Canis lupus hominis

On these days in mid-September, when the sky is clear and the air is so mild and sweet that you can’t believe you’re standing in the same place where the August sun sweltered, I have to stop and think.

Feeling the gentle sun against the skin and the soft breezes provides such a contrast that I have to call this my “September feeling.”

I remember the first day I felt that September feeling.

It was on September 11, 2001.

I had been a college student for a little over two weeks. I had cooked in my dorm room that whole time. I was miserable, not just from the heat but from my own doubts about my own abilities. I was from a small public school system. I now was in a private school, where a large number of the students were from out of state. To be in competition with students who went better  high schools was a daunting prospect.

But on the night of September 10, the air cleared. The temperature dropped into the low 5o’s.

On the morning of the 11, I went for my 6 o’clock walk, which had been my custom since arriving at school. I had myself on a very strict schedule of classes, studying, and sleep. I had to do well. I had to push myself.

The sun melted off the dew, and the birds flitted out of the poplar trees on campus. Every once in awhile, the grey squirrels would slowly leap across the green lawns.

I had grown up in the country, where squirrels are eaten. They avoid people at all costs. To see squirrels approach people with relative indifferences was such a weird thing to behold. It took me long time to get used to it.

I was just beginning to think how great it was that the hot days were behind us.

I was beginning to think that I was going to do fine in school, just so long as I didn’t let up.

I ate breakfast and went back to the room to prepare for my psychology class.

It was when I went to the class that someone had said something about a plane going into the World Trade Center. I thought it was one of those little planes that were always getting lost in the fog and flying into things.

I don’t know why I thought this.

But I thought nothing of that plane.

It was only when I returned to the dorm room that I thought that I should turn on CNN.

And then I knew that I was living in a different country.

The internet stopped working.

Websites wouldn’t load because of the traffic.

I couldn’t call  home. The lines were tied up.

I was on my own.

I really didn’t know what to do.

Was I going to be drafted?

Probably not. I had been passed over by military recruiters because of my bad hip, and I knew that I probably wasn’t going to be conscripted in any capacity.

But I knew I had to find out what was happening.

It was on that day that the 90’s ended for me.

Those days of almost fairy tales of safety and prosperity were gone.

We were vulnerable.

And that was scary.

I try watching shows about 9/11. They still make me uncomfortable.

Not because I lost anyone on that day, but because they remind me of how a false sense of security can be overpowering.

And they also remind me of what happens when we let that fear overpower our better judgment.

We want to be secure.

We want to return to the garden.

But we can never go back.

I just know that when the weather starts to change in September, I have to stop and think of these things.

That first clear 70 degree day reminds me of that day.

I think it always will.

That was the day that the fairy tales died.