It’s been ten years. How easily we forget this day.
This is Jonathan Briley, the Falling Man, in a Postsecret postcard.
“Regarding the social and cultural significance of ‘The Falling Man’, theologian Mark D. Thompson of Moore Theological College says that ‘perhaps the most powerful image of despair at the beginning of the twenty-first century is not found in art, or literature, or even popular music. It is found in a single photograph.’”
My family and I had moved to New York City from Ohio two months ago. My dad had started a new job at One World Financial Center. He was down the block when it happened, but I didn’t put the pieces together. I’m not sure that I even knew where he worked.
Our Social Studies teacher, Ms. Mayer, announced it in class before our principal did on the intercom. She had dirty streaked blonde hair and always told jokes to make us laugh. That was the only day she cried.
Mom eventually joined me at home that day. I don’t remember her crying but I remember the look on her face. Dad came home later that night. He said that he had walked across the Queensboro bridge. “If you watch the screen for the people running away, you’ll probably see me.” It didn’t occur to me that the look on my mom’s face was her getting ready for the possibility that Dad wouldn’t come home.
The next morning, I got ready for school. I walked past streets of houses. A man came outside and looked at me. “Where are you going?” He asked. I told him. “No one’s going to school today. Don’t you get it?” I didn’t. I’m still not sure that I do.
