nmah5491.xml
Title
nmah5491.xml
Source
born-digital
Media Type
story
Date Entered
2003-04-12
NMAH Story: Story
I was living in Pittsburgh. I had just quit my job with a brokerage firm in San Diego the end of July. So, when our company was bought out, I cashed out my stock options, and my partner, Marc and I packed up everything to move back East where we both were from. I had been out West for the prior 5 years and was so happy to be back home where things were more familiar. I grew up in Philadelphia and had friends in New York. I love the city and enjoyed being a tourist there. Even though Arizona and California have some amazing and beautiful sights, it couldn't ever compare them to the feeling I had visiting Manhattan. My partner, Marc grew up in Northern New Jersey. New York was part of the regional neighborhood for him. We both couldn't wait to get some pays together and visit. One of the last places I visited was the World Trade Center on St. Patick's Day, 1996 with my sister. I made a point of us going there because I loved the twin towers and knew I wouldn't be able to see them in person for a long time.
I was in the process of interviewing for a position with the same brokerage firm from San Diego, so until that came through, I was working for the Carnegie Library's main branch in the Oakland section of the city. It was such a beautiful cloudless morning. I remember arriving at work shortly before 8 a.m. thinking how like San Diego's weather it was, low humidity, perfect weather.
I was filing some forms when my partner called me on the phone. He told me a plane hit the World Trade Center! I thought how horrible it was, but I thought it was a small commuter plane. The fire would be put out and I'd see it on the news when I got home. So, I was a little put off by the call. I mean, this was the middle of the work day and I'm on a new job that may lead to something permanent. So, here I'm taking a personal call. I got off the call but mentioned it to the computer techs I was working with. They seemed pretty amazed but none of us fathomed what we were about to hear as the day went on. A short time later, Marc calls again. He's sounding panicked. He's telling me another plane flew into the OTHER tower of the World Trade Center. I felt as though someone threw an ice cold bucket of water at me. I couldn't believe it. I love architecture. I'd been to the Trade center a handful of times. However, the last time I was there, I was purposefully trying to remember all the details of the experience until I could visit it again. The marble tiled multi-storied lobby. The polished chrome and glass. The way the street lights looked almost like the glow of lava flows through lower Manhattan at twilight and the flashes of pictures being taken from tourists at the Empire State building miles uptown.
When I got off the phone, my nerves where shot. People around me at other desks were getting similar calls. I tried to bring up MSNBC or CNN but it was taking a long time to load. When I finally got it's main page to load and saw just how large the hole in the buildings were, I almost passed out! It was no small plane that hit the buildings. I knew right away that several floors were on fire. We were also able to bring up an internet news radio feed. They were describing another plane had hit the Pentagon and several planes were still unaccounted for. A woman from the desk over the cubicle told me her husband called and said they heard a missing plane was flying over Cleveland and had gone off course. It was headed for Pittsburgh! By this time, I was in shock with everything that had already happened, what I had seen. What I was hearing over the radio and on the phone from Marc. I dismissed this Pittsburgh bound plane. Why Pittsburgh? But at the same time, it didn't make any sense why New York and Washington.
I used to call Morgan Stanley's operations center in the Trade Center. Their Account Transfers office was in 4 World Trade on the 5th floor. I saved that address in my Outlook contacts. Dealing with Morgan's branch offices usually was very frustrating. So, I would call the Trade center to expedite an account transfer problem or to get an answer on when an account was coming over. I remember talking to one of the reps around 1999. She was waiting for her computer to come back with an answer on something. I was making small talk about what it was like to work at the World Trade Center. She said she liked working there. She told me they had the bulk of their offices in the upper floors of 2 World Trade. She mentions the jazz concerts in the plaza during the summer months that she would listen to on her lunch breaks. I said, "Oh, so you just walk across the plaza when you have meetings there?" She said, sometimes, and sometimes they just take the elevator to the concourse level that connects the buildings." I just finished working for a brokerage firm. I knew what people were probably doing when all this happened. From secretaries, to wire operators, brokers, traders, support staff and janitors...ordinary people who just thought they were going to work that day. Murdered. Out right murdered. Suddenly, nothing horrific seemed to be off limits in my imagination.
Marc calls again. This time he's telling me another airliner crashed in a field outside of Pittsburgh. He also told me his father, who works in Brooklyn was supposed to deliver a printing job in lower Manhattan and his mom hasn't heard from him. She tried his cell number over and over and there was no answer. Marc's mom works as a secretary for a school in Northern New Jersey and many of the children at the school had a parent or parents working in the towers. Her brother, trying to get a train out of Manhattan in Penn Station had heard of a plane crash in Pittsburgh and thought it had crashed into one of the sky scrapers in the downtown area. He was concerned for me, thinking I was working there.
Thankfully, Marc's father stopped to talk with a client in New Jersey before heading for the tunnels and by the time he got there, cars were being turned around. No one was going through the tunnels. Word finally got out to Marc's uncle that the plane crash happened 80 miles outside of Pittsburgh. We also got work Marc's dad was safe.
I stayed at work the entire day. I was in a fog. Working at the Carnegie gave me access to the art museum, the library, the Natural History Museum. Around noon, I didn't want to hear about any of it anymore. I couldn't take it. I wanted to go to a place in that huge building and pretend it wasn't happening. I wandered through the empty art gallery but people, cashiers, guards, anyone with a radio had it tuned to news of the disasters. It was everywhere. I thought it was odd being in this place of civilation and culture while this facade of safety, facade of invicibility was falling apart.
When Marc called and told me one of towers was gone. I said, "what do mean it's 'gone'?? You mean the top floors fell over? He said, 'No, the entire building collapsed' I stood there frozen with the phone in my hand. In 1993, it took people a good hour or hours to get all the way down the stairs. I knew there were alot of people still in the building. I knew instantly thousands of people died a horrific and brutal death. The towers were immense. Each floor was the size of an acre. Multiply that acre by 110 floors and double it. Then place a shopping mall underneath, and 6 stories of parking and transit lines. I still can't think of it without crying. It's a fire in New York. All the personnel working to get people out of the building. All the bystanders looking up at the towers. I still can't believe it could happen. Marc said he heard that most everyone had vacated the building when the first tower was hit. I knew that was probably the case, but there still would have been many people still trying to get out.
When I got home, Downtown Pittsburgh was a ghost town. When I sat on the fire escape of our building looking at downtown, usually there were helicopter and planes flying about and cars going by on Western Avenue, but nothing. I was so quiet. This beautiful, cloudless eerie quiet sunset.
I was in the process of interviewing for a position with the same brokerage firm from San Diego, so until that came through, I was working for the Carnegie Library's main branch in the Oakland section of the city. It was such a beautiful cloudless morning. I remember arriving at work shortly before 8 a.m. thinking how like San Diego's weather it was, low humidity, perfect weather.
I was filing some forms when my partner called me on the phone. He told me a plane hit the World Trade Center! I thought how horrible it was, but I thought it was a small commuter plane. The fire would be put out and I'd see it on the news when I got home. So, I was a little put off by the call. I mean, this was the middle of the work day and I'm on a new job that may lead to something permanent. So, here I'm taking a personal call. I got off the call but mentioned it to the computer techs I was working with. They seemed pretty amazed but none of us fathomed what we were about to hear as the day went on. A short time later, Marc calls again. He's sounding panicked. He's telling me another plane flew into the OTHER tower of the World Trade Center. I felt as though someone threw an ice cold bucket of water at me. I couldn't believe it. I love architecture. I'd been to the Trade center a handful of times. However, the last time I was there, I was purposefully trying to remember all the details of the experience until I could visit it again. The marble tiled multi-storied lobby. The polished chrome and glass. The way the street lights looked almost like the glow of lava flows through lower Manhattan at twilight and the flashes of pictures being taken from tourists at the Empire State building miles uptown.
When I got off the phone, my nerves where shot. People around me at other desks were getting similar calls. I tried to bring up MSNBC or CNN but it was taking a long time to load. When I finally got it's main page to load and saw just how large the hole in the buildings were, I almost passed out! It was no small plane that hit the buildings. I knew right away that several floors were on fire. We were also able to bring up an internet news radio feed. They were describing another plane had hit the Pentagon and several planes were still unaccounted for. A woman from the desk over the cubicle told me her husband called and said they heard a missing plane was flying over Cleveland and had gone off course. It was headed for Pittsburgh! By this time, I was in shock with everything that had already happened, what I had seen. What I was hearing over the radio and on the phone from Marc. I dismissed this Pittsburgh bound plane. Why Pittsburgh? But at the same time, it didn't make any sense why New York and Washington.
I used to call Morgan Stanley's operations center in the Trade Center. Their Account Transfers office was in 4 World Trade on the 5th floor. I saved that address in my Outlook contacts. Dealing with Morgan's branch offices usually was very frustrating. So, I would call the Trade center to expedite an account transfer problem or to get an answer on when an account was coming over. I remember talking to one of the reps around 1999. She was waiting for her computer to come back with an answer on something. I was making small talk about what it was like to work at the World Trade Center. She said she liked working there. She told me they had the bulk of their offices in the upper floors of 2 World Trade. She mentions the jazz concerts in the plaza during the summer months that she would listen to on her lunch breaks. I said, "Oh, so you just walk across the plaza when you have meetings there?" She said, sometimes, and sometimes they just take the elevator to the concourse level that connects the buildings." I just finished working for a brokerage firm. I knew what people were probably doing when all this happened. From secretaries, to wire operators, brokers, traders, support staff and janitors...ordinary people who just thought they were going to work that day. Murdered. Out right murdered. Suddenly, nothing horrific seemed to be off limits in my imagination.
Marc calls again. This time he's telling me another airliner crashed in a field outside of Pittsburgh. He also told me his father, who works in Brooklyn was supposed to deliver a printing job in lower Manhattan and his mom hasn't heard from him. She tried his cell number over and over and there was no answer. Marc's mom works as a secretary for a school in Northern New Jersey and many of the children at the school had a parent or parents working in the towers. Her brother, trying to get a train out of Manhattan in Penn Station had heard of a plane crash in Pittsburgh and thought it had crashed into one of the sky scrapers in the downtown area. He was concerned for me, thinking I was working there.
Thankfully, Marc's father stopped to talk with a client in New Jersey before heading for the tunnels and by the time he got there, cars were being turned around. No one was going through the tunnels. Word finally got out to Marc's uncle that the plane crash happened 80 miles outside of Pittsburgh. We also got work Marc's dad was safe.
I stayed at work the entire day. I was in a fog. Working at the Carnegie gave me access to the art museum, the library, the Natural History Museum. Around noon, I didn't want to hear about any of it anymore. I couldn't take it. I wanted to go to a place in that huge building and pretend it wasn't happening. I wandered through the empty art gallery but people, cashiers, guards, anyone with a radio had it tuned to news of the disasters. It was everywhere. I thought it was odd being in this place of civilation and culture while this facade of safety, facade of invicibility was falling apart.
When Marc called and told me one of towers was gone. I said, "what do mean it's 'gone'?? You mean the top floors fell over? He said, 'No, the entire building collapsed' I stood there frozen with the phone in my hand. In 1993, it took people a good hour or hours to get all the way down the stairs. I knew there were alot of people still in the building. I knew instantly thousands of people died a horrific and brutal death. The towers were immense. Each floor was the size of an acre. Multiply that acre by 110 floors and double it. Then place a shopping mall underneath, and 6 stories of parking and transit lines. I still can't think of it without crying. It's a fire in New York. All the personnel working to get people out of the building. All the bystanders looking up at the towers. I still can't believe it could happen. Marc said he heard that most everyone had vacated the building when the first tower was hit. I knew that was probably the case, but there still would have been many people still trying to get out.
When I got home, Downtown Pittsburgh was a ghost town. When I sat on the fire escape of our building looking at downtown, usually there were helicopter and planes flying about and cars going by on Western Avenue, but nothing. I was so quiet. This beautiful, cloudless eerie quiet sunset.
NMAH Story: Life Changed
I have this sense if immediacy. Anything I feel I want to do before I die, I do as soon as I can. I don't put things off anymore for another time. It's shown me the impermanence of conditions in our world. I don't feel I can count on anything to last forever.
I've felt so aweful since Sept 11th. The only thing that kept me going was Marc and the stories of unbelievable sacrifice. That those who died were in the presence of angels in the form of rescue workers and co-workers. That in the face of unspeakable evil, the closest thing I've ever come to seeing the face of a satanic monster's acts, there were words of comfort, incredible sacrifice and bravery. Americans rose to the challenge and brought down a plane in Pennsylvania. Made sure people got out safely. Lined up for blocks to donate their blood. Volunteered to dig through a living hell.
When I would visit the 107th floor "Top of the World" observatory, I would always be in the presence of families from every country in the world. Most speaking in the native languages and marveling at this engineering marvel. I was always so proud of my country when I was around these people. That I lived in a country that could create something so amazing, it drew people from all over the world to see it.
The words of those citizens in countries all over the world. The flowers, the tears, the comfort they've provided has also helped to heal the wounds of that day. I feel I need to thank them all. The entire world was united in collective mourning, grief and support. We all felt our humanity on that day.
I've felt so aweful since Sept 11th. The only thing that kept me going was Marc and the stories of unbelievable sacrifice. That those who died were in the presence of angels in the form of rescue workers and co-workers. That in the face of unspeakable evil, the closest thing I've ever come to seeing the face of a satanic monster's acts, there were words of comfort, incredible sacrifice and bravery. Americans rose to the challenge and brought down a plane in Pennsylvania. Made sure people got out safely. Lined up for blocks to donate their blood. Volunteered to dig through a living hell.
When I would visit the 107th floor "Top of the World" observatory, I would always be in the presence of families from every country in the world. Most speaking in the native languages and marveling at this engineering marvel. I was always so proud of my country when I was around these people. That I lived in a country that could create something so amazing, it drew people from all over the world to see it.
The words of those citizens in countries all over the world. The flowers, the tears, the comfort they've provided has also helped to heal the wounds of that day. I feel I need to thank them all. The entire world was united in collective mourning, grief and support. We all felt our humanity on that day.
NMAH Story: Remembered
The main thing is how fragile life is. And how we all live on the planet together. No matter what flag people call their own, or what part of the world their from, we're all human.
I thought the goal in life, before Sept. 11th, was to get rich and amass as much material status as possible. I always thought if I was working in the World Trade Center for a brokerage firm, it would be the penultimate statement that I had achieved success. When the towers collapsed, so did my illusions. Illusions that we're safe from terrorists. That American lives are more important that others.
Unless we come to terms with creating a world where everyone can feel safe, where everyone has a place to live, where the dignity of every person is held in high regard, we'll be forced to live with the consequences of a world where trust and unity lose their meaning. Every citizen on the planet has a responsibility to themselves and those they love, to creating a planet where a 'September 11' or a Holocaust or any other genocide can never happen again.
I thought the goal in life, before Sept. 11th, was to get rich and amass as much material status as possible. I always thought if I was working in the World Trade Center for a brokerage firm, it would be the penultimate statement that I had achieved success. When the towers collapsed, so did my illusions. Illusions that we're safe from terrorists. That American lives are more important that others.
Unless we come to terms with creating a world where everyone can feel safe, where everyone has a place to live, where the dignity of every person is held in high regard, we'll be forced to live with the consequences of a world where trust and unity lose their meaning. Every citizen on the planet has a responsibility to themselves and those they love, to creating a planet where a 'September 11' or a Holocaust or any other genocide can never happen again.
NMAH Story: Flag
No. Even though I've become even more in love with America than I have before this, I feel flags, borders and religions are helping to keep us of us in the world from seeing the real truth. We all have a vested interest in the future of the planet.
Citation
“nmah5491.xml,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed November 23, 2024, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/42823.