I’ll never forget commuting to the City that day. We were among the last busses into the tunnel. Traffic was normal at first, but had slowed down for some reason and I remember seeing the toll booths holding traffic after few lanes back after we got through but lost sight of it as we went underground and under the Hudson. Exiting the tunnel we went straight up to Port Authority, and, from what it seemed at the time, it was a normal day. I ran down to the subway, knowing I’d likely be a few minutes late for work but it was just a few stops on the A train to 59th and Mad. There was an announcement – the train wouldn’t stop at Fulton St. or south. That was fine, I wasn’t going south. Must be construction or a stuck train or track issue, I thought. I exited, walked the short distance between midtown skyscrapers and ducked into my office in between designer stores. My phone rang. My father asked me to be careful. Something hit the towers, a plane, must have been a small one from Teteboro or something, he wasn’t sure yet but to please stay put, and be safe. I went to the break room where there was a TV and saw the news. I asked my boss what to do. In my memories it feels as if there was no one in the office but me, but I know that’s just my brain remembering the fear and isolation we all felt. Most of the team had already arrived and a few stragglers that came from downtown of course were held and couldn’t take the subway. We were about to learn why.

Estée Lauder released everyone from their offices immediately, encouraging us to seek safety, go home if we could, and that they had heard it was best to exit the City entirely if we lived outside of it or had somewhere safe to go. We were still confused, but, safe. I think we took the stairs – I know we did a year or so later during the blackout, but I believe we did this day too. I took my huge laptop (work was life for me as a young manager with an up-and-coming career and one of the few with laptops back then) and a few things from my desk and headed out.

Cell phone service was spotty. By then I knew the first tower was hit by a commercial plane, and then had fallen. I saw that on TV just before they sent us home. Walking outside I saw the smoke billowing looking down Madison Ave, and wondered where to go. Subways were stopped. Busses weren’t running, and the streets were devoid of vehicles, save for emergency ones rushing downtown. The second tower was still standing. It was built to withstand great impacts, we were told.

I was outside when it fell. I don’t remember if I heard it, but I do remember the smell. The ash and smoke permeated the air throughout the city, and yet, I walked closer. Not to see, I don’t think, but because that was the direction of Chelsea Piers and I heard that there was a way out of the city near there. I grabbed a cheap disposable camera at a pharmacy along the way. I didn’t think to grab cheap sneakers or flip flops, and walked the entire day – into the night – in boots and heels. I kept those boots for years, afraid to throw the out despite the heels being broken, as if throwing them out I’d somehow forget.

Chelsea Piers was packed with people. Police ushered us south to South Street Seaport where they were calling for anyone who owned boats to load people up and take them across the river to New Jersey. The Seaport was overwhelmed and they opened Chelsea Piers and any other docks to any and all boats – private boats, tugs, barges, anything you could get on – and so I walked back up there. I stood next to people covered in ash. It smelled like the death you smell at Westminster Abby, but newer, fresh, still burning as if just moments before it was life. It had been.

I stood next to a woman who watched colleagues floors up jump from the towers, grieving and feeling guilty she made it out alive. I didn’t know where my friends were who worked in the City. My Aunt worked in the Pentagon at the time and I had learned it, too, had been hit. Fortunately she was late that day and made it just in time to help as a first responder (she is a P.A.) and eventually ended up on the cover of the US Medical Journal for her efforts. At the time, I didn’t know if she was alive. I just wanted to get home.

I did, eventually, make it home safely and learned most of the people I knew were fortunately safe as well. My cousin who had worked for the FBI based out of the towers, a few friends working construction in the basement, and so on. Others were not so lucky. The weeks and months ahead were a blur, returning to the city to missing persons posters plastered everywhere, hope scattered throughout mixed in with the ashes as the reality of it all set in. I got the photos developed and gathered them eventually into an album, alongside photos of the Towers from my childhood, paying homage to a City and its people. One still strikes me as particularly poignant – smoke billowing in the background, a mostly empty street, and a billboard for the upcoming release of the new Planet of the Apes that simply said, “Rule the Planet” as a helicopter flew overhead. The irony was not lost on me, and it still holds an eerie stillness for me when I see it today.

The City was different after that. Softer. Kinder. Grieving, yet resilient. We helped each other out, offered directions when needed, guidance when available, a listening ear to a stranger on the subway or train just because we knew the world needed it. We needed it. We say we’ll never forget, yet, somehow, watching the events of the world unfold today, it seems we have almost entirely.

We may not have forgotten what happened that day, or those who were lost and all those affected in so many, many ways. But what we have forgotten is love. Love thy neighbor. Help one another. Be there. Offer a helping hand, a warm smile, a comforting hug. It’s okay if you never met. You once were strangers to even your loved ones in life and they are no longer strangers because one or both of you took the time to be kind. Remember that. Reading names of those lost that day, remembering those lost to diseases after as a result, honoring the fallen – all honorable things. But we do not change the future and prevent the recurrence of history by speaking only of the past. We change the world by remembering the kindness and love that followed those tragic events, the stories that unfolded of the resilience of the human spirit, of the Earth to heal, if the City to keep moving, and of Americans to all believe in one common goal – the ability to live in freedom, with love and kindness, not hate and division, at the helm.

It would seem we have forgotten.

Today, I take a moment of silence to remember the fallen, the heroes, and the departed. Every day, I vow to take a moment to build on that in their honor, with one small act of kindness to a stranger, in honor of 9/11. We need to do more than never forget. We need to act with honor, and grow together through love and community. Imagine how different a place the world would be if we carried through that vision from 9/12/01 into every day forward. I implore you, please, please, carry that kindness forward today and every day. I am not worried you will ever forget. I am worried we have lost our way.

With love, and honor always, for all of those lost.