Most of us will take some time today to reflect on the September 11th tragedies of eight years ago. Its sobering to remember the disbelief, apprehension and grief we all held as the day unfolded. As the days and months passed we learned of the 2,752 who had died, we witnessed the ceaseless acts of bravery from those who were assigned to ‘make it right’ again and we watched the ushering in of a new era. One of muffled hope and cultivated fear.
In many ways 2001 seems far, far in the past. We learn, communicate, heal, analyze, travel, even play differently now. We can thank (or curse) technology for many of the sweeping changes.
In order to get a finger on America’s heartbeat concerning 9/11 I did a Twitter search. I followed some links in the unending stream of thousands and thousands of tweets to read posts written by journalist, actors, conspiracy believers and politicians. I wondered what would have happened if Twitter or Facebook or the endless list of other social sites existed on that fateful day.