September 11, 2001

The weather that day was almost exactly like it is today, except the skies were even clearer.

The day before I had been in NYC, as I was several days a week back then. The weather was spectacular, and I planned on going downtown that afternoon.

Despite the fact I had lived in Manhattan for several years, I had never seen the view from the top of the world trade center and resolved that I would bring my camera and take the subway down. But my meetings ran well into the afternoon, and I had to get back up to Connecticut for some stuff Monday night. I had to come back into the city Tuesday evening, so I put off the sightseeing until the next afternoon.

Like this morning, I had been up late Monday night and slept in. When I got up and turned on the radio, I didn’t hear the expected programming. I quickly turned on the television. What I saw was confusing – how could an airplane hit the world trade center on a perfectly clear morning like this? Memory is a funny thing, but as I recall, the second plane came in and crashed into the other tower as I watched the first building burning on TV. It was about this time of day, a Tuesday.

It was impossible trying to reach my associates in the city. The circuits were busy. All any of us could do was watch, and listen, and wait, to try and find out what the hell just happened, and worry what it meant.

Stick to the subject, please.

  • Koyaanisqatsi*

    Clear, cloudless morning. Nice drive to city. 9 AM meeting, a bit late. Oh look. One small white cloud just over the WTC. No other clouds. Odd. Heavy traffic on Triboro Bridge. Damn. Black SVUs. Sirens. Lights. Guys in suits. Wow. Bad Feeling. Not cloud over WTC. Fire. Smoke. “Small plane struck…” No wait. Another plane. Something very, very bad is happening to all of us. No meeting. No downtown. Animal instinct. Home. Get home. No highways. No bridges. Get home fast. Listen. All the way home on deserted roads. Listen to what is happening. “…it’s so black, my eyes are open and I can see nothing. It’s so black.” Home. Quiet. No planes. No trucks. No movement except a light breeze. Blue, blue skies. Air like glass. “…more than we can bear.”

    *Koyaanisqatsi – a Hopi term for ‘crazy life, life in turmoil, life out of balance, life disintegrating, a state of life that calls for another way of living’,

  • Joanne

    I was at Marvin School, it was primary day and I was the Moderator…All of a sudden things got kind of weird and we saw the office staff moving quickly back and forth as if they were trying to make sense of something. Then someone came in and said a plane had hit the World Trade Center…it seemed kind of weird because as Turf said, it was such a beautiful day so how could a plane not be able to maneuver that building…as I think back I was actually complaining because I really wanted to be somewhere else celebrating my 49th birthday…now I remember how trivial that really was. Then came the news that another plane had hit the other building and thats when people started to really panic…what came next was confusion and dis-belief… so many kids in that school had parents that worked in or near the WTC…I thought of our friend Ron Gilligan and wondered if he was at work…unfortunately he was and Ron never came home again. As I watched the children going in and out of the office it just seemed to get worse, then people began coming to get children and I could only guess that they had parents who may be part of this horrific scene that was unfolding. It had such an impact on me that I wrote a poem about the children….

    From the mind of a child

    Goodbye daddy
    see you tonight
    I’m off to school
    I love you.

    They’re calling our names
    they’re bringing us in one by one
    our principal hugs me
    it’ll be okay hun

    She looks so sad
    and yet so scared
    I hear them say
    not many were spared

    I’m looking around
    everyone so quiet
    they’re looking at me
    what have I done

    They tell me mom
    is on her way
    they’re sending me home
    for the rest of the day

    What did I do wrong
    am I in trouble
    I hear them mention
    lost in the rubble

    None of this makes
    sense to me
    I’ll wait for mom
    and then I’ll see

    So strange is the look
    thats in her eyes
    like that of a baby
    after it cries

    Yet something else
    is there as well
    I’m not supposed to
    say this
    but she looks like hell.

    her arms are around me
    her cheeks are wet
    her sobbing is in my ear
    I think now what I saw was fear

    We have to go now
    we have to go home
    we must be there in case
    daddy tries to phone

    Hours went by
    and not a call was to be had
    I figured out now
    it was all so bad

    Hey mom its time
    for daddy to arrive
    I looked at the clock
    its half past five

    He won’t be home
    tonight my dear
    he won’t be home
    again I fear

    Days have gone by
    and still no word
    daddy is gone
    or so I’ve heard

    What do they mean
    he’s gone to heaven
    he didn’t say he was leaving
    on September 11

    He wouldn’t leave
    without telling us why
    cause he would know
    that would make me cry

    So I think I’ll just sit
    and wait til he’s here
    I’ll wait and wait
    even a year

    you can’t tell me
    my daddy is gone
    I don’t believe you
    your wrong

    He wouldn’t leave me
    without saying goodbye
    He wouldn’t leave without
    telling me why

    Stop saying my daddy
    has gone to heaven
    stop saying he left
    on September 11

    Stop saying he won’t
    be home again
    Just say he’ll be home
    we just don’t
    know when.

  • Vet Park Junkie

    Joanne, thank you. It brought tears to my eyes.

  • Joanne

    VetParkJunkie-you’re welcome…I thought maybe if I posted it, it would remind people just how many were affected and still are.

  • Anonymous

    Thankyou Joanne…

  • Diane C: never the same

    The usual TV news on – home, it was just a few days after I had closed my store. It was a beautiful day- windows open, cleaning, cable news on (perpetually), BREAKING NEWS……
    The first plane, then with the second, a realization – nothing will ever be the same. Before editing, people jumping – holding hands…and then the crumbling, and a new realization: people were looking for loved ones, and could not understand what we all already knew: that no one was there. A frantic call to the senator’s office, begging “Are our bombs in the air yet? Why not? We must know who! Get the bombs in the air and wipe those effing bastards from the face of the earth!”
    The awful plume of smoke forever and ever. And the weirdest memory of all is still the the weirdest to this day – the nights and days of no airplanes, anywhere, and then they started to fly again, and to this day, 7 years later, whenever I see a plane in the sky I have this eery feeling of it going to hit a building or of it dropping from the sky.
    My heart breaks for the loved ones left behind who cannot look ANYWHERE without the constant reminder of how much they lost that day. I hope that God comforts them in some way that not every waking day is the sickening feeling of what might have been.

  • anon

    I remember going to the beach in Rowayton and watching with others as you could see the smoke from the towers. Several days later I found out that on old family friend, Donnie Burns, never came out. He had been with FDNY for many years and was close to retirement.

  • anon

    there was a certain sense of “this can’t be real” while watching the coverage on TV that morning.

    I would normally have been at work in Milford by the time the buildings were hit. I was supposed to go to a meeting in New Jersey which got canceled. When I finally did start up I-95 to Milford I was struck by how light traffic was, but what really forced the reality of the situation on me was seeing 6 ambulances headed south escorted by 2 state troopers on their way to the city.

  • Old Timer

    Most of us will never forget where we were and what we were doing that day. Our area lost a lot of people and some of us, like the child in Joanne’s beautiful poem, cannot accept the loss. Nothing will ever be the same. We will give up a lot of personal freedom in the name of homeland security and that is a shame, but so necessary. We need to remember the ones we lost, and we need to thank the people who dedicate their lives to making sure it never happens again. As much as we criticise our elected officials, we are grateful.

  • akabi

    Do you think we will forget the ones we lost?It may take more than 7 years for some of us to get grateful.

  • Nonymous

    I hope Chris considers this sticking to the point. Akabi, I think what Old Timer meant was that those of us who are left should be grateful for the things we do have. I lost my fiancee this summer and I’ll never forget him and will probably still miss him 7 years from now, but even now I’m grateful for the right to live in this country, for beautiful days, wonderful friends, things like that.
    What I’m NOT grateful for is a president who has squandered money that should have been spent hunting Bin Laden on a useless, unnecessary war.
    We can’t ever let our guard down.
    What’s scary is never knowing what’s coming next. I tell myself you can’t let the evil ones control your life, and then I’ll find myself at Stew Leonards thinking – maybe they’d think THIS was a good target, so many people at one time in one place. Or taking the train into New York and tthinking maybe they’d think Grand Central was a ggreat target. The one think you KNOW is that they aren’t going to do the things they’ve done BEFORE because we’re on top of those.

  • akabi

    I think that those of us who are left should feel what we feel and if its not gratitude thats ok too.

  • Nonymous

    I’d like to take a moment here to mention some other heroes – Dr. Edward Senker, from Broad River Animal Hospital, donated his own free time going in to Ground Zero to help treat the search and rescue dogs, who were being hurt in the course of their work and also psychologically traumatized and in need of R&R. Both HE and the dogs are heroes. If Dr. Senker had colleagues who joined him, they deserve credit, too, but he’s the only one I personally am aware of.

  • Administration forgives and forgets…

    People never forget; governments do. I lost a dear, dear friend in the PanAm Lockerbie bombing. It was like a knife in the heart to see Condoleeza Rice making nice with that lunatic Gaddafi. I guess W believes that once a terrorist pays up, it’s OK to work with them again. Nothing will make up for the loss of those fine lives…

  • Kurm Udgeon

    9/11 was surreal to me. I watched in horror as the second plane hit the once proud towers. As they collapsed, there was a feeling of “why now, on this beautiful day”? Then the day got worse and worse.

    As the next thirty days unfolded, and the media was never more then 2 minutes from another story related to 9/11, I found myself coming to tears frequently, and for no reason. The world around me felt sad and empty, and I was drawn to want to be where the pain was greatest.

    In the middle of October, I traveled to the site. There, from the hastily constructed viewing platforms, you could see the smoldering ruin of those towers, with working crews going in all directions, to accomplish their tasks. A group of tourists were there, with their cameras, wanting their pictures taken with the ruins and smoke behind them. I felt revulsion for them, and a profound sadness that, this tragedy was so misunderstood as a photo opp. for a scrapbook. How shallow could we be? Didn’t those people feel the weight of the tons of rubble which now was strewn all over Manhattan? Didn’t the grafitti of love and caring on any and all surfaces reach those people? Couldn’t they see the tragedy in the windows of the closed shops, with inches of dust inside them as if it just came through the glass windows?

    Since that day, although the sadness and loss I feel continues to be a part of my private mind, I have come to see that people will use any and all means to gratify themselves, and their ambitions. By invoking the words “9/11″, they have used that event as a means of justifying their actions and as a means of gaining political power. The battle over the memorial on the site, the insurance companies vs. the real estate developer, the demands for more money and control over this process have turned this profound tragedy into a tool to be used for any and all puroposes. Shame on us for allowing this to happen.
    I still feel those days of my eyes watering and the heaviness of my thoughts as days of pure emotion. We should all remember the way we felt on that day and the words “never forget”, which have been used before, and should signify the great meaning of that day.

  • Anonymous

    On my way down to Norwalk from Danbury yesterday, I was very saddened to find that I could only count 30 houses with flags flying in remembrance. And then I got angry. If it were me whose loved one or good friend had died in those towers, I would be absolutely LIVID to see that seven years later the idea of commemorating them has been almost forgotten by my fellow citizens.

    Where were the flags? Flags should have been out on houses, businesses and our cars!

    Total disrespect. It was very very sad.

  • Aunt Bertha

    Thank you Joanne. Loved the poem.
    I was teaching that day. It was second period. McMahon was surreal it was so quiet as the news spread. I sat with students and held their hands and told some that it would be okay. Some were concerned for parents who work in the city and they could not reach them on their cell phones. I called a few homes that night to make sure everything was okay. I have a dear friend who worked in one of the towers and she tells the story of that day as she ran from the towers. She saw people falling from the towers and thought she was going to die. I am always going to be thankful to be an American. I will always remember that day. I put out my flag everyday since 9/11 and three flags later I continue to do so. I wish everyone would remember this day with their flags and hearts.