Feature: a world of loss and recovery for families of 9/11 victims

Moments after the first hijacked jetliner rammed into the World Trade Center, Cynthia Motus-Wilson, a receptionist working on the 79th floor of Tower One, managed to reach her husband, William, on his cellphone. After telling him she was all right and asking him what to do, she said "Honey, I love you, and I'll see you when this is over."

That turned out to be the last words William Wilson heard from his wife. The tragic event on Sept. 11, 2001 for ever changed his life and those of other victims' families.

"Time may heal the wound in our hearts, but there is no time frame for this," William told Xinhua in a recent interview.

Wilson met Cynthia in early 1996, a year after Wilson's first wife, Deanna, lost her battle with breast cancer, leaving Wilson and his three teenage daughters behind. The bereavement plunged William into an increasing state of reclusive sadness. Then he met Cynthia Motus, a divorced immigrant from the Philippines.

The ensuing marriage rekindled his hope in life, and Cynthia became, to use the words of Wilson's daughter, an "anchor" for the whole family. Yet, Sept. 11 terror attack shattered once more the family's comfortable and peaceful life.

Wilson said he tried to get to his feet again by himself, but it proved too difficult. He did not ask for counseling until the summer of 2002 when he was hit by another lapse of depression. "Now I'm doing fine," he said.

Wilson said he felt that nobody really understands the feeling of the Sept. 11 families. The pains of losing one's dearest ones in such a tragic manner and in such a big scale are understood only by those who go through the ordeal, like the families of US embassy bombings in Africa, he said.

"Someone even got the idea that we're all millionaires and why don't we just get over it?" he noted, adding that whether to accept federal compensation has been a painful decision for many of the victims' families.

Wilson said he even felt guilty when he used part of the compensation to pay his home mortgage. "It is a good thing to pay off one's mortgage, but at what cost?" he asked.

When asked about whether he felt safer after the United States launched the wars on terror, Wilson said his answer is both yes and no. "Military strike is a double-edge sword. The toppling of Taliban and Saddam Hussein's regimes might be a plus, but we are also creating a new generation of terrorists," he said.

Only those desperate people would blow themselves up while destroying others, he went on to say, and that the United States should get across to terrorists the message that violence is not the answer to problems. "I believe that human being should have the intelligence to find a better solution to terrorism," he added.

Wilson is not alone among the victims' families who are still trying hard to get over the aftermath of the tragedy and go on with life.

According to a recent poll conducted by The New York Times, among 339 relatives and close friends of the victims, almost half of the surveyed still have a hard time getting a good night's sleep. Some said they no longer flew on airplanes. About a third have changed jobs or quit. About one in five have moved since 2001, and a fifth of those who still live where they did on Sept. 11 would move if they could. Very few who lost a spouse have remarried.

A former employee of the New York City transit system, Wilson has retired since 2001. He said he is grateful to many ordinary people for what they did to help the victims' families, such as his neighbors who drop in from time to time and offer whatever help they can. Wilson said that because of the nature of the Sept. 11 attack, victims' families have inevitably got much public attention, but he wished there would be enough private moments and space for the families.

Source: Xinhua