Falafel

[thisnewday]

It's a few minutes after 5 P.M. on Friday, September 11, 2009. I'm driving toward the Wegman's supermarket that's just beyond Thompson Road on James Street. I'm rushing to pick up a few dinner items to send to work with my wife so I don't have to bring them to her later.

Earlier in the day, I'd watched archival footage of NBC's news coverage from the morning of the attacks. Like every other American alive on that day, I have my own particular memories of those events. I had watched, in real time, as the second plane blew through the corner of the other tower, instantly erasing any doubt that we were under attack.

I immediately called my daughter who had moved to New York to work in a veterinary hospital and had since lived in various places in and around the city. Finally, she'd taken up residence at the hospital in Scarsdale but had found a profitable sideline moonlighting as a "pet sitter" for wealthy clients and might've been anywhere in the metropolitan area. Fortunately, I reached her at the hospital before the phone networks were all but shut down by the shear volume of calls from people similarly frantic to confirm the safety of loved ones.

Anyway, eight years and some hours later, I'm pulling into the parking lot of the store when, over to my left, I notice this group of men walking toward the store. There's six of them, they're talking and laughing as they walk, and they look like they're on a mission. They're also dark-complectioned - I'm thinking Middle Eastern - and they're each wearing brand new, identical backpacks.

As I drive past them looking for a parking space, it's the backpacks that worry me. As well as the intentions of those who are carrying them. And as I'm getting out of the car, I'm wondering if I should call my son and let him know what I've seen. You know, like the ones on Flight 93 who called home to let someone know that they might be in trouble. Only to learn that they were in a whole lot of trouble.

Still, a grocery store is not like an airplane. There are doors and windows you can step through and still be on the ground. So I kept walking. Then I thought about my nephew Erik and the night patrols his Ranger unit did in Mosul. This would be like one of those open air markets where the blast wave shreds everything in its path. And, instead of one or two, there are six of these guys.

I encounter them again in the produce section. Now they're pushing shopping carts around but they're still together. Maybe that's a good sign because, if they were here for something besides grape leaves and falafel, it would've made more sense for them to disperse throughout the store. At least that's how I would've done it. Then I notice that I'm the only one with them in the produce section. Shit!

I finish my shopping in record time and walk out of the store. Back at the car, I'm starting to wonder if maybe these guys are from some poli-sci class at SU. Doing, you know, a project on racial profiling maybe. (If that's it, ya got me, fellas.) Because they really did seem intent on something.

Unless it really was the falafel...

LPK
LiveJournal
9.11.2009