have their gathering succeed, admit to enormous problems in logistics, travel and planning. The ripples from the crashed Twin Towers have been felt literally on the other side of the planet.
A few days ago I talked to a rescue worker who has been digging for bodies in disaster after disaster for twenty years. I asked him how he copes with things, what he would advise for New Yorkers.
"Deal with this the same way you deal with any challenges in your life," he said. "Lean on the same friends and family and churches. Do the same things that normally help you."
I'm a writer. What normally helps me is writing. You who are reading this need to understand that I am venting a bit, and that these missives are impressions and swathes, hints of our New York reality. But they are not hard, objective journalism. Some things may prove inaccurate with time.Ê Some may offend.
It helps me, however,Ê to pour this out every day. At least, for now. I cannot say how long I will keep this up. But there is no shame in telling me, "Enough, already! Stop sending these things."Ê I will be happy to remove your name from the list of recipients, and I will understand. You are being generous in indulging me. I thank you.
Be safe. Be strong. Stand defiant.
Laurie Garrett
