Reflections - NYC 9/11/2001

[IndelibleDotInk]

I lived in the Wall st area of Manhattan at the time and woke up to a phone call.

'Mike, look outside your window!' she said, calling me from her apt. a few stories up in our building.

'Yeah, yeah, zzzz,' I said, and did manage to pull back my drapes to see paper. lots of paper. falling from the sky, fluttering, swirling, dancing confusedly.

'wtf? A parade?' I thought, going back to sleep.

She called me back. Serious. Urgent. 'TURN ON THE NEWS!'

The serious voice. I turned on to CNN and 'wtf holy motherlover ever freaking shit?' The picture on tv was showing a building with a gaping, burning hole in it.

I cracked a beer and downed it, pressing a cold one into Nick1's hand and woke him up, having just enough presence of mind to realize I was being macho, but wth else could I do? Sven and Nick2 had already left the apartment for morning classes.

I motioned Nick1 to take a look at the tv and called my parents. It must have been like 4a in Honolulu, but this was one of the most important phone calls I ever made, would ever make. 'Turn on the news, I am ok, I love you, I will call you again' was the message I left on the answering machine. Only businessmen and rich students had cellphones back then.

He was calling his loved ones, and we started going door to door on our floor, waking them up, making them realize the urgency. I ran so many flights of stairs that day, so much adrenaline, not even sweating, just stairs, up, down, up, down. Most of the building housed students from Parson's, Lang, all the New School branches.

I ran past an open door, glimpsed the huge window and did a double take, rushing into this kid's room. He was stunned, turned and mumbled to me 'I could feel the heat.' The plane had left the remaining tower teetering like a Jenga game, all on fire. More people crowded in the room, some of them panning around with camcorders.

'People are jumping!' I turned away, did not want that to haunt me, why the hell were they watching them do that? Taping them. Jumping. To certain death. The building collapsed and disappeared into an explosion of dust. We couldn't hear it. Silent cloud of confusion and certainty.

People decided to leave the area, no stay, chemical weapons? Virulent strains of bacteria? Breathe through a wet tshirt. Who could have done this? War? Crazies? Are we safe?

Most of the people I talked to decided to trek uptown; Nick1 and I had decided to wait it out for sure. We were tough, had beer and food. Then the power went out, dark inside, dark outside. Nearby buildings started to teeter, to collapse, joining their two big brothers. We decided to head uptown too, taking stock of our loved ones.

I made plans with a few people to meet up later and walked outside into a world of ash. Everything was grey, the sky, the ground, windows, food stalls, and shoes, shoes all over. Heels, slippers, sneaks, penny loafers, Ferragamos, boots, most in pairs. They were covered in ash. Ash covered the fruit outside a grocery store, watermelons, apples, oranges, bananas. Ash fell from above. Clouds of darker color expanded around buildings, zigzagging ever closer, like the ghosts who chase PacMan.

We walked in silence, some crying quietly. I didn't shed any tears, so stunned and numb. I wanted to slap the crying ones, the ones who bawled openly. Shut up and walk, let's get out of here and then you can cry and we will laugh together. We walked like nutcracker soldiers in a Christmas globe.

I don't remember much of what happened next, but managed to call a friend and find a place to stay for a few days.

I don't think about it much. I don't have nightmares. On 9/11 I sometimes recall, glad to feel like a survivor, glad to have known first responders, people who cared and purposely went into the burnt shit storm of utter chaos to rescue others.

We walked slowly, disbelieving, trying to understand.

I still don't understand it fully, and am ok with this part of my past; how could people do something so horrifying? How can they be so heroic?

I was working for Borders bookstore at 32nd and 2nd, and our flagship store was at the base of 5 WTC. All their staff had a hell of a time convincing our patrons to leave for safety, and everyone did, though many didn't know what had happened and just wanted to buy some damn books.

I'm glad i worked in Midtown, where the strangest things going on were having to shoo a sleeping customer at closing time only to realize he was dead, and the weirdo who anonymously smeared his poop all over our bathrooms, once a month like clockwork. 'We must be oppressing him in some way,' my coworker observed.

Yeah. I don't think about it much.

Thank you first responders and friends.

[amagdalene]

Wow. Thank you for sharing this.

[Kaitlanfutbol]

I liked the part where you cracked the beer.

[Quercus]

Hey IndelibleDotInk, I've been trying to find the words to do justice to what you wrote but can't find ones with the right power. What you wrote is one of the best "I was there (or near)" descriptions I've read in the 19 years since 9/11 happened. Your words carried me right along, I felt like I could see what you saw and feel the intensity of what you and others were going through. You perfectly captured a moment in time, not an easy thing to do.

So much of that day was shocking but the images of people jumping are burned into my heart forever. I remember my next door neighbor at the time being aghast that they'd jumped but I was glad they had that last bit of control, to choose how to die. It broke my heart, even so.

[Fallguy]

Excellent accounting. TY

[brave777]

I was in high school in portland that day, i remember the teacher turned on the tv, we stopped doing what ever we did and just watched the news.

Till this day no one knows how steel and metal turned into dust. and if you see some pictures and videos, you will see that it got vaporized, not one building in history had that happened. People can only assume it was something metaphysical done from the other side to cause this effect. Or perhaps new tech we dont know about. Those damn terrorist that used the airplane knew exactly what they were doing.

[e_poison]

In life, there are a few moments where you always remember where you were and what you were doing in vivid detail.

On the morning of 9/11, I was 21 years old in my apartment in Colorado with my girlfriend. She woke me up saying the country was under attack. At first I was like "wtf is she talking about" but then I went out into the living room and watched the news with her. It was also her birthday.

I was going to take her out that night but everything was closed. The entire city and country had gone into lockdown. We ended up cooking dinner at home and our eyes never left the TV set for most of the day.

I still remember that day in crystal clear detail, even almost 20 years later. It was the day the US changed forever.

One thing that really pisses me off is when stupid kids make 9/11 jokes. It was such a tragic day for this country and most of them weren't even born yet. Not to mention all the innocent people who had to decide between burning to death or jumping to their death. I can't even imagine their sadness and panic.

[IndelibleDotInk]

In life, there are a few moments where you always remember where you were and what you were doing in vivid detail.

On the morning of 9/11, I was 21 years old in my apartment in Colorado with my girlfriend. She woke me up saying the country was under attack. At first I was like "wtf is she talking about" but then I went out into the living room and watched the news with her. It was also her birthday.

I was going to take her out that night but everything was closed. The entire city and country had gone into lockdown. We ended up cooking dinner at home and our eyes never left the TV set for most of the day.

I still remember that day in crystal clear detail, even almost 20 years later. It was the day the US changed forever.

One thing that really pisses me off is when stupid kids make 9/11 jokes. It was such a tragic day for this country and most of them weren't even born yet. Not to mention all the innocent people who had to decide between burning to death or jumping to their death. I can't even imagine their sadness and panic.

Me neither. The flipside is the bravery exhibited by everyone who helped at the time and who helped rebuild. I haven't gone back to ground zero, I don't really want to.

Funny thing is my exgf from Hawaii later went to college in Manhattan and dormed at the apartment building I was living at during 9/11.

[Kaitlanfutbol]

I was in 9th grade, about 9-10am. No school day! Followed by many confused feelings about life.