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As 9/11 approaches, the anxiety fills me again. Pop my blood pressure meds, go walking in the park, watch Miami-Florida State, call Donna ,my new gal-i should be feeling good. Labor Day weekend is amateur weekend down the shore but i went anyway, mainly because Donna was jonesing for the triple-bonus poker slots.Paid too much for the rinky-dink dive of a motel, but the bed was huge, the distance to the beach less than fifty yards, and Donna was in a great mood
It was fun gambling all saturday night especially since we both won.$600 took the edge off the room rates ,and i even managed to pull her away from the machines before she gave it all back.We returned to our room and ate breakfast staring at the sea gulls flying in over the boardwalk.Then she asked the question."Where were you on 9/11?"
God! what a memory.So i asked her to sit down on the bed and told her my story.I was a chef at a boat club in Philly having moved there from New York, and had worked seven straight days the previous week , so i asked my boss for two days off so i could go to New York and visit my family. My cousin lives on Houston Street on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, and she works for the City as an attorney. Her husband is an ex-navy cab driver who has had a run of bad luck finding a job once he left the service,so he had been drinking too much , and my cousin called me up to ask if i could come visit and cheer him up and talk to him about AA.
I made good time driving down that Monday, parking my car at the Penn Station lot in Newark and taking the PATH train into the World Trade Center. I decided to hop a cab to the South Street Seaport and hang out with my former co-workers at Fluties Restruant.I called my cousins husband Tom and asked him to meet me at the ESPN sports zone in Times Square, because the New York Giants were playing Monday Night Football in an hour against the Denver Broncos and i wanted to watch the game since this was the first game since we lost the Superbowl to Baltimore.
Though i hate hanging out in bars since i quit drinking, i also wanted Tom comfortable enough away from home so that he might open up and tell me what was bothering him.Tom pulled up in his car just as i turned into 42nd street and luckily he found a parking. I could tell he had already been drinking , and i immediately decided that he was not going to drive home. The game sucked because we were blown out and Tom was steadily drinking and flirting with every girl that walked into the place. It wasn't until two that we left the bar , me driving, and got to his place.My cousin was pissed and practically threw the pillow and blankets at me as i went to sleep on the couch.Tom staggered into their bedroom and i heard them arguing as i fell asleep.
My cousin woke me at six on her way out the door and asked me if i could make sure her son got to school on time. I've taken him to school plenty of times in the past and i nodded before i went back to sleep. Tom left to work an early shift while i was asleep and the house was quiet, until their son Bobby shook me awake and said it was seven -thirty and we should get going. I walked him the mile to school and decided to stop at the Puerto Rican bodega , grab a newspaper and coffee and plan my day. I wanted to go to M.O.M.A, and planned to visit my ex at her job on Wall Street. I walked into the condo complex that my cousin lived in and stopped to talk to Mrs.Morales who had babysat Bobby when he was younger.
We were just talking about old times when a kid ran in and said a plane had just crashed into the WTC. I ran outside and in the distance could see the top of the building smoking. I immediately started walking towards the building. I had gone about three blocks when all of a sudden i saw another plane flying real low heading towards the building. I stood there in horror as the plane plunged into the second tower sending flames up in the air and huge billowing black smoke all around.Cars were screeching to a halt all along the street and people were screaming and crying. I used my cellphone to call my cousin but got a busy tone , and my first thought was i needed to get Bobby out of school. I ran almost the whole way to his school, just in time to see all the kids being let out.
I found Bobby and together we decided to walk towards City Hall to try and find his mum. Walking past Canal Street we were real close to the building and Bobby was getting scared that the WTC could fall on us. I told him we were too far away from it but we should stop and buy some disposable cameras so we could take pictures.It never entered my mind that the buildings could fall and as we rushed down Broadway i kept an eye on the building. "Look John", Bobby said," people are jumping oh my God!" i froze and looked up and sure enough you could see people jumping from the top of the building.
I took some pictures and through the viewfinder , got some close looks of some people standing on a ledge of an office window , and then holding hands and jumping. Bobby was crying by now and i decided that we should go home instead because hundreds of people were walking in the opposite direction and we were being told to move away from the area by police. I could hear hundreds of sirens heading down there and people were abandoning their cars in the middle of the street. All around us people were crying , shouting and screaming and Bobby was losing it ,so i grabbed him and we ran back towards Houston street. In the time we took to approach his house , i could turn and see the fire was raging out of control and the smoke was getting worse.
Like a scene from hell i heard a huge roar and the it seemed like the one tower tilted and all of a sudden, in a mass of twisted wreckage, billowing dust and a sound i'll never forget , the building disappeared from my view.There was only one tower where two had stood. I started running faster trying to keep up with a youthfull Bobby who was now totally freaked out and crying.We got back to the complex and stood and watched the scene with a bunch of shocked and disbelieving neighbors. When the second building collasped i has seen enough and i pulled Bobby and took him upstairs. I again tried to call my cousin but still got no answer and Tom was nowhere to be found. To make it more freaky, the power went out and now i couldn't watch the coverage, but bobby found a battery operated radio and we listened to 1010 winds news updates. By now i had already guessed it was a terrorist attack and i could hear military jets and helicopters flying all around.
I listened to the presidents statement on the radio and also heard all the rumours about attacks in Washington and Pennyslavania.Bobby was getting hysterical about finding his mum and i was trying to convince him that it was impossible to find anyone in that area with all the dust and chaos, and thouands of people. We say there listening to the radio and stepping out to the balconey where we could see the dust clouds over the site. It wasn't until two that my cousin walked in , barefoot carrying her highheels. She had gone to Bobby's school looking for him and she was crying in relief when she saw him at home .Now we worried about Tom but i was convinced he was fine because his cab service was based in Queens.
Tom didn't get home until 6pm having walked all the way from Queens because even the subways were disrupted or crowded and it was much easier to walk across the bridge. The Mayor announced the closing of all bridges and tunnels out of Manhattan and i was effectively stranded. Tom and i then went down to the site that night and watched the rescue workers going in to find bodies , getting cheers from the crowd as they drove in. It was pitch black with spotlights set up and it was pretty eerie .The police had created a barrier at 14 th street so we couldn't go any further, so we sat there with a bunch of people hearing horror stories of lost husbands , wives , lovers, children and co-workers as the young kids lit candles and started singing "God Bless America".
A terrible smell permeated the air and dust was everywhere. I mentioned to Tom that it was the smell of death and destruction , and he was soon bawling his eyes out. I tried to think about all the times i had been in the WTC the previous day, having twice connected trains in number five. But for the grace of God , i might have been in that building , as i had gone through it every day for five years when i worked and went to college downtown. I thought of all the people i knew who worked there , and didn't know it at the time, but a friends husband died in the North Tower. His office was on the 105th floor right below Windows of The World restruant. In his office 700 people died. He was off that day but was called in to meet a client.
We returned home in silence , and sat in the dark , using the two candles we had for light in the bathroom and Bobby's room.. I hadn't called my folks or sisters and brothers and all they knew was that i was in New York. My boss too knew i was in New York and he was calling my cell but couldn't get through. For four days we stayed in only leaving to go to a branch of my cousins bank to get money for food and supplies. We bought a portable generator and set up some light, but mostly we played cards , listened to the radio and told stories. Even my cousin let Tom have a few drinks at home figuring that it was one way to keep him indoors. I eventually returned to Philly on Friday , with memories that i have tried to erase.
My cousin and Tom have since divorced, Bobby is getting ready to go to College and my cousin is in private practise, but even now i have nightmares of the people jumping and the second plane hitting and that huge fire ball that filled the sky. I've never been to Ground Zero, always finding a way to avoid it but next week i'm making the trip, maybe i can stop the demons.Donna says she'll go with me but i have still refused to show her the pictures i took that day. There's no need to ruin her sleep.
Full moon last night. Even though it's still summer, that harvest moon gives it away: change is around the corner. This had to be the fastest summer of my life; I ran the entire way.
I really, really like living in The 'Kan. I love adventure and I love travel and it's the best day of the week when I can find out something new and learn a whole lot more. And therein lies the conundrum of each and every day as I pull the soft, smooth sheets away and slip out of bed to survey the morning sky, panoramic in my bedroom window. That horizon bids me ever onward and succumbing to the call of the Sirens, much as Odysseus, I find to my dismay that when I come home to The 'Kan, the roses have bloomed and gone.
I planted the roses and made a garden in memory of my mother, in honor of my friends, in hopes for my children. I lined the paths of the garden with the most used of bricks and filled them with the tiny rainbow pebbles of the Mission Valley. Along the way, I culled and collected birdhouses and benches and feeders and fountains and my most favorite of rocks from everywhere and poked and placed them along the path, for respite and reflection. It's a wonderful garden, built by me.
It's been alone much of the summer and as a result, my eye is clouded and corroded and weary. I sit in my office and watch the planes fly east to Chicago and south to Denver. The little ones head straight for Seattle. The American flag waves languidly off a crane of the big project down the street and the sky sits a pale gray, still in the September summer. I can't see and understand how the gray of the morning air makes me feel and so I know again, that the benches in my garden have sat too long in the summer sun without me.
I need a mast made of the finest hardwood and the strongest of rope; to lash me, to hold me, to protect me from the seductive call of the Sirens, ever singing a new beautiful melody of odyssey. I will plant this mast deep in my garden among the tall ferns and in the thickest of the mosses, and hold dear to the ropes that bind me--to keep me near the roses, who bloom fragrant and spicy each and every day of the year, just for me.
JBelle
Bellemaison
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