one month later

Can you believe it's been a month?

When the towers fell, Heather said, "This is going to change everything." I brushed it off. Thought she was just giving in to the melodrama of the moment. But she was right. It has changed everything. Even in my life, on the opposite coast, far removed from the streets of New York.

Since September 11 ... I've gone on television talking about it ... all my clients have postponed or cancelled the projects we were talking about ... all my friends are out of work ... the dotcom crash seems resolute and final ... flags litter cars, buildings, newspapers, television logos ... the recession of the early nineties seems to be back ... rental rates in the city are falling for the first time in years ... the planter in the park has been overrun with candles and crosses made from coffee stirrers ... and everything, everything feels different.

Heather was right.

{ 11:58am }

» Even here in Dublin, it's different.
We have a nuclear power station sitting not 50 miles from where I sit - it's in Wales. We've never been fans of it - Ireland has always been anti-nuclear, but the possibility of terrorists hitting it (and intelligence people have confirmed it is a possible target) has made us all totally paranoid. Imagine Chernobyl multiplied by 50, and you have Sellafield.

And then there's a friend who lost her sister in the towers. And the news. And the government talking about a decent defence force for the first time since 1945.

I have at least two conversations a day with people about the whole thing. Usually more.

Heather was, as you say, spot on.

– Tom Cosgrave  { 10.11.01 @ 2:19pm }

» Indeed, everything has changed. Here in Australia, things have changed - people worry about if our support makes us targets, if our hosting of an American intelligence installation on our soil (PineGap) makes us vulnerable to attack, all in all, people are just frightened and uncertain about the future.

The funny thing about the future is though, WE make it. Yes, the world has changed, but what that concretely means, in the end, is up to us, the world's citizens.

– Cassie  { 10.11.01 @ 4:45pm }

» It has changed everything. I miss everything that was before.

– Jeremy D.  { 10.20.01 @ 7:35am }