Where Were You on 9/11?

25 years later, I still remember.

Where were you on September 11, 2001?

I remember exactly where I was.

We were in our morning sales meeting in a conference room in Midtown Manhattan. Our office was on 40th Street near Broadway, and suddenly our administrative assistant walked into the room.

“Hey, we just got news that a plane hit the World Trade Center.”

We all looked at each other.

A plane?

Our first thought wasn't terrorism. We wondered whether it was some kind of terrible accident involving a small aircraft.

After all, something similar had happened before. On July 28, 1945, a B-25 Mitchell bomber, flying through heavy fog, accidentally crashed into the Empire State Building.

Maybe this was something like that.

We had no idea.

At 8:46 a.m., American Airlines Flight 11 had struck the North Tower.

Then, at 9:03 a.m., United Airlines Flight 175 struck the South Tower.

Now everything changed.

This wasn't an accident.

We had guys in our office who were military reservists, and immediately the atmosphere shifted. Windows were closed. People became alert. Nobody knew what was happening or what might happen next.

And we had colleagues working downtown near the World Trade Center, including people around the World Financial Center.

Were they okay?

Could we reach them?

What was happening downtown?

Nobody really knew.

And Then We Went to a Sales Meeting

This next part still makes me smile a little when I think about it.

One of my colleagues, Robert, was a great salesman.

And salespeople know the rule: if you tell a client you're coming, you show up.

Robert looked at me and said, “Pierre, let's go. We have that meeting at 1211 Sixth Avenue.”

I'm thinking, Rob, they're not going to let us in.

But off we went.

We walked over to Sixth Avenue and headed toward the building. The entire time I kept telling him, “They're not letting us in, Rob. Not with what's happening.”

Sure enough, we arrived and security had essentially locked everything down.

Even people delivering food weren't simply being allowed upstairs. Someone from the office had to come downstairs to receive the delivery.

Nobody was getting into that building.

So Robert and I turned around.

By then it was around 10 a.m.

What we didn't fully comprehend while walking Midtown was that downtown Manhattan was being transformed forever.

At 9:59 a.m., the South Tower collapsed.

At 10:28 a.m., the North Tower collapsed.

From where we were walking on Sixth Avenue, we didn't have a clear view of everything happening downtown.

What we could see was a gray sky.

Eventually, we returned to the office.

By then one thing was becoming very clear:

It was time to get out of Manhattan.

Getting Out of New York

Thankfully, I had driven into the city that morning.

At the time, I lived in Teaneck, New Jersey, and my car was parked in a garage next to our building.

But I wasn't about to drive toward the Lincoln Tunnel or immediately try the George Washington Bridge.

Nobody knew what was happening.

Nobody knew whether bridges, tunnels or other landmarks might be targets.

So I headed north.

I stayed mostly on local streets, worked my way up Manhattan, crossed into the Bronx and eventually made my way toward Pelham Parkway.

It took me roughly two hours just to get out of the city.

Everyone was trying to leave.

People were walking.

People were driving.

Transportation was overwhelmed.

The streets were filled with people trying to understand what had just happened while simultaneously trying to get somewhere safe.

Eventually I made it to the home of my friends Steve and Kathy DiMaggio in Pelham, New York.

Steve had his own 9/11 story.

He had been coming into Manhattan that morning and was emerging from the subway when the attacks occurred. He felt the effects of what was happening and went back into the subway to get himself home.

Kathy was a teacher in the Bronx and had made it home as well.

So we sat there.

We watched the news.

We made sure everybody was accounted for.

We tried to comprehend the incomprehensible.

Finally, sometime around 8 p.m., I decided to drive home to New Jersey.

And I'll never forget crossing the George Washington Bridge that night.

I looked south toward Manhattan.

The towers were gone.

If you knew the New York skyline before September 11, you understand what I mean.

It was eerie.

It was wrong.

For years those towers had simply been there.

Now there was empty space.

You Didn't Have to Be in the Towers to Be Touched

For a while, I could have told myself:

Pierre, you weren't downtown when it happened.

And that's true.

I was in Midtown.

But something I learned afterward is that tragedy doesn't necessarily stop at the geographic boundaries of where something happened.

We had colleagues working around Merrill Lynch and the World Financial Center.

One colleague who had come down from Massachusetts was staying at a hotel downtown. When everything happened, he had been getting ready for his day and had to flee wearing his boxers.

One of our church administrators, Jimmy, worked south of the towers. He managed to get out and take a ferry back toward New Jersey before the towers came down.

Thank God he made it.

Other colleagues weren't as fortunate.

Some lost friends.

Some lost coworkers.

Some lost family members.

And some of the people who survived carried what they witnessed with them for years.

Then I Went Back Downtown

Our church used to meet at 90 West Street, right beside the World Trade Center site.

That building was badly damaged during the collapse.

Our church met on the 18th floor, and I remember photographs of our pastor going back into the building and looking through windows that had been shattered by debris.

About a month after 9/11, I finally went downtown again.

There are things photographs cannot reproduce.

The smell.

The atmosphere.

The absence.

Walking through streets where I had walked countless times and seeing buildings damaged and deformed.

And then looking up and realizing again:

The towers aren't there.

I continued working in New York until 2014 and eventually left the New York area in 2017.

I had worked in New York City for about 25 years.

Those towers had been part of my New York.

Today One World Trade Center stands over Lower Manhattan.

It's beautiful.

But for those of us who knew the skyline before 2001, it's still different.

That skyline changed forever.

But One Memory Touched Me More Than Almost Anything Else

About a month after the attacks, the company I worked for brought in a Holocaust survivor to speak with us.

She was an older woman by then.

She had survived something almost impossible for most of us to comprehend.

And she came to speak to employees who had been touched in different ways by September 11.

I remember her strength.

I remember her humility.

But there's something else I remember.

I remember watching grown men cry.

These weren't weak men.

These were my colleagues.

Big guys. Strong guys. Fathers. Professionals.

Some had lost friends in the towers.

Some had lost colleagues.

Some had lost people much closer to them.

And while this woman spoke, I watched those men break down.

That touched me.

Forever touched me.

There was something about watching someone who had survived unimaginable tragedy speak strength into people who were walking through their own grief.

Twenty-five years later, I still remember it.

New York Became Different for a While

There are stories from the aftermath of 9/11 that still touch me.

Recently, I heard the recollection of a structural engineer who had gone downtown to assist after the collapse.

Engineers were desperately needed. They understood structures, loads and the danger of additional collapses.

A couple of days after the attacks, this engineer got into a taxi.

The cab driver asked him something like:

“Do you think they're going to find anybody alive?”

The engineer knew the reality of what he had seen.

He was about to answer negatively.

Then he noticed a photograph on the cab driver's dashboard.

It was a young police officer.

And suddenly he wondered:

Is that his son?

When they arrived, the engineer prepared to pay.

The cab driver wouldn't take his money.

He recognized that this man was helping at Ground Zero.

Then the driver got out of his cab.

He walked around.

He opened the door.

And he hugged him.

Think about that.

A New York cab driver hugging a stranger.

If you knew New York, especially back then, you understand why that image stays with you.

For a little while, something happened.

People came together.

Strangers helped strangers.

Police officers ran toward danger.

Firefighters ran toward danger.

Construction workers came.

Engineers came.

Ironworkers came.

Volunteers came.

People donated food.

People donated money.

People donated equipment.

People donated time.

People hugged people they didn't know.

For months, workers continued around the clock.

The rescue became recovery.

The recovery became cleanup.

And finally, after approximately nine months, the Ground Zero recovery operation formally ended on May 30, 2002.

2,977 People

That number matters.

2,977 people were killed in the September 11 attacks.

And they weren't all Americans.

They came from more than 90 nations.

Thousands of individual lives.

Thousands of families whose morning began normally and whose lives would never be normal in quite the same way again.

But there is something else worth remembering.

When the attacks began, approximately 16,400 to 18,000 people were inside the World Trade Center complex.

The overwhelming majority escaped.

Thousands lived.

Thousands made it home.

Thousands got another day.

That is worth remembering too.

So What Does This Have to Do With Us 25 Years Later?

Memory matters.

Sometimes we think something didn't affect us because we weren't standing at Ground Zero.

Maybe you weren't in New York.

Maybe you weren't in Washington.

Maybe you weren't anywhere near Pennsylvania.

Maybe you were in another country.

But perhaps you knew someone.

Perhaps you watched it happen live.

Perhaps someone you loved was traveling that day.

Perhaps you spent hours trying to reach somebody.

Perhaps your father, mother, brother, sister, son, daughter, friend or coworker was a police officer, firefighter, military member, first responder or someone working in Lower Manhattan.

Events can touch us even when we're miles away.

And those memories become part of our story.

And There Is a Spiritual Lesson Here Too

Scripture tells us:

“Be sober, be vigilant…” — 1 Peter 5:8

September 11 reminds me of vigilance.

There are physical gates that nations protect.

But there are also gates in our personal lives that we must protect.

Protect your eyes.

Protect your ears.

Pay attention to what you're allowing into your heart.

Pay attention to what you're allowing into your mind.

Not everything attempting to gain entrance into your life deserves access.

Jesus said:

“Watch and pray…” — Matthew 26:41

There is wisdom in remembering.

There is wisdom in watching.

There is wisdom in remaining spiritually awake.

And there is wisdom in recognizing that some things we experience should not simply disappear with us.

Tell Your Story

That's another thing September 11 reminds me of 25 years later.

Tell your story.

Write it down.

Record it.

Put it in a journal.

Put it in a book.

Tell your children.

Tell your grandchildren.

Don't assume that because something happened to millions of other people, your perspective doesn't matter.

Nobody else stood exactly where you stood.

Nobody else saw everything exactly the way you saw it.

Nobody else experienced it through precisely your relationships, your emotions and your circumstances.

Your memory is part of history too.

That's one reason I'm writing mine today.

Twenty-five years later, I can still remember that conference room.

I can still remember Robert insisting that we go see our client.

I can still remember walking Sixth Avenue.

I can still remember that gray sky.

I can still remember trying to get out of Manhattan.

I can still remember sitting at Steve and Kathy's house watching the news.

I can still remember driving across the George Washington Bridge that night and looking toward Lower Manhattan.

And seeing what wasn't there anymore.

I remember returning downtown.

I remember the smell.

I remember the damaged buildings.

I remember the stories.

And I remember those grown men crying as a Holocaust survivor reminded us that even after unimaginable tragedy, human beings can continue living, loving, rebuilding and moving forward.

Twenty-five years later:

I remember.

And I hope we never forget.

Now I want to hear from you.

Where were you on September 11, 2001?

Even if it's only a few sentences, put your story in the comments.

Tell us where you were.

Tell us what you remember.

Because your story matters too.

#NeverForget #September11 #September11th #911 #25YearsLater #WhereWereYou #NewYorkCity #NYC #WorldTradeCenter #TwinTowers #Remembering911 #TellYourStory #Legacy #Faith #Vigilance #MemoryMatters