On September 10th, my son asked, “Is anyone afraid that we are flying to New York tomorrow?”
My wife and I looked at each other.
“No, we’ll be fine,” replied my wife.
The next day we boarded the flight to New York. While some of the cabin’s passengers slept, enjoyed movies, or ate, I wrote.
Much has changed since 9/11/2001 in the United States, but some terrorist threats remain. Artificial Intelligence thinks for us, religious divisions divide, and conflicts with countries in the Near East continue. The White House has housed presidents with different politics and similar agendas.
Pennsylvania Avenue’s latest occupant authorizes airplane decoys, renames lakes, and antagonizes America’s antagonists.
Like many of us, I can remember my location and the emotions of 9/11. I sat in a barbershop in the south suburbs of Chicago. Although I stayed still, not wanting my barber to make a mistake, fear moved through my body as footage of the planes hitting the World Trade Center aired on a TV.
While the clippers buzzed around my ears, the moment and chaos that followed the attacks stained my psyche. The news replayed the attacks continuously and reported that some of the people trapped in the building chose death by suicide. Never had war seemed so imminent in my life.
I was an eighteen-year-old freshman in college, working in retail at a mall. While I had witnessed neighborhood violence, the 9/11 tragedy shifted my worldview. My studies and job didn’t hold as much weight as they did on September 10, 2001.
Instead of hip-hop, I listened to radio commentaries as I drove to work after I left the barbershop on 9/11.
I remember the fearful conversations with coworkers and discussions about closing the mall early. The country was on high alert for additional attacks. I finished my shift and went home, where I talked more about terrorism with family and friends.
Everyone expressed concerns.
Children, men, women, firemen, policewomen, fathers, mothers, people from diverse communities including the African diaspora, died twenty-five years ago this month. It was a tragedy.
Unlike JD Vance, we shouldn’t “celebrate 9/11,” but remember the lives lost and decide how to prevent similar catastrophes from happening again. Engaging in more wars or providing weapons to rebel groups will not solve world conflicts.
Instead of aiming artillery to annihilate differences, how about we aim to achieve world peace?
In the 24 hours after September 11, 2001, patriotism carried me as it swept through the country. I almost put an American flag sticker on my car’s window. In the immediate aftermath of the attacks, conflicts along race, class, gender, age, ability, ethnicity and sexuality lines vanished.
Soon after, life in the United States resumed and challenges resurfaced. Students returned to school, employees went to work, and Mosques received hate-filled threats. Later, we learned of the relationship between the US government, the CIA, and Osama bin Laden.
I criticized the politics that corresponded with the loss of innocent lives. My undergraduate major in Black Studies and the Chicago open-mic poetry scene shaped my political consciousness. Muslim hate speech and media claims of “they’re threatened by our freedom” did not capture the full story behind the 9/11 attacks.
Poets, commentators, and professors challenged me to discover the truth beyond mainstream media’s messages and the counter conspiracies. My studies and the Ancestors inspired me to write poems. I published my poetry in a book.
Today, we can make pledges to peace and forge new pathways to appreciate cultural differences. The US president will not do it for us.
We must do it for ourselves, our families, and our communities.
Before my family boarded our flight to New York on 9/10/26, I shared my son’s concerns that someone might want to repeat 9/11/01. America’s current political actions have attracted more enemies than allies. But give thanks, we arrived at the JFK airport without a problem.
Inside the terminals on 9/11/2026, people stood in line for coffee, hustled between gates, and headed toward the baggage claims. My family made our connecting flight to move abroad once again.
While traveling, I captured footage of our plane travels and wrote a blog post explaining the decision to leave the United States. See the video below and read the post here.
Photo by Miguel Ángel Sanz on Unsplash
