longer.blue

It’s been twenty‑five years since 9/11/2001, and I’ve been thinking a lot about what that day means to me now. My own experience wasn’t anywhere near New York City. Like so many people, I was just a teenager watching the news on a TV in high school, trying to make sense of something that didn’t make sense at all. I honestly don’t remember exactly how I felt in the moment anymore — memory gets fuzzy — but I do remember how shaken I was years later when I watched the Naudet Brothers’ documentary for the first time. I remember asking why anyone would do something so horrible, and I remember crying openly. Now, in 2026, the world looks so different. Some of that change is just time passing, but a lot of it traces directly back to that day. And I can’t help feeling that some of those changes haven’t been for the better. But more than anything, I keep coming back to the people — the lives lost, the families changed forever, the first responders and rescue workers, even the animals who were part of the effort. A few videos about them popped up for me this week, and I’ve cried more than I expected. I don’t think that grief ever really goes away. Even now, 25 years later, 9/11 still hits a part of my heart that feels tender. I actually couldn’t fully engage with it this year for my own mental well‑being. I tried. I tried to learn more, hoping that understanding might make the pain feel a little more manageable — for the people who died and for the people who survived. What matters most to me is remembering them: the ones whose lives were taken, and the ones who fought so hard to save others. And I still feel the same frustration I felt years ago when Jon Stewart called out political leaders for failing 9/11 survivors. It’s infuriating that it took twenty‑five years for the truth to be fully acknowledged — that the dust downtown was deadly. Those people were betrayed. And now that the truth is out in the open, the people responsible need to own that.