Reply #38: September 11, 2001

[Burma Jones]

We were living in NY and I didn't know where my wife and kids were, no cell phones. My wife and kids arrived home at about noon. Our friends and family that lived and/or worked in/near the financial district couldn't communicate with us until late that afternoon via email. One of my younger brothers saw the attacks from Washington Square Park, he was a Sophomore at NYU. Our community lost 12 people that day. We had moved to NY from Northern Virginia the year before and I grew up in the DC area, so, I watched the pictures of smoke billowing over DC and the Pentagon and was nauseous. I went grocery shopping later that afternoon, just to get away from the TV I guess and because our neighbor still didn't know where her husband was so we invited her and her infant son over for dinner......and the store was darkened as if it was on backup power and it was silent except for the sounds of cash registers. The days that followed were so quiet.

My brother came to stay with us for awhile as the wind shifted and the noxious cloud of dust and smoke was directed northward into Greenwich Village and beyond. We came back with him about 10 days after the attack and decided to walk down to ground zero. You could hear bagpipes and sirens and mumbling. There was thick dust everywhere. We passed two fire stations on the way down. For years, I couldn't pass a NYC fire station without a surge of emotion. We looked at the ruins, they hadn't started to do much cleanup by then. The signs for the missing were everywhere and the air had the strangest smell. We went back to Washington Square Park, which was absolutely bustling with people, and saw Walter Becker with an electric guitar and portable amp just playing for kicks....



My Dad fought and, for four years now, has beaten throat cancer....as he was going through the treatments, there were some very bad days there.