In September of the year 2000, My brother died under very mysterious circumstances in New Orleans.
He was an expert commercial diver who trained for years at his craft. His specialty was dry-suit diving, where the depths were so deep that he would have to spend hours, sometimes days in a decompression chamber before being able to safely enter the normal land atmosphere again. He died face down in 3 inches of water on the side of a road. The police would not allow us to see his body, even to identify him. The police report seriously conflicted with interviews we conducted with the 2 witnesses concerning the events of the night he died. It is like a different country there. My life long battle with insomnia suddenly became much more than a nuisance.
I spent the next 6 months in psychologists and doctors offices trying to find a way to sleep for more than a few hours a week. I changed my evening habits and tried every available drug. Valium would allow me 2 hours at a shot and at the time that was a huge gift. Finally, it was time that began to heal me. Little by little I began to sleep longer each night until I normalized by about mid-summer of 2001.
On the day of September 10th, 2001, I woke up feeling all of the crushing anxiety I'd worked so hard to recover from. I was jumpy all day and I had a feeling very similar to what I feel when I'm having a particularly nasty precursor to my feminine monthly event,even though it was no where near that time. I knew I wouldn't sleep that night and I didn't.
I crawled out of bed on the morning of the 11th dreading the bad acid trip of a day I knew I'd have for lack of sleep. My job requires ridiculous amounts of multitasking which is challenging even on a full night's sleep. I am not a morning TV person and I did not yet have a computer so I had no idea what was going on in the outside world until I got to work. I must have looked very disheveled, because when I walked in the door my boss said,
" ,..so you know then ? "
My brain function was so slow and foggy and for a moment I thought to myself 'they caught Charlie's (my brother's) murderers and it's national news.'
My boss turned and motioned for me to follow him down the hall to his office where I could hear a news announcer, sounding very stunned and emotional and together, my boss and I watched the second plane hit, live on TV.
My world, your world, our world has never been nor will it ever be the same.
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