Oh The Places

25 years ago today. It’s a lifetime ago. Some people today don’t even remember a world before 9/11. I’ll never forget. 

I’m not sure I’ve ever put down my story of that day. In a way I didn’t think it was deserving. I survived. All my closest people survived – although friends can’t say the same. I was lucky, but it’s made me the person I am today. I grew up that day and I will never forget.

I was young, new to New York City and it was a beautiful day. The most perfect of days. The sun was shining. The sky was blue. The temperature was perfect. I was at an early morning job interview almost 50 floors above Manhattan. I was admiring the beautiful view as I sat down. That changed in the next hour.

I first saw smoke coming from downtown, and I thought that was strange, but I was on an interview so I wanted to focus. Then someone came in to the office and said a small plane hit the World Trade Center and we all said “How do you miss that?” We went to the windows for a closer view and after a few minutes, we went back into the interview. We were wrapping up with a few pleasantries, and I see a huge orange fireball. I calmly said, “I’m sorry but the World Trade Center just exploded.”

At that moment, we instantly realized that life as we knew it had changed. We knew our world was under attack, and we knew we were almost 50 floors above Grand Central Station, so we might be next.

In that second, Stacy immediately told everybody that we were leaving the building. She called the managing director and couldn’t get a hold of him so she directed us all downstairs. As we headed downstairs, I said, “What do I do now?” She said, “ Go home if you can handle this, you can handle PR.” In that moment I remember thinking that she cared about her people and that she’d be a good person to work for. (I did get the job). 

So I stood on the corner of 42nd and Lexington. New York City buzzing. I decided to try to call my mother at work. For some reason, I didn’t think anybody would know what was going on. This was before the days of social media and immediate news. All I had was a flip phone that I hardly ever used. So I dialed a few times, and not surprisingly, it wasn’t going through.

But I did get through. The receptionist was so excited to hear from me and as soon as soon as I talked to my mom, she started crying. I didn’t think she would even know what happened, but she did and she didn’t know where I was – only that I was on a job interview. She was so relieved and also a bit guilt ridden as she had other coworkers who didn’t know where their children were.

After I hung up the phone, someone else used it to call one of their loved ones and I started thinking about how to get home. 

It was a simple Subway ride on a normal day, but this wasn’t a normal day, and I was scared to go underground and decided to take the bus. 

I was able to quickly get on the bus at 42nd and third heading uptown to 85th and second. A short journey normally. I’m not sure how long this ride took, at least an hour, but it felt like forever –  each moment there was a new development.

Somehow I got a seat. It was at the front of the bus. The woman next to me was crying. She was shaking a bit and she kept saying my alarm didn’t go off. My alarm didn’t go off. I just remember putting my arm around her and finding out that she worked in the World Trade Center. She was coming up the subway as the plane hit. Her alarm didn’t go off.

Then there was a guy who got on the bus, I don’t know maybe we were at 45th street at that point. He said the Pentagon was hit. At this point I was thinking we were in an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie and I’m about to wake up from this bad dream. It didn’t feel real.

A few minutes later someone said the south tower was gone. I said what do you mean it’s gone. He said it’s collapsed. I couldn’t believe that was possible.

As we continued along 3rd Ave, we continued to get updates. We heard that there there was a plane crash in field in Pennsylvania, and that the north tower had fell. All this heading up third Avenue. I realize now I could’ve walked faster. But at the time I felt safer on the bus and with the strangers who I will never forget.

When I got off at 86th street there was no traffic. I was shocked at how quiet it was around 10:45 in the morning. I stood in the middle of 2nd Avenue looking downtown seeing the smoke even from 85th street you could smell it.

When I got into my apartment, the first thing I did was turn on the TV. Even after seeing that huge orange fireball with my own eyes, somehow seeing Peter Jennings talk about it, made it feel real.

The phone lines were still jammed, so I went online. AOL instant messenger was the best way of communicating with people. I was messaging with my roommate and she was still at work. I couldn’t believe they hadn’t let them go. The entire city had shut down.

I spoke with my mother again and as I looked out the 18th floor window of my apartment. She asked if I wanted her to come get me. I immediately responded no! And then a little quieter. I said you can’t.  My first response I was proud of my second I was a bit scared of. Manhattan was truly an island at that point the only way on or off was walking over a bridge – something I didn’t do until many years later in my final weekend in NYC.

Once my roommate came home, we went outside with our neighbor Ruth and her dog Jack. We didn’t really know what to do but we wanted to do something, and we’re New Yorkers so we decided to go get a slice of pizza. We went to the pizza shop a couple blocks away, still in a daze. The guy at the shop apologized because they didn’t get their delivery that day and they didn’t have enough pizza. So the three of us split two slices, and we honestly didn’t care. We just wanted to do something. Support a business? Be with our fellow New Yorkers. Anything to not sit there with our thoughts.  

And that was the theme for the next few days. We just wanted to do something. So Ruth and I we went to the firehouse with Jack. I think we baked them something. Ruth told jokes. Jack smiled and made everybody happy. We didn’t know what else to do. But it was something.

We went to Synagogue. Something I never really do, and I think it was the first time for Ruth since she left England. The synagogue was full of everyone just wanting to do something – and the sermon was about kindness.

If you ask me what I remember from that time, of course it’s the heartbreak of losing so many innocent lives through such an evil, despicable act and the way our world changed. And also that orange fireball and the thousands of missing posters, and the smell that you would get even uptown that you just knew was the World Trade Center.

But what I hang onto – even 25 years later – is how the city came together. I remember the kindness of strangers I remember how the Rottweiler New York City became a huge teddy bear, and how we all looked out for each other. We were a community. A community of eight or nine million people who had experienced something awful together, and we weren’t going to let it kill the spirit of our city. We were strong. We were proud. We were New York. I was new to New York City, but on that day, I became a New Yorker. And today as I write this from London, I still am. 

If if there’s anything that we can take away on the 25th anniversary of that horrible day, it is the spirit of kindness. 

While those of us in New York experienced so much kindness, a level of hate was also growing – us versus them. And as we navigate through today’s world that so often shows so much hate, if we can do anything for those who were forever frozen in time 25 years ago, we can be kind. We can be better. We can stop the hate. We can each do one little thing to make this world better to honor those who we lost and who we will never forget.