Coping Since Sept. 11
NPR Listeners Reflect on Life After National Tragedy

Amy Thiessen and her husband James, with pets Ezra and Simon. Photo: Courtesy Amy Thiessen

When the April 19 bombing occurred in Oklahoma City, I was a college junior at the University of Oklahoma. Although I did not know anyone personally who was killed or injured in the bombing, my life, along with every Oklahoman's, was personally changed forever.

It has been six years since that day, and the downtown is almost completely repaired. The memorial is completed, and one square block of downtown has completed slow, painful transformation from office workplace to burned-out shell to soothing green space. However, my life will never be 'normal' as it once was. As President Bush calls us to return to our 'normal lives,' I still look at Ryder trucks twice when they drive down the highway or are parked innocently on the street. I lose myself in downtown when I pass the memorial on the way to somewhere else. I meet people every day who lost relatives and loved ones.

All of this is to say that there is no return to the 'normal' that once was. There is an easing of the pain and the fear, and a new way of life emerges from the rubble and confusion. My life went on from April 19. I graduated from physical therapy school, got married, and returned for my master's degree. If I could leave the city of New York with any words at all, they would be: Hang on. 'Normal' will come again when you least expect it and in a time when you could not think it possible.

Amy Thiessen
Norman, Okla.

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