I remember as a child, once a year, my father used to take me to work with him at the World Trade Center. I used to strain my neck back, marveling as I failed to see the end of the towering monstrosity. I would look out the window on the top floors, seeing cars way below that looked as ants, people that were nothing more that moving dots on the streets so many stories beneath me. I remember nearby outside, by the large fountain, a large portion of concrete that was slightly discolored from the rest. My father would tell me that it was where King Kong fell and died. I believed him. My Dad knew these things.

I remember seeing the sheer enormity of the structure as King Kong began his fateful climb. I held my breath as the mighty Kong jumped from one tower to the next. I gasped in horror as he fell, plummeting to his death. I looked in wonder as the vast tidal wave of Deep Impact smashed into the Twin Towers like they were miniscule anthills, showering us the sheer scale of the comet’s oceanic impact. The meteors that barreled through the buildings in Armageddon, showing us the devastation of the asteroids flight.

None of that compared to the horror of seeing them in flames, seeing jetliners collide into them with devastating explosions. Watching them collapsing downward, disappearing in a huge plume of smoke. Except it wasn’t a movie, this time it was real.

The World Trade Center has been an integral part of every New Yorker’s life. It was one of the modern wonders of the world. No New York City skyline is complete without them; towering up majestically, perfect brothers, identifying NYC immediately as unique from every other city around world. There were visible for miles, you couldn’t drive anywhere near the city without seeing them. At night, they lit up the horizon, towering over the entire city. Even in post-apocalyptic movies and shows, such as X-Men’s Day of Future Past, the broken and stripped portions of the once mighty towers showed viewer immediately where they were, and how something terrible had happened. Something terrible HAS happened, and the buildings that once WERE the city of New York are now gone forever, our skyline will never be the same again.

My father still worked there back in the 93 when they tried bombing it the first time. He had JUST left for lunch, walking almost through the area where the bomb went off just twenty minutes later. I was proud to tell that story to my friends. He retired from his job shortly after that and lucky wasn’t anywhere near there today. At the time of the first bombing, most people didn’t realize this because it was only recently declassified; but that bomb was a chemical explosive. If detonated properly would have killed every man, woman and child in Manhattan. We were lucky, this time we weren’t.

Yes, the loss of life is terrible, and is very tragic. But every New Yorker has loss a piece of ourself today. We have loss a SYMBOL, a symbol that has defined us, helped us make us who we are. In movies, in shows, at sports events, every time the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center were shown, all New Yorker would proudly say, “I’ve been there.” Or “That’s my hometown, that’s my boys.” Our future generations have been robbed of that heritage that identified us as New Yorkers, and DAMN proud of it.

I had just driven by New York City as we went to the Renaissance Faire upstate. I pointed the twin towers out to Susan and she watched them as we drove by. When I got back from Spain, I had planned on taking her on a trip to the City, and to the World Trade Center. I wanted to show her ‘the place that Kong had died’, I wanted to watch her as she gazed down at the ants below, I wanted to take her dining on ‘The Restaurant at the Top of the World’ located the roof. One day, I had hoped to take my future son to show him were Kong had died, and he’d believe me cause “my Dad knows these things.” All my hopes, dreams and plans vanished in the beat of a heart in a giant plume of smoke.

New York will never be the same again.