I paused for a second because this reminded it was the day before my one year anniversary. Was a newlywed living with my folks in NJ, just over the river from NYC. It was horrible. My husband, a truck driver, was stuck on the road because many bridges were being closed from bomb threats. I remember that night my best friend and i sat on a bench on the river and watched the now empty west side highway moving only ambulances and firetrucks by the dozens all heading to and from the WTC. It smelled of smoke and burning plastics and i remember saying 'it looks like somebody knocked the front teeth out of Manhattan. '

Since then i have moved to Pennsylvania, then Chicago, then Oregon, and now here to Massachusetts.

It's funny and emotionally weird... But being a girl who grew up in and around NYC and some body who watched what the aftermath of thousands of commuters dying at the same time looks like (btw it's horrifying)... People who weren't there make it very nationalist and political when they mourn. Me? It's like mourning a thousand friendly strangers you moved past every day (even missing their anonymous faces) while going about life. It's personal for us. I lost dozens of anonymous morning commute pals. I couldn't even acknowledge how to mourn that but to sat it's a hole in your heart.

And when they came to tow their cars from in and around the bus stops and train stations we all stood outside on the long boulevard where i sold coffee, rolls and smokes to commuters and cried. "That's what's his names car... The guy who always got an taylor ham egg and cheese on a roll salt pepper and a black coffee... What was his name? " All the customers would chime in until maybe somebody remembered a name.

That's life after 9/11 for me.

Remembering friends who were strangers and trying to remember to be kind because tomorrow they might be gone.