GETTING OVER IT . . .

It has been one year, ten months, and twelve days since 9/11.

I hardly think about it anymore, except for when I chance to look up and see military helicopters speeding across the horizon . . . or when I'm standing outside with friends and hear the low drone of an Army cargo plane heading upstate . . . or when a CNN Breaking News alert dings into my mailbox . . . or when I read about the trial maneuvers of Zacarias Moussaoui . . . or when my anxiety is piqued by the beginnings of a news scrawl across the bottom of the sitcom I'm watching . . . or when I'm lying in bed at night and hear mysterious far-away booming sounds . . . or when I'm driving on the highway and see plumes of black smoke drifting in the distance . . . or when I wake from a bad dream and can't figure out where I am exactly . . . or when I meet someone who has the same name as my horrifically incinerated classmate and friend . . . or when the headlines announce another terrorist bombing in some other unsuspecting corner of the world . . . or when I'm driving down the West Side Highway and realize that my view to the south is no longer obstructed . . . or when my digital clock reads 9:11 . . . or when I'm one of tens of thousands of obliviously content people in a crowded stadium, arena, train station, Times Square . . . or when I'm crossing the Tappan Zee Bridge and look off to both horizons to make sure they're clear . . . or when I'm preparing to get on a cross-country non-stop flight in two days . . . or when I have a moment of silence at 8:45am and have time to allow myself to wonder "is this what it was like?"

Actually, I don't remember what it's like not to think about it . . .