September 11, 2023
22 years on, this is what comes to mind as we look back on that horrible day....
Usually around the time I finish up my last WM of the summer, something comes up that I wish to discuss regarding 9/11. It might be something I saw on TV, or on-line or a conversation I had with someone. Sometimes it's newsworthy or sometimes it's just an observation.
But this year, nothing seemed to come up.
I thought about writing about Rudy Giuliani, about how he went from being a hero in many people's eyes that day to now having to grovel for money to pay for his legal fees-necessary because he chose to hitch his wagon to Donald Trump and all his baloney of a stolen 2020 Presidential Election.
But that may be a blogpost for another day. On this day, and for this blog, it's about remembering, and working through the feelings we all have about what happened and how we all coped with it.
I've said it countless times before and I'll say it till my dying day, for all the pain and the fear and the sadness that came out of September 11th, what I will always remember is the days that followed, all the rescue workers that went down there, who spent hours that led into days digging out what remained of the World Trade Center. All the people who went to the staging areas around the city to load up trucks with food and supplies for the rescue effort. (Shea Stadium's parking lot was one of them)
I recently just watched an ESPN Documentary about the 1972 Olympic Massacre in Munich. Peter Jennings, had been the chief correspondent to the Middle East for ABC News, and ABC Sports president Roone Arledge asked him if he wanted a break from the tension in the Middle East to cover some news events at the Olympics. Instead, he ended covering the biggest Middle East crisis that year. As Jennings was recalling the events in 1972, he also thought back to how he covered the events of 9/11, (the documentary was made in 2002), and it showed a clip from 9/11 talking on the air about how he had gotten to speak with his kids in the little time he had that day where he wasn't on TV, and he urged anyone who had a parent or a child they hadn't reached out to yet to "call 'em up" as he barely held on from bursting into tears on national TV. I remember watching that live.
I'll never forget it.
Those are the stories that stick with me now. Yes, the anger still burns. The thought of kids who lost parents that day, especially the ones now who are young adults, 22, 23 years old, just babies, never really knowing their lost parent, except through the stories their surviving relatives tell them. The even more heartbreaking thought of parents who lost kids that day. Having spent so much time in Rockaway in my life, there were so many guys around my age who either worked in finance or were FDNY, who died and left behind a devastated mother and father.
The anger still burns. It will never flame out. And the sadness, that will always remain.
But also the hope.
The hope that we'll remember how we all came together and left our differences behind to help the healing. It didn't matter what side of the aisle you were on, you just wanted to help. Donate blood, help get supplies to Ground Zero, help a neighbor, all of that was part of it too.
I don't know if we'll ever get back to that, I really don't. But on this day, as we remember what happened, as we work through those feelings of despair, anger, sadness and fear, I think it's worth a shot to remember how we all cared about each other those first days after the attacks.
And we can put some of our hope into that.
God Bless everyone we lost that day, and all who were left behind.
God Bless those who worked down at Ground Zero, who continue to suffer from 9/11 related illness.
God Bless all of us who deal with the memories of that day, that we as Mr. Rogers used to say, "look for the helpers."
And May God Bless America
Weekly Mail returns next Sunday
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