September 11, Twenty-Five Years Later: Remembering Our Common Humanity

by Mikaela VanMoorleghem, MPA

There are certain moments in history when we remember exactly where we were and what we were doing when the world suddenly changed. September 11, 2001, is one of those moments.

At 8:46 a.m. on a clear Tuesday morning, American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in New York City. Like so many others, I remember wondering whether it could have been a terrible accident. Then, just 17 minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175 struck the South Tower, and I knew.

Soon came the news that American Airlines Flight 77 had crashed into the Pentagon. Then we learned about United Airlines Flight 93, whose passengers and crew fought back against the hijackers before the plane crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Four commercial airplanes had been hijacked by 19 terrorists, and 2,977 innocent people had been killed.

Twenty-five years later, I can still remember how confused I was that morning.  I think that for so long I was under the illusion that foreign threats could not reach the U.S. mainland. It was disorientating. Major attacks and acts of terrorism were things I watched happening somewhere else, far from our own cities and neighborhoods. And just like that, that distance was gone.

And yet, when I think back on that time, I don’t remember only fear and heartbreak. I also remember what happened afterward.

We reached for one another. Strangers helped strangers. People waited in long lines to donate blood. Churches and houses of worship opened their doors. First responders ran toward unimaginable danger. Communities collected supplies, people checked on their neighbors, and American flags appeared on homes, businesses, and street corners across the country.

For a time, many of the labels we used to define, and too often divide, one another seemed less important. Republican or Democrat, rich or poor, Black or white, Christian, Jewish, or no faith at all, we were reminded that beneath all of those distinctions was something much more basic: we belonged to one another. Someone else’s grief mattered. Someone else’s fear mattered. Someone else’s family mattered. I understood, perhaps more clearly than I had before 9/11, that what happened to one of us affected all of us.

That sense of unity was not perfect, and remembering September 11 honestly means acknowledging that as well. Fear and anger were directed toward Muslim, Arab, and Sikh Americans and others who were perceived to belong to those communities. Innocent people experienced harassment, discrimination, and violence. It remains an important part of the story because it reminds us that moments of fear can bring out both the best and the worst in us.

But when I look back 25 years later, what stays with me most is how instinctively so many people responded by helping.

Much has changed since then. The sense of national unity we experienced did not last forever, nor could we realistically expect it to. We returned to our disagreements, our different perspectives and the ordinary tensions of life in a diverse country. Today, those differences can sometimes feel especially pronounced.

Perhaps that is why I find myself returning to the days after September 11, not because I want to romanticize a painful time, but because there was something worth remembering in the way people cared for one another.

Unity does not mean sameness. Maybe it is as simple as that.

We can hold different beliefs and still care about one another. We can disagree and remain neighbors. We can listen to someone whose life experience is different from our own. We can notice when someone is struggling, sit beside someone who is grieving, lend a hand when it is needed, and make room for people outside our usual circles.

None of those things requires a national tragedy. They are small, ordinary choices available to us every day.

Perhaps that is one meaningful way to honor the 2,977 people whose lives were taken on September 11. We remember their names and tell their stories. We honor the extraordinary courage of the first responders, passengers, crew members and ordinary people who stepped forward when others needed them most. And we carry forward some of the compassion and generosity that emerged from such an unimaginably painful day.

September 11 showed us some of the worst things human beings are capable of doing to one another. But the days that followed showed us something else: extraordinary courage, generosity, sacrifice and compassion.

They showed us what human beings are capable of doing for one another.

Twenty-five years later, that may be something especially worth remembering.