Accepting Devastation at Ground Zero

            Suzanne Berne’s essay explores the reality of dealing with devastation. Berne began her essay by explaining how she visited ground zero to pay her respects. She looked at ground zero and described it as looking at nothing, but the “nothing” she was looking at was absence. Ground zero appeared to be an average construction site and she found the busyness “reassuring” because of the “hopefulness so often inspired by construction sites.” In the middle of the essay, she noted an elderly man telling his son how he watched the towers being built and he struggled “recalling an absence before there was an absence.” Her mention of the elderly man provided a great source of insight from someone who grew up with the towers beginning to end. Her final sentence, “And by the act of our visiting- whether we are motivated by the curiosity of horror or reverence or grief, or by something confusing that combines them all- that space fills up again,” leaves the essay on a positive, suggesting that ground zero is much more than empty space.

            I visited ground zero six months after 9/11 and it was raining when I visited, as it did when she went. I enjoyed how she described it; her description is what I remember from my visit. I recall that it was busy from the construction site, the police officers, the firefighters, and people from other countries walking around. I especially recall the American flags everywhere and the flowers left near the site. This essay was good enough to be published because it effectively captures the surroundings of ground zero and describes that ground zero is “nothing,” but that “nothing” is absence.