It is now a month. But... a month... since what?
More than five thousand, missing or dead. And for those outside their immediate circles, still - a month later - the shock can hit.
At Yankee Stadium last night I saw a sportscasting colleague for the first time since August. We had worked together in college. He had known my classmate, the Cornell athlete, Eamon McEneaney, who was killed in One World Trade Center. He had interviewed Eamon, he had had a beer with him. Until I told him, he didn't know Eamon was dead. He found out last night.
How many others didn't know, or still don't know that they lost long-ago classmates, or a neighbor's cousin, or a casual friend? How long will that slow-moving shock wave reverberate? In this sense, while the calendar may read October eleventh, for many of us, in every city in this country, it is still early in the morning of September eleventh. There are losses we don't yet know, griefs we have not yet encountered.
And for those directly affected, like the 3000 or more families who won't file for death certificates because to do so would be to deny even the smallest of hopes, it may very well always be early in the morning of September eleventh.