ven though weeks have passed since the 11^th, in a sense, that is where my heart still lies.

On Tuesday mornings, I teach an early class.  I glanced at Yahoo and saw a blurb that said a plane had struck the World Trade Center.  I thought at the time that it was some drunken idiot in a small plane who got lost, had a complete loss of direction, or some similar ham-bone fool error.  I worked with a class on the varieties of ways to make the "r" sound.  As I learned later, people were jumping out of an inferno of a building that was collapsing around them while I was talking about the difference between the uvular "r" and the rolled "r."

It was after class I found out what happened.  For the remainder of the day, I couldn't be in a place for more than thirty minutes.  I'd watch cable news at home for awhile.  Then I'd come back to work to listen to the news on the radio playing in the lobby.  Then I'd go home. Then I'd come back to work, and so on through the day.

I work at a college in Shreveport very near Barksdale Air Force Base. A student came by.  President Bush was at the base, we were told.  And so it was announced on the news some ten minutes later.

Although the attack was awesome on its own, the immediate effect was almost one of complete invasion.  One almost expected a goon squad to come walking down the street with Uzi's and mop us up.  As terror, it worked.

Right now we're producing "Wit" on the mainstage.  A play about a woman dying from ovarian cancer. During the day thousands die for real, and our best actress dies every night in a play.  I play her father.  I'm supposed to be aloof behind a newspaper.  The prop is a Wall Street Journal written after the attack.  So while acting aloof, I read stories each night about the horrors that continue in the aftermath.  Acting keeps me from crying.

Audiences come and cry and laugh and cry.  Since the attack, people have been born.  People laugh.  People cry. People die.  People are born.  We huddle in a dark room and tell stories about life and death with laughter and tears.

I don't know how to end this one.  I don't know that it has an ending.  I guess all I can offer is a small vision of human life -- a life that seems to be significant because of the stories we share, we tell, we act out for each other.  After that, something else will happen.

Rest in peace.

© 2001 Nathan Thomas

Nathan Thomas has earned his
                               living as a touring actor, Artistic Director, director
                                 stage manager, designer, composer, and pianist
                                 He has a Ph.D. in Theatre and is a member of
                                       the theatre faculty of Centenary College

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Winter 2001