Dear Mom. (First Person).

I'm safely back in New York City. The trip was a real hassle, and I got to the dorm much later than I had thought I would. The crowds at Kennedy International Airport were unbelievable. I guess that is what to expect, though, when you are traveling during the holidays. Even the shuttle took longer than usual.

But it was worth it. I was happy to have been able to be with all of you again. And to have seen my friends.

Mom, there is something I need to tell you. I hope you will understand that I'm not being critical. I simply want you to understand that I'm different now than I was when I first left home for school. (Was it only three months ago?) And it isn't just the green hair. This is difficult to explain, so please bear with me.

Though I had so looked forward to Thanksgiving Day with my family, when it finally arrived I was sad to discover that I no longer fit in. I simply couldn't relate. You see, the people on the West Coast have gone on with their lives, and right now I can't imagine that I ever will.

You once told me that you knew that no matter how much people in other areas of the country were affected by the tragedy of September 11 none of you could begin to experience it in the same way those of us who live in Manhattan did. I heard what you said at the time, but I have only just recently recognized the reality of those words.

When we were down at the waterfront Thursday night, you pointed to the sky where the lights of the town of Vashon were reflected on the clouds above. You saw beauty.

I saw the sky above the World Trade Center--as I have seen it every night since the attack--lit by enormous spotlights so that the cleanup work can go on. Mom, there are maybe 4,000 people still buried there.

When I see a police car, I think of it covered with dust and its windows blown out. I see an officer in the back seat covered in ash and dust. He is coughing and coughing and coughing.

When I see fire trucks, I remember them smashed and littered with papers sticking out of every possible crevice. You see, the towers were office buildings. And office buildings have tons and tons of paper.

When I see a construction worker shrouded in the day's soot, I remember the people fleeing the area completely covered in ash and soot--except where their own blood had washed it away.

And when I see an aid car, I remember the emergency vehicles lined up for blocks and blocks just waiting for the danger to pass and the rescues to begin. Only when the danger passed they remained there, unused.

But most of all I remember the ash. Plumes of it rising and turning the day into night. That ash wasn't just the towers and their contents. It was also human ash. And I breathed it, Mom. Oh, my god, I breathed it right into my lungs.

So you see, Mom, I can't just go on with my life. It is with me every minute of every day. Some people say that those of us in New York are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, just as the soldiers in Vietnam did. They say that we were witness to one of the worst battles in history, and so it makes sense. I have heard that those soldiers felt alienated, believing that no one could understand unless they had been there.

I think you can understand. You can't experience it in the same way, but through dialogue you can come closer to understanding what we experienced. And so I have written this letter.

One final note. When I heard that the United States had begun to bomb Afghanistan, I sat down and cried. I cried for the continued loss of human life and for those left behind to grieve. And I cried because I don't know what to do.

Trevor Dallier is a now nineteen-year-old student at New York University. This essay received honorable mention in the eighteen-to-twenty-four-year-old age category of the Humanist Essay Contest for Young Women and Men of North America.