Always That Feeling
09-13-2001,

Always That Feeling...

September 13, 2001

that things are just not right. You can forget for a moment or two perhaps, but it's always there in the background. This paralyzing fear and sadness that maybe things will never be normal again. Logically, it will be... life has shown us that. But some things have changed, and how we deal with that is a personal thing I guess.

I finally was able to turn away from the news last night around 11:30 and go to sleep. Okay, I fell asleep with it on, but we won't talk about that. I woke up again at 1:30, from a horrible nightmare about all of this stuff. My head was pounding so bad, and I knew that it was going to be a long night. When I have migraines like that I just can't go back to sleep right away. Everytime I lay down, my head just pounds so badly, and I can't even relax enough to actually go to sleep. So I got myself a cold rag for my head and settled myslef on the couch. I heard this really eerie sound outside and went out there to check it out. It was coming from the train tracks a few blocks away. Living near the airport like we do, it just sounds so different to not hear the planes flying overhead all day and night. It makes everything else seem so eerie, especially with all that is going on.

I turned the news back on, and it being the middle of the night, they were pretty much just showing tapes of the same stuff they had been showing all day long. The more I watched, the more my head hurt, and I finally realized that I needed to do something else for a while. If I had any chance at all of going back to sleep, I needed to get this stuff off my mind. So I flipped thru the channels for a bit, until I came to a movie. I don't even know what it was.. it was just what I needed though. I watched for a bit, and felt the advil and cold rag finally start to work, and eventually I even felt like I could go back to bed. I was into the movie by then and wanted to see what happened, but I was smart enough to realize that I needed some sleep. I went back to bed, and cuddled up to Stephen, and everytime I started to think about all the horrible things happening in the world around us, I forced myself to think about the movie I was watching instead, and even try to figure out the ending to it. It worked, and I slept pretty good for the few hours I had left.

Things are still out of whack today, and I know that they will be for a while. But I also know that we are strong people and that we will get thru this. To sit here paralyzed by fear and sadness will only allow the monsters to win. I won't help them to do that. On the way to work, outside of this little store, a man and woman were standing near the street, passing out flags to cars as they stopped at the stop-light there. We were handed one, and I was very happy to have it. What a wonderful thing for them to do. I was impressed. We are going to have people out there that take advantage of this situation, that is the sad part of human nature... but we also have some wonderful people out there that really come together at a time like this. I am glad that I have my friends and family to get thru this with... it helps to not be alone.