Here's mine in abbreviated form so I can get this thing online:
My main memory of 9/11 is the blue of the Chicago sky. No jets lowering to O'Hare or Midway, no contrails making some new weather, nothing. Just blue.
I was driving east on Irving Park when I heard the first report on -- of course -- the sports-talk radio station WSCR The Score. I switched over to NewsRadio WBBM 780. Even the earliest reports -- erroneously reporting that it was a DC-3 that hit the first tower -- made it sound deliberate. I was driving south on the Kennedy toward downtown when the second plane hit. My eyes went immediately upward -- to the Sears Tower, as it was then known, already visible in the distance. My office building was kitty-corner from it.
I called Mrs. Plainsman, in charge of an elementary school in a suburb. I called her out of a meeting and told her to get a TV on pronto.
No work got done that day. There was concern over whether the Sears Tower would be targeted, and our building closed down by midday. I had the only TV in the office, and people huddled around, disbelieving.
I had spent some of my young-guy life in New York City, but a few emails and phone calls blessedly confirmed that no one I knew had been injured or killed. I didn't know of the full impact of 9/11 on my life until several years later. I was vaguely aware that my best childhood friend growing up in the Midwest, a brilliant kid and a brilliant man, had eventually ended up at the Pentagon as a financial analyst. I had not kept in touch with him over the years, and I hadn't thought about him on 9/11. Later, I did.
If he had been sitting in his office in the Pentagon on 9/11, he would have survived.
He wasn't. He was in the jet that hit it.
I'm sorry for your loss. My twins were born less than an hour after the first plane hit. See here: http://middletree.blogspot.com/2011/08/saying-goodbye-to-one-set-of-twins-and.html
ReplyDeleteJames, that's a wonderful piece. I commend James's link to The Nation, and don't forget to click through to the photograph at the end. What an extraordinary day for you.
ReplyDeleteHappy birthday to Abigail and Jacob.
I will say that all Ticket hosts did an exceptional job covering the tradegy for at least a week. As you would expect, sports was put on hold and it was non-stop talk about 9/11.
ReplyDeleteOne more thing that's relevant in this space: there is audio out there of the Musers on 9/11. Pretty fascinating how the tone of the broadcast changed as they watched that 2nd plane crash into the tower.
ReplyDeleteMusers are going to replay their 9/11 audio tomorrow, apparently.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theunticket.com/musers-911-audio-slightly-extended/
ReplyDeleteand
http://www.theunticket.com/musers-911-audio-1-23-04/
Thanks to good strong unP1's ilikesteak and stickman.
-ap
I was in Vegas for a trade show. I never left the room until late afternoon. When the airliners were grounded I got a rent car and we drove home on Thursday.
ReplyDeleteI guess the most surreal part of the trip was the lack of interaction between me and my two co-workers. We were mostly silent as we drove straight through to Dallas.
Driving halfway across the country gave us the opportunity to listen to different people when we stopped for gas and to eat.
Thanks ap. We really appreciate The Unticket's work. Especially for things like this.
ReplyDelete-Anon B
The Muser's 9/11 audio always gets me choked up when they replay it and talk about how they were feeling at the time. I wasn't a big P1 then and only listened in the evenings, so I wasn't part of it live at the time, but it still brings back the memories.
ReplyDelete