every 9/11, voicemails and text messages sent from the victims of the hijacked planes & those stuck in the buildings enter my social media feed…it is devastating. Messages saying their final goodbyes to their loved ones, some laced with the hope that their reality will not turn out the way it did, and others laced with acceptance of their fate. No matter how you spin it, it is one of the most heartbreaking things I have ever seen.
i then put myself in their shoes the best I can. I sit & think, “Who would I call? Who would I text?” There is so much love in my life that if only seconds separated me & death, who would I pick up the phone to say one last thing to? I’ll play around with a few scenarios in my head. I’ll think about my immediate team: my mom; my grandparents; my best friends who became family; my lover, and then I go further down the rabbit hole. At a certain point, I started to wonder, “Who do I wish I could call? Who do I wish I could text?” And, to me, that is equally as heart-wrenching as texting the people I do love.
there are so many people in this life that I have fallen in and out of love with. I mourn the ending of my relationships, both romantic & platonic, so often that it starts to feel fresh & like they happened yesterday. Somehow the attachment I still had for them & the events that led to our separation act like a fountain of youth—keeping me young at heart and in mind. But when I boil it all down to, “Who would I want to call?” I’m not ashamed to admit that a few names do come to mind.
Unfortunately, there are people who I have loved that I STILL have love for, and they will never know it. I wish them the best and speak it into existence in the hopes that they feel it one day. I want so much good for them that I hope I never find out about it because everyone has to move on and keep moving on at some point. It’s disappointing to feel this way sometimes; it’s disappointing to know that there are so many intense feelings for other people inside me, and they’ll never know about it. I wonder if they ever think of me too. If I ever slip into their minds whenever they see or hear something that looks & sounds like the imminence of our relationship.
if one day, I find myself in a similar situation, will I send a text to the man I once loved when I was a kid & tell him that I hope he finds the person he is meant to make grocery lists & fold towels with? Will I tell my old best friend from high school that I haven’t spoken to in years that I have never felt as seen & as understood as I did by her at 16? Will I tell the girls I lived with at 20 that they taught me the value of loyalty, the importance of girlhood, & how great it is to be a girl?
Maybe one day, instead of thinking about life as a hypothetical, I’ll have the courage to act instead. One day I might not have to make up fake scenarios in my head & only think of them in these instances of delusion & make-believe. If I’m lucky enough, I will have the courage to say kind things to the people of my life who have become strangers.
the one thing I always take away from one of these posts & remembrance of 9/11 is
1) nothing should be taken for granted & sometimes the only fault is being in the wrong place at the wrong time
2) Tell them you love them because life is fleeting & they should never be able to question the depth of your life
3) At the end of the day, all that really matters is love &, unfortunately, sometimes there is love that is taken away prematurely because of hate.
There is no excuse for the actions that caused on 9/11/2001. There is no justification for the lives lost & the lives & futures that were altered because of this tragedy, but one of the greatest lessons to be learned is the undeniable unity from Americans upheld by love & commitment. Tell the people you love that you love them & I hope you too have the courage to build back up the bridges that were burned in order to spread kindness & love.
with all my love,
♡steff
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