Waiting for a refrigerator to be delivered to my apartment in Boston — that’s where I was on September 11, 2001.
Last night I was watching, appropriately enough, The Killing, on AMC, when tweets and Facebook status updates hinted of an upcoming presidential address.
I never dreamed it would be the death of Osama Bin Laden.
CNN’s John King remarked — repeatedly, I might add — that last night would be another moment in history where people would always remember “where they were” when they heard the news.
For me, it’s more interesting how.
In 2001, the television networks were my primary news source. I sat huddled in my apartment, told to remain there by my employer and by the city of Boston, my television set my only real connection to the tragic events in New York City and Pennsylvania.
Last night, I learned as much on Facebook and Twitter as I did on the television networks. Obama’s announcement at 11:35 served only as a more eloquent confirmation of what I had already gleaned from my own sources.
Bin Laden was dead.
Although I was alone on my couch in both instances — a decade apart — I definitely felt a real sense of community last night. Yea, Facebook! Yea, Twitter! Yea, Texts!
Bin Laden is dead.
“I have never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure.” — Mark Twain
I found out about 9/11 when I woke up, saw the plane hit the first of the towers on my nightstand TV, and assumed it was a trailer for a Tom Clancy novel. I found out about Bin Laden when college friends—mostly journalists now—updated their FB statuses.
But social media played a huge role in how I viewed the human response. The most moving messages I read on 9/11 were from improvisers on the YesAnd.com boards—offering support from all over the world, and offering safe places in New York for their neighbors to sleep or call their families.
I learned about the 9/11 tragedy while I was at work, and one woman, who was late for work that morning, had seen it on the news and called us. We had a television in the break room, that we moved out to the main office space and watched, in tears, all morning as the chaos and awfulness of that day fell out.
Last night, I had the television on for background noise and caught just a “ribbon” at the bottom of the screen announcing his death. I had to turn it up, and watched, struck in silence, as the story unfolded, and the President made his address.
The first day, was a day of silent sorrow. Last night, was a night of silent relief. Not because he was dead, but that this means that he can no longer cause harm to anyone else, through his leadership. His footsteps end here. His followers may decide to create chaos in their own names, but at least they can no longer “follow” him, unless they follow him to the bottom of the ocean.