An anniversary is coming up, a sad one that's hard to think about. It's a day when I'll always remember exactly where I was and what I was doing when I heard the news. I teach on Long Island and I was at work that day, organizing my card trays. My friend Barbara, came down to my room. "A plane flew into the World Trade Center!" she announced.
We turned on the television in the library to see a burning tail piece sticking out of one of the towers. A shocking sight, to say the least, but we figured it was probably a bizarre accident. What we witnessed next, though , was even more horrifying -- another plane flying into the second tower. Clearly, this was no accident. For the rest of the day, our school was in lockdown, meaning nobody could enter or leave the building. The teachers whispered to each other in the halls. "What's wrong?" the kids asked. "What happened?" How could we tell them? Would they understand? What if somebody's mom or dad worked there? No, we couldn't tell them -- not yet.
For weeks after the attack, an eerie silence settled the parkways and streets of Long Island. The roads that were usually jammed bumper to bumper with traffic were almost empty. Homemade signs dangled from the overpasses -- Pray for the missing EMTs, David come home, Pray for the missing firefighters.
A figure model from my drawing class lost both of his daughters in the World Trade Center. They worked for Cantor Fitzgerald, on the top floor of one of the towers.
A young woman who babysat for our boys when they were small lost her husband. He didn't even work in the WTC. She talked to him on the phone as smoke engulfed the conference room where he was trapped. "I love you," he told her before she lost contact with him forever. He had been there for a one day meeting.
A newlywed music teacher my husband worked with lost her husband. She was in denial about it for weeks, claiming he was probably lost and disoriented but, sadly, nobody ever found him.
A friend of ours had just stepped off the subway when the second plane hit. He worked across the street from the WTC. He immediately got back on the subway and took the train home. Later he found he'd lost 10 of his colleagues, including his golf partner. For a year afterward he had trouble sleeping and suffered from depression.
Almost everybody on Long Island lost somebody that day -- a soccer coach, a fire fighter, a police officer, a cook. A friend of my husband's niece -- a Suffolk Co. Police officer -- was on the site with her cadaver dogs in the weeks following, looking for bodies. She can't even talk about what she found. Let's just say, she didn't find any bodies in tact.
For some strange reason I still think of the time we took a plane from Islip Airport on Long Island to Newark, the first leg of a longer flight out west to ski. It was a small, twin engine plane with about 40 passangers aboard. The pilot decided to give us a thrill and fly a few loops around the WTC. We could see people sitting at their desks working, people standing and talking while drinking their morning coffee. It was strange but thrilling at the same time. Now I often wonder how many of those people later lost their lives and, if they survived, what their lives are like now. I know that ours will never be the same.
We lost more than lives that day. We lost our innocence and the feeling of security we had always enjoyed.
4 comments:
Stella,
I wrestled with the idea of blogging about September 11th; I didn't know if I should, or if it would change the tone of my blog. But I did post about 9/11 on 9/11. I had to. I didn't know anyone involved, but the day has great impact on me and I didn't want to ignore that.
I debated about whether or not I should blog about it, too, Danette, but it's an event that impacted my life, that shaped the way I view the world. I didn't think I could just ignore it. Thanks for dropping by!
Oh, Stella. It is all so clear in my mind as well. I did not know anyone who was lost, but it touched me so deeply, like one of those memories we hear our grandparents struggle with--WWII or the Depression or Viet Nam--and now someday, we will struggle with such a memory as we sit with young ones gathered round us.
My daughter was only a few months old, and my son was getting ready for preschool. I flipped on the TV to check the weather only to see that horrible sight of a plane rubbed into the Tower and swallowed by flames.
Only moments later, we watched as the second plane hit--disbelieving our eyes. Before we could even get our little guy out the door, the Pentagon was hit. We felt that sense of attack. And when the towers fell, my husband and I sobbed together, held each other tightly. How do we explain to our children about the silence? The solemn faces that fill the streets? The rows and rows of flags and banners and messages.
We tried to keep the television images away from the kids, but it was hard not to hid in our room and watch, as if somehow, somewhere in the burning wreckage there was a message saying it isn't real. It's all okay.
Thanks for taking a moment to share, Stella. It still brings tears to my eyes, and I don't want to forget. All those lives had meaning. Even if I didn't know a single one of them.
Thanks for your touching comment, Mary Ann. I debated whether or not I should post a comment about 9/11 cbut I just had to. We were so close to it. How could we not? My art teacher, Robert, lived across the river from the WTC in Brooklyn. He said that bits of paper and debris fluttered down on his building and porch for days after the towers crumbled.
One of the most touching sights were the children on nearly every street selling lemonade to raise money for the victims.
I cried too. I still cry when I think about it. I ran into Stephanie's dad the other dad (the father of the woman who used to babysit for our boys). She still hasn't remarried. Her life has changed forever. So it ours, but not to the extent hers has.
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