Posted by Oleanna at spider-mtc-tj033.proxy.aol.com on September 18, 2001 at 05:31:11:
On Tuesday, I received the news of the attacks in a manner almost identical to Kevin. My mother woke me up with a message at 8:30am explaining what was going on and adding, "No, I am not making this up." because honestly, it was quite an unbelievable thing to hear eminating from a crappy answering machine. I turned on the TV and could not believe my eyes...all I could think about was the movie Independence Day. Since the phone lines were on meltdown in LA, it was almost impossible to get a line out to call my mother back. Eventually, I was able to contact her...I spent the entire day in a state of shock, calling loved ones who were no where near the crash sites, but whom I desperately wanted to check on, because something like that always makes you paranoid. It wipes away all the trivial bullshit and makes you focus on what really matters: the people you love.
I'm a Chicago native, but I have been living in LA for about 2 months now. I feel a bit traitorous for finding myself crushing on LA. Los Angeles is infamous for its beauty...but as beautiful as it has seemed in the past, I have never seen it look as amazing as it did Friday night. Along with a handful of other people, I stood on the corner of my street and Sunset Boulevard, holding a candle and watching the overwhelming show of love, support, and humanity that everyone had for one another. LA is a place known for its pettiness and for the shallowness of people who reside here (although most of them would never admit it, and if they did, it would only be in an attempt to be self deprecating, which has apparently become trendy this year). What I saw on Friday was so far from petty that I cannot even name a word for it...I just know I have never seen anything like it before in my life, and I sadly realize that I probably will never see anything like it again. I know that other people found it to be astounding as well, but it was something no one seemed to discuss. So thank you Kevin, for mentioning it.
I have a lot of things to say about all of this, most of which I have in last week's entries to my online journal, and I am not sure that this is the forum for my various feelings about it all.
In an odd foot note, our presence on the street induced a lot of honking, cheering, and waving from passing cars (this is what made it so amazing, the feedback we received, the sharing that occurred)...there is a church on the corner of my street and Sunset, and apparently they were having their own memorial service Friday night for the victims. They were the only people to openly object to our display of support and love out there on the corner--a representative was sent out to ask us to move because the honking was disturbing them. I just found it a little odd that here were two groups of people trying to mourn and come together in their own ways, but for the same cause, and yet we still could not find a compromise. I'm not trying to dig on the church, I fully respect what they were doing...I just found it interesting for some reason.