Lembranças, Recuerdos, Memories

I don't really have a lot to add to the memorials or comments people are making today, but as one who lives and works in New York, I guess I should add something. Last year on September 11, I made the point of volunteering for a business trip to Seattle and spent the day at the Experience Music Project. I just didn't want to be in New York that day.

I'll pick up when I was finally able to reach Mércia and determine that she was okay. I then called our answering machine and changed the outgoing message to a message in Portuguese and English saying that we were both okay. I was advised at work to stay where I was along with my colleagues, but I finally left at 3:00 p.m. I was stunned to notice that every table at the outdoor sections of the three restaurants in the building where I work was filled with late lunchers. I crossed a couple of streets, noticing that while the Barnes and Noble at Lincoln Square was closed, the Tower Records across the street. I headed for the Red Cross center on Amsterdam, but was asked to return the next day. As we were advised that our offices would be closed the next day, I decided I would have plenty of time to do so.

I took the 104 bus to Times Square to get the 7 train (the inter-borough train with the fewest stops in Manhattan, thus making it largely unaffected by the attacks) home. I noticed that the street vendors were selling quite a number of the "I Love New York" T-shirts. We had moved to Jackson Heights less than three weeks before. A block away from our street I saw Mércia and yelled for her. She heard me and stopped. I don't think that I had seen a more beautiful sight before or since. My immediate plans had been radically altered: the next day I was supposed to fly to Portland, Oregon, spend the night there and rent a car to drive to Gleneden Beach, Oregon for business. Not any more.

The next day, I bought the papers and saved a few. I decided to attempt to go donate blood again, so I took the 7 train from 90th street. An older man was waiting on the platform with me, and in that camraderie that those experiencing a tragedy share, we started talking. One of his comments was that "It's a good thing Giuliani is mayor now, rather than that schwartzer!" I told him that I assume he meant David Dinkins and he said yes. I asked him how the color of Mr. Dinkins skin was relevant to his ability to be an effective mayor. He rolled his eyes at me with the implication - rendered with all the sublety of a brick wall - that I was a moron. When the train arrived I moved to another car.

At Times Square, I went to the uptown platform to catch the 2 or 3 train. Waiting on the platform with me was an elderly couple, obviously Muslim and the fear in their eyes was palpable. I had no idea whether they scared for the same reasons I was. I let my eyes trace a slow arc around the platform, silently defying anyone to lay a hand on these people. I was spoiling for a fight.

When I arrived at the Red Cross center, I was asked my blood type. It's B+ and they only wanted O that day. Physically weary and mentally and emotionally drained, I decided to walk back to Times Square. I saw three cops at Columbus Circle and gave up trying to remain stoic. Mércia had been absolutely terrified and I knew that one of us had to be strong during the difficult times that we were sure lay ahead. I was alone, now, however and could succumb to the nexus of fatigue and fear that was permeating my spirit. The tears flowed freely and I didn't care.

The next morning I awoke at 5 a.m. to the smell of something burning. I went around the department touching all the appliances that stay plugged in and on all the time. Everything felt normal. I noticed that the smell was coming from the southwest and promptly concluded that the wind had changed direction. I was now smelling the remains of the WTC from some twelve miles away.

The next day at work we find out the horrifying news that one of our colleagues, Jane Simpkin was on Flight 175, the jet that crashed into the South Tower. Later that day we find out that Peter Owens, the brother-in-law of a dear colleague in my department had perished in his office at Cantor Fitzgerald.

When I got home conveyed this news to Mércia. She was upset and her family had been begging us to go to Brazil. I had been to Barnes and Noble during lunch and bought a copy of John Ray's The Night Blitz. I am convinced then, as I am convinced now, without minimizing the horror of what had happened in southern Manhattan, if the British civilian population could survive eight months of nearly nightly bombardment by the Nazis, we could survive this.

Finally, I'll leave it to The Onion to have the last word in an uncharacteristically poignant fashion.

Comments

[akaky]

9/11 is a day to bless our family's dumb irish luck. my aunt retired from the nys dept of taxation and finance four months before the attack so didnt go to her office on the 40th floor of the south tower, my brother's company did security work for some of the companies in the wtc and he was in and out of there all the time, but on 9/11 he was up here getting some dental work done, and my brother in law's ladder company in queens got to the towers 5 minutes after the second tower came down. i still find it amazing how just how much is owed to blind stupid luck

[Randy Paul]

I don't know who said it, but someone once said that 50% of success is just showing up, and of course we all know about being in the right place at the right time. Sounds to me like your family subscribes to that line of thinking, or should!

I had a friend of a friend whose subway was late that morning and she was cursing that she would have arrived at AXA late that day. She was one of the few survivors from her department.

I was also tempted to fly to Portland, OR on the 11th instead of the 12th. I happen to like Portland and was going to spend a day there on my own (probably at Powell's) before traveling for business. While I don't think that I would have been in danger, my flight was due to leave at 8 a.m. and I would have certainly been inconvenienced, certainly a much smaller problem than what so many suffered.