15 Years Later

At this point in time fifteen years ago, I had finally made it home to Long Island from my job in Westchester County.  As I have written about before, the day had started with me dropping my car off for service and upon getting to work, I learned that a plane had hit one of the towers of the World Trade Center. I was able to find a TV and my colleagues and I crowded around the TV to watch.  I went off to find a computer to get more information and then learned that a second plane had hit the other tower.

I was able to get to the roof of the Archive Center and could see the smoke rising from the city skyline some thirty five miles to the south.  I was finally able to reach my girlfriend (now Mrs. BA) who had a dentist appointment (which I hadn't remembered, I only knew that she worked across the street from the White House).  I left for home about 2:00pm and as I traveled south, fighter jets crisscrossed the sky above me - I crossed the Throgs Neck Bridge as policeman waived me through the toll barriers.  As I looked over to the city, the smoke hanging over lower Manhattan was immense.  I drove east on the Long Island Expressway as trucks and emergency equipment passed me heading west into the city.

Upon getting home I was able to talk with my parents, who had been flying that day - they were in Texas - but they were taken off the plane, shortly after the planes struck their targets and the decision was made to close the airspace over the United States. (If you're in the DC area, I highly recommend that you go to Ford's Theatre to see "Come From Away" about the planes from Europe that were forced to land in Gander, Newfoundland.)

I went to church that evening as many Americans did.  As the scope of the tragedy unfolded and the tremendous loss of life became evident - I stayed home the next day - there wasn't anyway for me to get to work anyway - and I was able to reflect on how much had changed for each and everyone of us.

I traveled to Ground Zero not long after - when the debris still burned and participated in a candlelight vigil.  Just last year, I finally made it to the Memorial in the plaza and was deeply moved - much as I knew I would be.  Today, I spent most of the day reflecting on what happened fifteen years ago - I watched some of the coverage of the events in New York City today - I watched some of the documentaries that have been produced about that dark day.  We went to church, as we do almost every Sunday and we closed with the hymn, Let There Be Peace on Earth.  Yes, please, let's try that.

Remember.

 

To Remember

Today our nation will pause, as it has done for the past thirteen years, to remember, to reflect.


The events of September 11, 2001 are seared in our minds.  On that particular day, I left for work, dropped my car off for service, and when I picked it up that afternoon, the world had changed.  Each year since starting this blog, I have posted to remember the day.  Feel free to go back and read the previous posts:

• 2006
• 2007
• 2008
• 2009, this post included my contribution to Project 2,996
• 2010
• 2011
• 2012
• 2013

Take a minute today.  Take several minutes.  Remember. 

12 Years Later - Never Forget

This past year, traveling home from a conference in Erie, PA, I had the opportunity to stop in Shanksville, PA and visited the Flight 93 Memorial.  It was a very moving experience and I'm glad I stopped.  Every year since I started this blog - I have posted something today, here's the list of the previous posts:

1. 2012
2. 2011
3. 2010
4. 2009
5. 2008
6. 2007
7. 2006

On this day, as I always say, stop - take a moment - remember.  Remember the ones we lost, remember the ones who helped and gave all.

To Remember 11 Years Later

The weather today is very much like it was that dark day 11 years ago.  Bright blue sky, comfortable temperatures.  I had dropped my car off for service and a friend picked me up to take me to work.  Walking into my office and turning on the radio in my office was the last "normal" thing I did that day.

I moved from the New York area less than a year after 9/11.  But on this day - I will always be a New Yorker.  Here are my previous posts on 9/11.

• September 11, 2006
• September 11, 2007
• September 11, 2008
• September 11, 2009
• September 11, 2010
• September 11, 2011

I also recommend that you go read MetroDad's blog - who usually posts a letter to his friend Andy, who was in the Towers. Today I am choosing to remember one of the victims who was from the same town where I grew up.  Remember Andy, Maria, and all of those we lost that day.

Maria Rose Abad

Age: 49
Residence: Syosset, NY,
Occupation: Senior Vice President, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Location: World Trade Center, Tower 2, 86th floor

Marie Abad loved her job as a senior vice president at Keefe Bruyette Woods, where she was one of the highest-ranking women in the firm. But it was equally important to her to find an escape from work, said her husband, Rudy, and she found that through the hundreds of books she went through each year.

Ms. Abad, 49, read on the train commuting from Long Island to the World Trade Center, and she read on vacation. Each October, she and her husband would spend three weeks in Hawaii — a tradition that started on their honeymoon and continued over the next two decades — and every year she would make sure she had plenty to read. Hawaii meant down time: days on end when the biggest decision was where to have dinner, and the passage of time was marked by the leisurely flutter of turned pages — novels, biographies, celebrity tell-alls.

"She'd go through eight books in three weeks, and these were not little books," Mr. Abad said. "I know because I did the packing."

Ms. Abad, who was born and raised in Queens, did not plan on a career in business. She studied sociology at Queens College and dreamed of being a teacher. She and her husband had plotted out the lives they would lead when the workaday world could be left behind: six months of the year traveling was their plan. And of course, a world of books to explore.

Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on April 7, 2002. From Legacy.com
______________________________________________

Rudy Abad's world collapsed when the Twin Towers fell, burying his wife, Marie Rose, and the couple's plans to retire early and travel the world.

"I could feel the slabs of concrete hitting her, crushing her body," Abad said at his Woodbury home.

It took a while for Abad to face the reality of his devastating loss. Feeling like he "was getting paid for her death," he held out until the 11th hour to claim his share of the $7-billion victim's compensation fund after the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

But Abad found a way to channel his grief by helping others in hardship and keeping the spirit of his wife alive by partnering with a nonprofit to build housing for homeless families in his native country, the Philippines. So, in one of the Philippines' most poverty-stricken areas, today rises The Maria Rose Abad Village, named for his late wife.

Abad's is just one of the most visible charitable efforts undertaken by many bereaved relatives of 9/11 victims. Other families have launched similar charitable ventures ranging from full-fledged foundations to scholarships and donations to the victims of natural disasters such as the Southeast Asia tsunami.

"The grief they have experienced has made them more empathetic to the grief of others," said Bill Doyle, a 9/11 family advocate and co-president of the 9/11 Charitable Health Insurance Group, which provides group health insurance to more than 1,500 individuals and family members affected by the attacks. "So many families are now calling me to find out how they can do something for the hurricane victims." Doyle, a retired Lehman Brothers stockbroker from Staten Island, lost his son, Joseph, a government bond supervisor for Cantor Fitzgerald at the World Trade Center.

Marie Rose Abad was 49 when her life was cut short in the south tower. She was born in the Greenpoint section of Brooklyn and raised in Richmond Hill, Queens.

"She was a very bright, very pleasant, giving person whom was always willing to lend an ear," Abad said of his wife, who was memorialized Oct. 13, 2001, at Holy Name of Jesus Parish in Woodbury. "We were really best friends."

The Maria Rose Abad Village in Tondo, in metropolitan Manila, comprises three clusters of 46 brightly colored row houses and a two-unit school house for preschoolers. Except for the school, all the houses have been completed and are already occupied.

One of the residents is Marites Espinosa, 39, a mother of seven, the youngest of whom is only 3.

She lives with husband Romulo, who works hauling vegetables delivered at a nearby market. After their humble shelter burned down in 2001, her family was awarded, one year later, one of the new homes that Abad financed.

"I am happy that we now have a home," she said.

Especially with the onset of the rainy season last month, Marites is thankful that there are no roof leaks to contend with anymore. The only hitch now is the lack of electricity because residents have yet to apply for meters with the utility company.

Rey Campanera, a two-term councilman in Baseco since 1998, is grateful as well for the work being done by nonprofit groups like Gawad Kalinga and Habitat for Humanity. "Finally, legitimate residents are being provided their right to decent housing," he said.

His wife would have been extremely happy about that, said Abad, 59, adding that theirs was a "Cinderella marriage." They met in 1970 during a Merrill Lynch training program, he said, and married, in 1974.

She landed a job in Manhattan in 1978 with investment bankers Keefe, Bruyette & Woods. She rose to senior vice president at the firm, which moved into the south tower in 1985.

When a truck loaded with explosives tore a hole in the underground garage of the north tower in 1993, Abad said his wife walked down 90 floors and was covered in soot. "At first, we were fearful about her going back," he said, "but, like with everything, time makes you forget."

Still, Abad said, he won't forget the images of Sept. 11.

He was on his daily treadmill run when the phone rang that morning. "Don't worry," Abad said his wife assured him from her office on the 89th floor. "I'm OK. I said, 'What are you talking about?' She said, 'Turn on the TV.'"

Video of the burning tower played on television, prompting Abad to call his wife. As they talked, he watched horrified as the second jetliner slammed into her tower. "Your building just got hit," he told her. She cut the call short. Then around 9:25 a.m. she called again to say the heat was getting unbearable and people were trying to leave.

"Pray, please pray," she told him. "Call me as soon as you can," he said.

In the aftermath of his wife's death, Abad said he searched for a purpose - something "meaningful."

He sponsored a couple of young Filipino girls whose photos adorn his fridge, and even made donations to American Indian causes.

But when former schoolmate Mike Goco told him about the work a Philippines-based nonprofit was doing to provide housing for residents in metropolitan Manila, he had an epiphany.

Abad recalled how, heartbroken by the street urchins his wife saw, some as young as 4-years-old selling lottery tickets on one of several trips to his homeland, she spent two days handing out one-peso coins to every kid she crossed paths with.

Abad partnered with Gawad Kalinga, taking a portion of the victim compensation he received to finance the construction of the village that now bears his wife's name and picture on a plaque at the gateway.

"The lives of 50 families will improve dramatically because my wife died," Abad said shortly before leaving Long Island last week on a five-week trip to the Philippines where he plans to break ground on a second housing project. "This time, I want to get my hands dirty." - Collin Nash  From Newsday

10 Years Later

Twin Tower Cameos from Dan Meth on Vimeo.

Here we are - ten years later. This post will go up at the exact moment the first plane struck the north tower of the World Trade Center (of course, shown in the video above). At that moment ten years ago, I was dropping my car off for service and had a friend pick me up for work. When I got to work, of course, everything changed. You can read my previous posts about September 11 by clicking the links that follow (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010).

Since that day, so much of my own life has changed. My mother (who was getting on a plane with my father in Texas that morning) passed away in 2006. I married the love of my life (who was here in Washington on September 11, while I was still in New York) and we now have two wonderful boys, who I hope will never have to experience the same tragic circumstances that I did.

We live in a nation forever different. Many of the things we took for granted have been irrevocably changed. We still find ourselves looking over our shoulder for what might be coming next (as recent news shows). I feel like I want to watch some of the ceremonies tomorrow and have been drawn to several of the anniversary shows that have been on TV this week.

Remembering is what we should do. Never forgetting what and who we lost is what we can do. Being strong and moving forward is what we must do. At some point today, stop. reflect. remember. God Bless America.

A Day For Reflection

My post from September 11, 2006

My post from September 11, 2007

My post from September 11, 2008

My post from September 11, 2009

In the morning on this day nine years ago, I had just dropped my car off for service and gotten a ride into work. I turned on the radio in my office and the morning show deejays that I normally listened to were talking in very subdued tones, relating how what was believed to have been a small plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.

There is not a day that goes by when I don't think about September 11. Everything changed that day and the images from that day are seared into my mind. Like a tragic Flickr stream, images pop into my head, and especially on this day. I have also been watching some of the specials that have been on television over the past few days leading up to today's anniversary.

There is another blogger out there whom I read. He also marks this day by writing a letter to his friend, Andy, who didn't come home that day from his office in the World Trade Center. You should go read his post for today.

Then. Stop. Reflect. Remember.

To Remember

It was such a nice day. Eight years later now and we need to stop, reflect for a moment and remember. Always remember. Previous posts about this dark day in our history here and here.

To help remember this dark day, I joined Project 2,996, where bloggers around the world offer to post memories of those lost on September 11. I was asked to remember William Chalcoff. I ask that you do so as well.

Mr. Chalcoff, 41[the same age I am now] was a computer systems developer at Marsh & McLennan. He and his wife immigrated to the United States from Argentina. They both became naturalized citizens in 2001. "He was so proud to be an American," Mrs. Chalcoff said. He was also proud that his accent was disappearing and that people no longer asked where he was from.

On the morning of Sept. 11, Chalcoff and his wife were were talking on the phone when she heard a very loud noise, and the call was disconnected.

Chalcoff lived on Long Island in Roslyn, New York.


Update: The Big Picture (from the Boston Globe) has a series of photos out today remembering September 11.

A Hope and a Prayer

Today is September 11, 2008. It was seven years ago this morning that the world in which we live was forever changed. I posted about my experiences in 2001 here. We are now preparing for a presidential election where we will elect a new Chief Executive to steer our nation in this new world. Now, I have a political blog and my allegiances are fairly well known. But I am using this blog to make a pitch to every American to exercise their right to vote.

This election is by far the most important one of my generation. It is likely to be close and the result may not even be immediately known. However you feel, whichever candidate you support, please get involved. You owe it to yourself to vote. You don't get to speak if you don't use your voice.

If you need some inspiration, think about the thousands of people who aren't here anymore as a result of the attacks we remember today. Don't you think they would like to have a say in the direction this country goes?

So today, stop, remember, and then get involved. We have no choice. The future is in our hands.

To Remember

I know I missed putting a recipe out yesterday, but I have been busy with packing up the house for our move, which will take place one week from today. We will close on our house tomorrow.

I wanted to take a moment to pause and reflect on the day. I put my flag out today. My mother was a stickler for flying the flag on holidays. Not that this is a holiday, although it is proclaimed as "Patriot Day." Last year I wrote about what I was doing on this fateful day six years ago.

As I did last year, I want to tell everyone. Stop. Take a Moment. Be thankful. Give the one you love an extra hug and a kiss. Remember those we lost. Be well, all.

To Remember

Today the nation and the world observes a somber anniversary. Five years ago, I was working in New York. My office was in Westchester County and I was living on Long Island. I had just arrived at work and walking into my office, I heard on the radio that a "small plane" had struck the World Trade Center in New York. I left my office and went to turn on the only TV in the building. As I passed the office manager's office I told her what I had heard and she followed me to the TV. I then returned to her office to get on the computer to try and get more information. A few moments later she came into the office and said gravely, "I just watched another plane hit the other tower." Suddenly we knew something very bad was happening.

My girlfriend was living here in Maryland and her office is across the street from the White House. I tried vainly to get in touch with her for most of the morning. I finally remembered that she had had a dental appointment and was not in downtown DC that day. My thoughts then turned to my parents, who were preparing to get on a plane in Houston, Texas. When I finally talked to them later, my mother told me they had been put on the plane only to be taken back off again. My father went up to a television and asked a pilot who was standing there what had happened. With a voice barely audible, he replied, "the planes hit the towers."

I finally left my office in the early afternoon, after talking to my girlfriend and learning she was safe. I was unsure how I would get home and how long it might take me. As I traveled south on the Bronx River Parkway, fighter jets crossed overhead. I arrived at the Throgs Neck Bridge and for the first and likely only time in my life, paid no toll. Police stood at the toll barriers waving people through. As I crossed the bridge, I could look to the left and see the plume of smoke still rising over lower Manhattan. I got on the Long Island Expressway and headed east. The westbound lanes into New York City were closed except for emergency vehicles. Many fire trucks, police, and rescue trucks (refrigerated trucks, spotlights, etc.) passed me. My commute home, which normally takes me an hour, had taken me just 45 minutes.

I sat in my parent's house and watched the endless coverage on the TV. I could not believe what I was watching, it was just too surreal. Even now, five years later, the memories are still so vivid in my mind. A month or so later, I had the opportunity to visit lower Manhattan and viewed Ground Zero, with pieces of the World Trade Center still standing on the site. Fires still burned in the wreckage, and recovery efforts continued around the clock. I wept as I looked at memorials, especially the one outside the chapel that had become a rest station for the rescue workers.

So five years later, the mantra has become, "America is safer, but we are not safe." I just finished watching the president's address to the nation and I know that our lives as Americans are forever changed and we must continue to honor the memory of those we lost on that day in any way that we can. Take a moment and remember what we lost that day. God bless.