The front page diary, Remember 9/11 has a lot of reminiscences of today ten years ago. I just posted my comment. It is longer than most diaries that many of us post here. With that in mind, I decided to repost it as a diary and include some photographs I took not even two weeks ago, on August 31st.
The evening of September 10th, driving up West Street. It was a beautiful night, the seemingly never ending construction by the World Financial Center and World Trade Center was finally done.
I thought to myself how nice the road finally was and how nice all the buildings looked. I stole a peek at the towers, like I always did when I went by them.
Twenty five hours later, that pristine urban scene had become hell.
I was in my classroom on Staten Island. I saw two students suddenly look up and out the window next to them. There was nothing to see as the room looked out onto a courtyard. They said they heard something like a low boom. It would be another couple days before we all realized that was the first plane hitting.
Another student came to my room and said a plane hit the Trade Center and if I had my computer online. Being the second day of the school year, and in a new classroom, I didn't. It was like being in a news blackout.
Thinking it was a small, private plane I wasn't too concerned, more curious as to what happened. Several minutes later, another teacher came by and said it was no small accident, and then we found out about the second plane.
I couldn't leave the classroom of course, even though these were high school seniors in front of me. I was stuck there until just after 10:00am. By now, we knew the size of the attack. I called my parents to see what they knew. My mother said that one of the buildings had collapsed.
I thought that is insane. A 110 story building falling down? Never. By now, I was a bit dazed. I went to go to the roof of the school, from there I'd see Manhattan, just about nine miles away. It was just past 10:30am.
When I had watched school football games from the roof, if you turned north east to see Manhattan, the Trade Center dominated the skyline. You couldn't see the Empire State Building, blocked by the towers.
When I look northeast that morning, all I saw was a huge plume of gray smoke and dust, and behind it, the Empire State Building.
The school emptied out over the next hour or two. Some students remained. They asked how many people may have been killed. I said, "Too many. Almost 50,000 people work there." Looking back, it is a sad miracle that only (!) 2700 or so died at the Trade Center. If the attack happened an hour or two later, the toll easily could have been ten times what it was.
Students asked who could have done this. Somehow, in the depths of my brain, came the name, and I said, "Just remember the name Osama bin Laden." "Who?" came the reply.
Today, those students are now 27 years old, out of college, some married, some even with children of their own. Thanks to Facebook, I still have some contact with many of them. Some I still see and talk to, and some have become friends. Not because of that day ten years ago, but that day is indelibly part of our shared lives.
I was incredibly lucky. A very close friend who worked across the street from the WTC, and would normally be crossing the plaza at the time of the attack, was on vacation. I know some of the names lost- three firefighters who were students at my school, a father of a former student. Yet, no one truly close to me was lost that day. No matter, the tears the next couple of days were intense.
Two things set my emotions off, in a way they are a bit odd. The first was watching the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace the next day when one of the Royal Military Bands played the Star Spangled Banner. I simply found myself on the floor, hysterical crying.
The second was reading that a German newspaper (I believe Der Bild), and I have never actually seen it, had a cover with a famous photo of a Berlin Airlift plane flying low over the heads of some Berliners, dropping candy from the cockpit. The headline read, "Now it is our turn to help them."
To this day, like right now, I choke right up when I tell that story. I would still love to see that newspaper.
Today, I don't have the television on. I just spent a couple of hours at my school doing some work believe it or not. (Yup, on a Sunday.)
My flag is flying but my mind is actually a lot more interested in what is rising at the site now. So far, it sounds like the Memorial is a success, the families are very happy with it.
I went to downtown Manhattan a week and a half ago. It really is not Ground Zero, a term I always hated. It is the World Trade Center- and it is just beautiful.
And here, the new World Trade Center:
From the Staten Island Ferry:
One World Trade Center:
Four World Trade Center rising:
The Memorial Plaza:
And one last one...just so everyone knows what kind of people are making the re-birth possible...union people: