I was unable to get a phone call through to the local Red Cross here in New Haven this afternoon, so I thought I’d just go up there after class, if I ended up having class, and see if they were able to deal with the undoubted influx of volunteers right now. I went to grab the book I’d been reading last night, because I never go anywhere without a book if a wait is expected, when I realized that I just couldn’t read it anymore. Not because it wasn’t a good book, but because the main characters are fending off planetary invasion and serious combat looked to be imminent when I put it down last night. I was simply unable to deal with that right now, or possibly for a while. (The book is Plan B by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, sequel to Partners in Necessity, and if being unable to read it were the worst effect today’s had on my life, I would be thrilled. Needless to say, this is not the case, though I am fortunate in that most people I know seem to be accounted for, and the few I haven’t heard from yet are unlikely to have been hurt, as they weren’t that near the World Trade Center. I hope.)
This book log is going to divert abruptly now into a journal, because I feel like it. If you don’t like it, go away and come back some other time. And anyway, I didn’t end up reading anything fiction today because I found out in the meantime that two blood drives will be going on tomorrow.
An hour ago, I was curled up on a couch in the law school dining hall, eating a comfort bar of Haagen-Dazs and trying to decide if I was angry or not. I feel like I ought to be, but I can’t seem to get past the sick sinking feeling in my stomach every time those horrible images of the Towers collapsing replayed in my head. Which is often. (I stopped watching the TV news after about 11 a.m., because I could not bear to see that footage one more time. Even Challenger was not so sickening to me. Truly, I can only think of one or two other sights that would be so horrible—the main being watching various loved ones die in front of me while I was helpless, that level of horrible—and I can only hope with all the fervency I can muster that I never see anything like that again in my life.)
I don’t think I’m angry. It’s hard to say, because all the various bits of me seem to be in disarray. It’s almost a physical feeling of discomfort, as though nerve connections have loosened and my stomach has hopped onto a roller coaster just at free-fall and my lungs have shifted around to be pressed on by my rib cage and my heart is laboring under being squished by something else nearby. Concentrating has become the kind of effort I experience during migraines, and my eyes are showing a tendency to water for no apparent (immediate) reason.
When I manage to piece together my emotions, I think I’m scared and upset rather than angry. I’m upset at what’s already happened—I don’t think I need to elaborate on that—and I’m scared at what might happen next. Call me a pessimist, but even if, by some miracle, cool heads manage to prevail enough that retaliation is not taken out on innocent people—the least I think we will see is further shrinking of civil rights in America, as well as increased prejudice against people with Arab or Islamic origins. The last time we had federal “anti-terrorism” legislation, we ended up seriously curtailing the rights of convicted prisoners to seek post-conviction relief from the courts. Given the number of innocent people who have been recently exonerated while on death row, this should not be considered a good thing, even by those who would be happy to see the people behind today’s attacks executed. And that’s not even considering the further powers investigative agencies might gain, powers that might start out in use against terrorists, but if history is any guide, will be expanded to deal with all manner of domestic crime.
I want nothing more than to see the people responsible for today’s horrors brought to justice. I want this never to happen again. But I am scared of so many things: that this signals a new era of terrorist attacks on the U.S. (as far as I know, it’s damn hard to prevent attacks by people who are willing to die in the process), that the country will bomb someone innocent in the haste to show that we will not take this lightly (if anyone could doubt it!), that any last shred of hope for peace in the Middle East will vanish if this turns out to be related to the region, that the Constitution will get further trampled on in efforts to prevent more attacks (see “suicide attacks,” above), and that I will never feel safe again flying.
Looking at that list (I’m sure I could come up with more, too), I really ought to be angry at the people who have brought this upon all of us. But I can’t seem to be, yet. Perhaps later I will be able to move past the sickness and fear.