The Memory is Now Mine
"As I stood in tower two I could hear the screams from beyond the stairwell and looked inside to see who was still in the building..."
A 9/11 show. "Darn...it started at 9, we missed the whole show," Jim said disappointed.
I however was glad we missed it. It is one of a hundred documentaries that will be on in the next couple days that I hope to miss. While I laid in bed last night with my eyes closed I listened to the show Jim was watching. I listened to the people describe their experience, the fear, the horror and the brave men and women of 9/11. I listened with my eyes closed and imagined what they looked like, I imagined everything they were talking about, and for the 10th year, I couldn't believe that people, just an hour up the road, actually had to endure something so horrific.
I said, "I can't believe that no matter how many of these documentaries we watch it is NEVER the same story. There are so many stories, there were so many heroes, there were so many families ruined...it is just so sad." And that is why I am glad I missed this documentary, they just take my breath away. I can't believe that people actually had to endure something so catastrophic.
There was a little girl on the show last night who is now ten. Her father was one of the men on the flight that crashed in the field in Pennsylvania. Her mother read something the little girl wrote about her dad, about how he was a hero and how it is hard missing him. I can't even imagine. The mother spoke about the day she decided to listen to the recorded black box audio. She heard the passenger uprising, she heard the chaos, she heard the wind in the background as the plane was crashing..and then she stopped listening. Ya see, she was on the phone for thirty minutes with her husband while he was on that flight. He called her to tell her goodbye. He called her to tell her he loved her and then she heard the plane crash. She said to hear that silence again would be just to much, so she stopped listening.
I can't even begin to put myself in her shoes. To pick up the phone and hear Jim tell me he loved me for the last time. To know that the silence meant he was no longer alive. How did she cope? How did any of them cope?
I don't want to watch the documentaries not because I don't want to remember or because I want to look the other way. I don't want to watch them because I am amazed at that level of human pain. I am amazed that anyone could endure such tragedy. I am amazed that there is actually a woman out there that listened to her husband as his plane crashed.
Tomorrow is the 10th anniversary of 9/11. I, remember being in my car headed back to GNC from the morning bank drop-off. I remember wanting to rush and pick up Cody and Skylar from school. I remember listening to it all on the radio. I remember looking at my boss in fear when two middle eastern men walked into the store. I remember knowing that nothing would ever be the same, ever again.
9/11 is something different for each person. My friend worked in the air traffic control office that was speaking to the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. I knew a guy that worked for HBO and watched the plane go through one of the towers. My friend and her husband organized a run from Indiana to Ground Zero and were there when the buildings were still smoldering.
I lost no one. I knew no one that died. Yet somehow each story that I hear becomes a story I never forget. Each story becomes my story. A story to live in my mind and to make 9/11 grow in my heart and mind forever. That woman's story is now a part of me. He daughter's story is a part of me....forever.
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A 9/11 show. "Darn...it started at 9, we missed the whole show," Jim said disappointed.
I however was glad we missed it. It is one of a hundred documentaries that will be on in the next couple days that I hope to miss. While I laid in bed last night with my eyes closed I listened to the show Jim was watching. I listened to the people describe their experience, the fear, the horror and the brave men and women of 9/11. I listened with my eyes closed and imagined what they looked like, I imagined everything they were talking about, and for the 10th year, I couldn't believe that people, just an hour up the road, actually had to endure something so horrific.
I said, "I can't believe that no matter how many of these documentaries we watch it is NEVER the same story. There are so many stories, there were so many heroes, there were so many families ruined...it is just so sad." And that is why I am glad I missed this documentary, they just take my breath away. I can't believe that people actually had to endure something so catastrophic.
There was a little girl on the show last night who is now ten. Her father was one of the men on the flight that crashed in the field in Pennsylvania. Her mother read something the little girl wrote about her dad, about how he was a hero and how it is hard missing him. I can't even imagine. The mother spoke about the day she decided to listen to the recorded black box audio. She heard the passenger uprising, she heard the chaos, she heard the wind in the background as the plane was crashing..and then she stopped listening. Ya see, she was on the phone for thirty minutes with her husband while he was on that flight. He called her to tell her goodbye. He called her to tell her he loved her and then she heard the plane crash. She said to hear that silence again would be just to much, so she stopped listening.
I can't even begin to put myself in her shoes. To pick up the phone and hear Jim tell me he loved me for the last time. To know that the silence meant he was no longer alive. How did she cope? How did any of them cope?
I don't want to watch the documentaries not because I don't want to remember or because I want to look the other way. I don't want to watch them because I am amazed at that level of human pain. I am amazed that anyone could endure such tragedy. I am amazed that there is actually a woman out there that listened to her husband as his plane crashed.
Tomorrow is the 10th anniversary of 9/11. I, remember being in my car headed back to GNC from the morning bank drop-off. I remember wanting to rush and pick up Cody and Skylar from school. I remember listening to it all on the radio. I remember looking at my boss in fear when two middle eastern men walked into the store. I remember knowing that nothing would ever be the same, ever again.
9/11 is something different for each person. My friend worked in the air traffic control office that was speaking to the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. I knew a guy that worked for HBO and watched the plane go through one of the towers. My friend and her husband organized a run from Indiana to Ground Zero and were there when the buildings were still smoldering.
I lost no one. I knew no one that died. Yet somehow each story that I hear becomes a story I never forget. Each story becomes my story. A story to live in my mind and to make 9/11 grow in my heart and mind forever. That woman's story is now a part of me. He daughter's story is a part of me....forever.
Click COMMENTS to leave a comment!!!
I saw the show last night. Tom Brokaw did an amazing job. All the stories were so hard but the one that really got me was the woman who spoke with her husband of 20 years on the phone while he took his last breath. Then in an odd twist of fate she died a few years later in a plane crash. So crazy. I cried throughout the show. I was a first year principal in 2001. Keeping staff and families calm the 2nd month on the job is a memory I will not soon forget. God Bless the heros and the families.
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