Anchorage Daily News

Sara Anderson emerged from the World Trade Center on Sept. 11 after fleeing 60 floors down a stairwell packed with frightened people. She experienced a kind of "tunnel vision" that carried her forward. She had raced blocks away when the tower collapsed, beyond the plume of choking dust.

Other survivors have since told her the ground outside was littered with glass, debris, airplane parts, even the remains of victims.

But Anderson doesn't recall.

"When I left the building, I was very much in a survival bubble -- it's probably what enabled me to be here today," she says.

A year later, the former Anchorage resident and 1996 Service High School graduate has moved on with her life. But she will return to ground zero this week to attend anniversary events and retrace her critical steps to safety.

She doesn't know what she'll find.

"If you're not remembering something, there may be a darn good reason," she says. "But if I don't remember something -- and I can -- then I want to try."

When the terrorists attacked, Anderson was on the 61st floor in a training class as a new financial analyst for Morgan Stanley. In the aftermath, the 24-year-old Boston University graduate walked 21/2 miles to her hotel and called family. She returned to her office in Anchorage but later transferred to the firm's office in Fort Collins, Colo., where her mother lives and her family has roots.

Though she always followed the media coverage, her own memories were dimming, and she felt that was healthy.

"I definitely think about it more than some people, but it's just human nature to forget some things. It's how we continue to successfully live. We compartmentalize and deal with something and move on."

And yet, Anderson gradually realized that she had been touched, that she was no longer quite the same person who had been learning to manage stock portfolios.

"I do think that my priorities changed a little bit," she says. "One of the things that I learned after Sept. 11, that I try not to forget, is live every day as if it's your last. It's very hard to do that all the time, but I try to do it as much as possible."

Though Anderson liked many aspects of her job at Morgan Stanley, it wasn't a perfect fit, and she left the firm a few months after transferring to Fort Collins.

"There's no reason to waste time having a job eight hours a day, six days a week, that you don't love."

Over the year, her stepsister and grandmother were diagnosed with cancer, and Anderson was available to them. While her sister is recovering, her grandmother did not.

"It's kind of been a blessing not to have a job because I was able to spend a lot of time with her before she died," she says. "Spending time with my mom and my dad and my brother and stepmother and my step-siblings has become a lot more important."

This fall, Anderson has continued to explore possibilities, but has no full-time work. She hopes to return to college next year, possibly for a master's degree in business administration or tourism and natural resource management. She says she thinks a lot about marrying and raising children much sooner than she had once imagined.

And she has some questions about her encounter with tragedy.

A recent Denver Post article quoted people saying they were sick of hearing about the tragedy, that they don't need to be reminded. Anderson found herself angry at the attitude.

"I totally understand that," she says, "but at the same time, I wonder if the person who feels that way, if they're really telling the truth, that they do really remember. . . . Because I do believe that (remembering) is extremely important."

Anderson will return to New York this week. She will be there for bagpipe processions, a moment of silence, the tolling of bells, the placing of flowers in the pit.

And she will walk the route she took on Sept. 11, ready for what comes.

"The only thing that may cause me to remember would be being there again, and either I will or I won't," she says. "I'm curious, I'm very curious, and that's one of the reasons that I'm going to try."

But Anderson has also learned to be cautious, and her eyes will be open. Just in case.

"I doubt anything will happen, but I'm going to be wearing my tennis shoes," she says. "And I'm going to have my cell phone and my credit card and my money in my pocket. And I'm going to be mobile."

Doug O'Harra can be reached at do'harra@adn.com and 907-257-4334.