Journeys of the Questress - WTC
Borders
Home
The Way it Was - 1
The Way it Was - 2
Sept 19 - When Tomorrow Never Comes
Sept 27 - Oral Interpretation
Oct 5 - A Mile of Tears - Part 1
Oct 5 - A Mile of Tears - Part 2
Oct 5 - A Mile of Tears - Part 3
Oct 11 - Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow
Oct 28 - Each Day I Search the Rubble
Nov 12 - When Spires Fall
Nov 19 - 911 The Rape of America
Dec 14 - Just A Thought
Dec 18 - A Sense of Place
Feb 2 - Final Pass to the End Zone
March 3 - Sitting on the Edge
March 14- Do You Still Remember
March 20 - Virtual Walk-Through
March 25 - When Will It End - Part 1
March 25 - When Will It End - Part 2
April 1 - Towers of Light
May 14 - View From Above
May 30 - Tunnel At the End of the Light
May 31 - Seventeen Hundred
Aug 9 - From the Margins Erased
Aug 30 - The Train Doesn't Stop There Anymore
Sept 9 - Ceremonies of Light and Dark
Sept 10 - Just An Anniversary
Sept 12 - September Holds Great Promise
Literary Reflections
Rebirth and Resurrection
The Winter Garden Springs To Life
The Winter Garden Springs To Life - con't
Underpass to the Past
Rebuilding Ground Zero
Under Hallowed Ground
Borders
Yahrzeit
What Will Fill the Void?
I Submit a Design
Footprints in the Dust
My Memorial Design Submission
My Memorial Design - Drawings
New Path Train Station
Path Station Tour
May We Never Forget
That Which Surives
War Without End
4th Anniversary
Footprints in the Dust
Void
I Miss 9/11
Time Comes Between Us
A Thousand Cranes
Fear Factor
Love Letters On The Wall
Empty Chairs
Sitting on the Edge of Forever
Walking the Perimeter of Emptiness
A Counting of Days
For Friends Absent But Not Forgotten
Stigmata
The Memory Keeper's Promise
Unbreak My Heart
Standing On The Edge Of Forever
Both Sides Now
A Memory In Time
The Gravity of Loss
The Survivors Rise Up
Flowers Will Bloom
The Fire Within Us
The Sentinel
Stronger Than The Storm
Between the Candle and the Stars
Ghosts
A Journey Through Remembrance
Canticle of Remembrance
Beyond the Crucible of Chaos
Journey Through Remembrance project
What See We Now
Forever In Our Hearts
Keeping the Flame Alive
The Rebuilding of Ground Zero continues
Does Anyone Care Anymore?
Where Is Our Story Teller of Pain
At Memory's Edge
Dust Thou Art and to Dust Thou Shalt Return
7x7x70
Heroes Never Die
The Flame Inside Our Hearts
The Year of the Heroes of 9/11
Déjà Vu
Remembering 9/11 in the year of COVID-19
Coronavirus Decimates Ailing Sept. 11 Responders
Touching From a Distance
That Which Survives 20 years later
2021 - 20 years later
Memories of Terror Return
Putin's Name Covered Over On Teardrop Memorial
The 9/11 Tribute Museum Closes
When Memories Fade Away
St. Nicholas at Ground Z is rebuilt
The Blue Wall of the Unidentified Victims
When Time Calls Your Name
When Art Gets It All Wrong
9/11 victims that America wants to forget
Sing a Song of Remembrance
Words of Remembrance

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Borders
5/12/03
 
"border n. the outer edge of anything; a frontier; an ornamental design around the outside edge of anything" - Webster's Dictionary
 
It still amazes me, even though it shouldn't: People by the thousands continue to flock to Ground Zero. They come by cab, subway, limo, from out of town, uptown, across the river. They walk the perimeter, bordered by a chain link fence, and in silence peer down into the pit, all 16 acres of it. Some talk, some stare and some even cry.
 
It's been 18 months since the Towers fell and Ground Zero came into existence. Today the people wend their way around the edge: Vesey, Church, West and Liberty streets. Some climb into a covered pedestrian bridge that extends from the Dow Jones Building on West Street to the southwest corner of the WTC site. From its windows, it's possible to look down into the pit where the Twin Towers once stood. It's a parade of the curious, tinged with a huge amount of sadness.
 
Like Ground Zero itself,  the border, the edges of this hallowed ground, have gone through numerous changes. Immediately after 9/11 the entire lower Manhattan was shut off. By October when I made my first visit the border was only a number of blocks around Ground Zero. But this was the time when what fenced it in had them most impact: Notes, prayers, photos tacked to the plywood fencing. Candles left on the sidewalks, people jostling to get one peek through the tiniest of cracks. Hushed silence. Lots of tears.

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Fences at Ground Zero Oct. 2001

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Fences at Ground Zero Oct. 2001

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Fences at Ground Zero Oct. 2001
As time went on the border was moved closer to the actual area of the pit. When I went down that following December it been moved to across the street, to the west side of Broadway. It was a collection of blue wooden police horses, and wire mesh areas. The tacked on personal memorials were fewer.
 
 
 
 
 
As the perimeter around Ground Zero was cleaned up and the dust and debris removed from the adjacent buildings, the border was placed right close to the Pit. On a trip down in May 2002, I could actually walk up to the edge of Ground Zero, peer through the wire fence and see down into the pit, or look over to the damaged Winter Garden. Also, a 'viewing' platform had been erected.
 
 

 
By the September anniversary of 9/11 a  'Viewing Wall' fence was constructed along the east and south sides of the 16-acre site. It is 13-foot-high, of galvanized steel with the eastern portion along Church Street having the memorial panels. The names of the 2800 dead are listed on these black panels along with other panels that tell the history of the lower part of Manhattan and the construction and destruction of the WTC. (there is also one panel that has a lovely photograph of the Towers of Light from Spring of 2002)
 
 
 
Because it is a 'chain link' type fence, one can see through it and into the pit. Also a short distance away, the remnant of the North Tower in the shape of a cross is mounted just inside the fence; with wreaths and flags crowding  its base. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the World Trade Center site was responsible for building this memorial fence. "It is an opportunity for us to reflect on those fallen heroes. To understand the history of the site. But also to affix America's hope, New York and New Jersey's hope, for a better America," McGreevey said about it's existence. (New Jersey Gov. Jim McGreevey shares control of the Port Authority with New York Gov, Pataki.)

 
 
 
The border of Ground Zero will remain fenced in until whatever new is constructed on the site. But can a fence ever contain the sorrow? Can it contain the pain? Does it make it any easier to be able to look directly down into a pit that now symbolizes the end of our collective innocence? Today the wind blows across Ground Zero and through the chain link fence. Caressing the onlookers faces, you can almost hear it whisper "Do not forget".

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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Perimeter at Ground Zero May 2002

 
 
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Viewing Wall Jan 2003

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Plaque reads: The Heroes of September 11, 2001

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Viewing Wall Jan 2003