A Visit to the 9/11 Memorial – Before and After
Memory at three years old is a landscape of shadows; a quiet awareness that something heavy has shifted in the world around you, even if you don’t yet have the words to name it.
Two decades later, standing at the edge of the twin reflecting pools in Lower Manhattan, those faint childhood impressions take on a solemn, heartbreaking clarity. As the world marks 25 years since that fateful morning, honouring the 2,977 lives lost and the endless stories cut short, this is a personal reflection on growing up in the long shadow of September 11th, finding oneself in New York, and paying quiet tribute to the spirits that forever anchor the city.
By Pratishtha Natarajan
New York 2021
Within my first few weeks of moving to New York in 2021, just before September hit, I visited the 9/11 Memorial. Because I was born in 1998, I grew up knowing it was a profound tragedy from the news and movies, but the visceral weight of that day didn’t fully register until I stepped inside the museum. You are instantly struck by a heavy, complex mix of pain and the beautiful, desperate attempt to reclaim that space by honouring the lives lost. What broke me the most was listening to a voicemail left by a mother on one of the hijacked planes. Even in the face of absolute terror, she was pouring hope, optimism, and love into the phone for her family, choosing to leave them with light even when she knew what was happening in the dark.
The Complex Feelings
Walking through those exhibits also brought up incredibly complex feelings for me as an Indian immigrant. The aftermath of 9/11 irrevocably changed the reality of racism for South Asian and Muslim communities, transforming airport security from a standard checkpoint into a gauntlet of “random” screenings, invasive pat-downs, and heightened racial profiling. Almost any person who has experienced this profiling, can tell you about the exhausting mental calculus they perform ad nauseam before a flight: carefully policing how they dress, speaking in a certain way, and meticulously grooming just to ensure they are perceived as “safe” and non-threatening to security agents.
Inside the Museum
Yet, standing in the museum, that specific societal anxiety blends into a universal sombreness about the sheer fragility of life. You see the faces of people who were simply going to work, alongside the stories of those whose lives were miraculously saved by being stuck in morning traffic. It makes you think deeply about the agonising survivor’s guilt carried by those who lived while their friends did not. That haunting question of “why me?” which makes the trauma of that day so endlessly complex.
Footprints of the Past
The memorial wall and the footprints of the original towers, which are now massive, plunging fountains, were the first thing I saw as I left the sombreness to step back out. It can sometimes feel jarring to see visitors sitting on the edges taking smiling pictures (a stark reminder to always treat these spaces with reverence as memorials, not just tourist attractions). But there is also a quiet comfort in seeing humanity connect and life persist in a space that once held such destruction.
Thoughts
This September 11th, the 25th anniversary, I encourage you all to take a moment to acknowledge the lingering grief, pain, and loss, ensuring those who passed are never forgotten. Because the trauma of that day continues to ripple out in so many seen and unseen ways,
I am incredibly eager to dive into the books in the article below, which explore exactly how we continue to grapple with this grief.
