6 years ago

On September 8, I watched my best friend walk down the aisle and marry the man she would spend the rest of her life with. It was one of the better days of my life because I saw the happiness in her eyes, in her smile, in the way that held his hand.

Little did I know 3 days later, the safe little world I knew would be destroyed.

On September 11, I woke up knowing something important had happened that day but couldn't remember what. I showered, got ready for class and turned on the TV while I ate breakfast. What I saw was the world I knew crumbling beneath fear. I walked down the streets in Manhattan (Kansas) towards class, wondering why they were still happening.

I sat in the Union afterward, watching the huge TV as everything came into view. 2 building crumbled, a hole ripped into another building, and a plane disintegrated into the earth in Pennsylvania. And I for some reason felt the need to call my best friend because even though she and her husband were in Hawaii, I wanted to know that they were okay.

And now 6 years later, I don't feel any safer in the world. This summer, I saw what corruption can do to a government. I saw poverty unlike anything I have ever imagined, crimes that were unthinkable, and yet I felt safe.

And then I came back to the states.

And all I've wanted since I've been back is Kenya. Why, when I have the safeness of the states, do I want to go back to a place that is anything but safe?

Is September 11 becoming a distant memory for me, or is it a reality that I don't know what to do with? Unfortunately, I don't have the answers. I don't think war was/is a solution to feeling safe, I don't think that pulling troops or adding more is the answer either. Nor is a new Democratic president a solution. In reality, it's going to take a lot for the world to feel like it did on that fall day 6 years ago. And perhaps, the reality is that it may never feel that way again...and maybe I'm going to have to live with that.