For 20 years, America has had one shared cultural touchstone.

Every Sept. 11, we are transported to the day when the whole country held its breath, watching and waiting to see what would happen next in an unbelievable day where things couldn’t possibly get worse, and yet they did, over and over again.

We were afraid together. We were appalled together. We were shocked together.

And for two decades, we have grieved together. We mourned on that day and for weeks and months and years afterward as the numbness receded, leaving pain and anger and immeasurable loss in its place.

For most people, 9/11 is now like the John F. Kennedy shooting or Pearl Harbor. It is a moment in time that is revisited in video of remembered tragedy.

But in New York and in Washington and in Somerset County, 9/11 is not just a memory, and it is more than a documentary.

It is a neighbor. It is a constant companion. It is a sacred trust.

You do not just remember the day the planes crashed and thousands died once a year when you live in the shadow of the Twin Towers or in sight of the Pentagon. You do not forget anything about the day United Flight 93’s passengers became heroes when you live near the field where their fateful flight ended.

There is something about that day that lives with those people every day, the same way it lives with the family members who lost their loved ones or the first responders who lost their comrades.

When we remember 9/11 and the awesome weight of that day, we can choose whether that is something we can pick up or whether it is too heavy to bear. For those closest, that isn’t an option.

This year, 20 years after those terrible hours, we should try once again to be in this together.

We can do more than just rewatch the footage. We can do more than just hang a flag. We can pay attention to the real stories of how people navigated that day and those that followed, how they have survived the years since and how they have tried to honor the lives lost.

America came together on 9/11 in a way it maybe never had before. There may be no greater way to honor those who were lost and those who have lived than to come together like that again.

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