This is not my first memorial monument or landmark celebrating something lost. Sites I’ve visited include the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Parthenon, Chichen Itza, Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. All impressive. At each, I felt a sense of reverence and awe, but I was too young to understand their history and importance. Nor did I have a personal connection to any of the events or people for whom these monuments had meaning.

This is not my first time to the place in Lower Manhattan once called Ground Zero. I was there in 2006, before plans for redevelopment were finalized. It was a chill, overcast day and an eerie sense of loss loomed in the air. A nameless, faceless undercurrent buzzed, not audibly, but on my skin, like static electricity about to spark. Visitors wandered around the fenced-in gashes and scars of the two towers. The site was crowded with the souls. The unseen souls longing to be seen, to be heard, to be understood. The souls with physical bodies just trying to process the devastation.

In the late 1980s, the World Trade Center was one of my New York haunts. I lived in Brooklyn and worked in the financial district. My commute started with the RR subway in Bay Ridge, to the Towers, and then a walk in the Towers’ shadows to Fulton Street. I knew people who worked in the Towers. My mom worked across the street prior to her leaving the work force. Soaring up to the observation deck was a must-do for all my out-of-town guests. Like so many routine places, I often didn’t even see the towers, but their presences was unmistakable.

This past summer, I was the out-of-town guest and I had to visit. I couldn’t not go given my history, and personal ghosts lingering in the faded shadows of the original towers.

​I am one of thousands. Many wait in the line for the observation deck at the top of One World Trade Center. Others wait to enter the museum. I don’t have the heart or the time to do either. I have yet to fully process the disaster, the loss, the reconstruction. I find a bench and soak in the warm, golden late afternoon sun filtered by an adolescent oak tree.Around me are families, couples, solo travelers. They meander, look up, and point. They pose for selfies and family photos. Fashions of the world — saris, hijabs, jeans, flip-flops, heels, dresses, button-down shirts, and t-shirts — speckle the area with color and texture. French, Spanish, Arabic, Russian, and other languages weave together, forming a linguistic quilt around my shoulders.

Where else can such a mosaic of cultures and beliefs congregate? It’s comforting to witness this congregation of humanity paying tribute to the memorial built on the spot of of a most inhuman event.

Yet, something nags at my conscience. The sun warms me more than the idea of thousands here to honor the thousands who suffered, fought, and perished here.

What do people see looking at the tower? Or going up to the observation deck? Or entering the museum? How many of their posed photos and selfies are digital trophies of a bucket-list item checked? Are they here to bear witness or to be seen across social media? No one here behaves disrespectfully, but  I only see a fraction of their visit. Perhaps inside their observable behavior was more reflective and reverent.

A woman walking alone on a deserted Manhattan street…
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But it’s a Saturday in Tribeca, and the bright afternoon sunlight eases my fiction-writing mind. I have a few hours to kill before meeting a long-lost-but-Facebook-found friend. Time enough to knock-off one of my must-dos of this trip.

When I arrive, my curiosity is peaked. This is not a retail or commercial street. Or if it is, every shop is mysteriously low-key and nondescript. Don’t storeowners want to be found? Or, is it part of the allure now to keep a low profile so only those-in-the-know know. Entering, I feel as if I’m an accomplice in an unwitting crime: The Case of The Mysterious Bookshop.