Just now, I watched them
Just now, I watched them bring someone out of Ground Zero. From 39 stories up, and 300 yards away, the workers are small figures an eighth of an inch tall. It’s raining here, so they’re very visible in their yellow rain slickers. I had stopped by a window to look out at the site, and noticed an ambulance parked at the top of the elevated roadway they’ve built from the bottom of the foundation up to the northwest edge of the Pit. Dozens of small, yellow-suited figures milled around slowly, and then gradually aligned themselves, person by person, along the edges of the roadway. The supporting structure beneath the edges of the roadway is hung with construction-orange tarpaulins, which when combined with the yellow rain gear created an incongruously cheery profusion of bright colors.
After fifteen minutes or so, two people—one in yellow, one in black—walked slowly onto the portion of the roadway that I could see. A few minutes later, a tight group of six or seven yellow-suited workers followed, bearing their burden between them. I had thought that I might be able to make out the flag, but I never saw the anticipated splash of red, white, and blue. Finally, after a pause at the top of the roadway while—presumably—the tiny figure in black offered prayer, the group of workers gathered around the rear of the ambulance, which then slowly went on its way.
I realized, as I stood there quietly watching the small procession, that during the past two weeks a peculiar form of grief has been heavy on my heart. It has to do with coming here to work, a few days a week, and being near that place. It has to do with the state of the world, and the constant burgeoning presence of bloody sacrifice. It has do to with the realization that much of the world doesn’t understand tolerance, or virtue, or humanity the way that my culture strives to. All of that was imbued with a subtle sense of history, that communal product we all manufacture in some form or another. I felt that I was standing there alongside those tiny yellow figures, and for just a moment, the immensity of their task and of the work that they have already done struck me hard, bruising my spirit.
These are still mournful times. A friend of mine, who was also near Ground Zero on September 11, expressed much the same sentiment. Here in New York, we move through each day trying to forget what has happened, and trying not to imagine what may come. It’s an effort that can only be maintained for so long, before the reality of the past and the potential of the future conspire to bring us grief and anxiety.
We’ve come so far. But we have so very, very far to go.
