CRIME was up in York. Bishopthorpe had become a motorists' rat-run. Nicole Kidman's movie Moulin Rouge was a box office hit, and EastEnders had won honours in a TV awards ceremony.

These were the stories making the news before 2pm on September 11. A typical cross-section of hopes, fears and gossip on a typical early autumn day.

Now it is hard to recall that ordinary world. But we should, and we must.

Today marks a month since terrorists hijacked four planes and propelled us into a new and darker place. We have experienced so much horror, pain and fear since then that it seems like a lifetime ago.

Emotional overdrive takes its toll. Less than a week into the attacks on Afghanistan, there is a palpable sense of battle fatigue. Doubts about the necessity of a long military campaign are surfacing.

That is why we must cast our minds back to life before 2pm on September 11. Remember how you rushed off to work after kissing the kids. Remember how you grumbled about the traffic, then shared a joke with a friend before settling down to the day's work.

That was how September 11 began for nearly 7,000 people in the United States. Then they were annihilated in the most horrible way in the name of a twisted ideology. They never got to kiss their kids again.

Today, as York firemen attended a memorial service in London, their American counterparts continued to dig out the remains of the New Yorkers who went to work as normal a month ago.

Men, women and children were burned and crushed to death in cold blood. We should constantly remind ourselves of the scale of the atrocity to strengthen our resolve as ground war in Afghanistan approaches. This action is dangerous. It does make Britain a terrorist target. But it also proves that the world will not hesitate to fight evil.

We owe that to the dead, and we owe that to our children.

Updated: 10:39 Thursday, October 11, 2001