Twenty One

It has been twenty one years since three friends of mine were murdered by mid-Eastern Islamic terrorists.

 

That afternoon, I assumed such an occurrence would—from then on—occur every six months. Thank God it did not.

I’ve written before about my friends and will link to last year’s post and another from a few years before. I'm out of words to commemorate that loss.

Yet somehow I missed the contemporaneous words of singer-songwriter Mary Chapin Carpenter. 🎵Grand Central Station🎵, written shortly after 9/11, will speak for me. The song is here: "Grand Central Station (Album Version)" by Mary Chapin Carpenter on Amazon Music.

The first and last two stanzas are:

 

Got my work clothes on for love, sweat and dirt

All this holy dust upon my face an’ shirt

Headin’ uptown now, just as the shifts are changin’

To Grand Central Station . . . 

 

And now Hercules is starin’ down at me

Next to him’s Minerva and Mercury

Well, I nod to them and start my crawl

Flyers covern’ every wall, faces of the missing are all I see

Tomorrow, I’ll be back there, workn’ on the pile

Going in, comin’ out, single file

Before my job is done there’s one more trip I’m makin’

To Grand Central Station, Grand Central Station

 

Here’s to another 21 years without flyers on the wall—or terror fliers in the air.

20 Years

It seems impossible it's been two decades since the last major terrorist attack on the U.S. murdered nearly 3,000. I've written about my three friends murdered by those terrorists. And about an American Hero who died while living in a house less than a half-mile from the house where I lived going to High-School. Needless to say, I never was a hero.

Around 1:00pm on 9/11, I remember walking back from my law firm, once we’d got confirmation that a partner with whom I was close was killed. For years, I had dated that partner's best friend, so "double dates" were the norm. At her anguished request I joined my ex-g/f at her house to share the grief.

Traffic was jammed--literally stopped around Dupont Circle--yet no one blew their horn. An eerie and graceful silence. I remember thinking to myself over and over: "Well, this is the new normal--we'll suffer one of these attacks every six months." Yet, that too didn't happen.

I'd like to think the two events were connected. Every adult who lived through September 11, 2001, grew up a bit, including our intel community. I know I matured that day. And as I slept on the couch at my ex-girlfriend’s apartment, I rededicated myself to this country and to American Exceptionalism. I still believe that's part of the shield protecting us for 20 years.

Below are some images from 9/11 and the next few days you may not have seen before. According to The Military Times, the picture of President George W. Bush was taken on September 12, 2001, as he shook the hands of first responders at the Pentagon. The flag hanging from the Pentagon--while rescue and recovery efforts still were underway--was sent by nearby Ft. Myers, and is the largest authorized flag for the military. 

The clock is from the Pentagon, stopped at the moment of impact.  Ironically, the Pentagon was in the process of a segment-by-segment renovation.  The segment struck by AA flight 77 was the first (and sole) section renovated; the death tole within the Pentagon was relatively low because fewer than normal had moved back into their new offices.

The last two images show some of the antennas festooned around the top of the World Trade Center.  The penultimate shot shows virtually every TV and Radio broadcaster transmitted from there.  The final picture shows microwave feed horns as part of a longer transmission path, broken (of course) when the towers melted and turned to rubble.  When the towers collapsed, radio and TV stations switched to their back-up transmitters/antennas, most on the Empire State Building.  But those were not nearly as well positioned:  over-the-air service in New Jersey and Connecticut suffered for several years.