9-11

So, as much as I don't really like having conversations about 9/11, maybe today 6 years later its time to tell my story. It is not a story of heroism or hardship. It is not a story riddled with a political agenda or one with social commentary or answers or conclusions. It is just my version of what happened to me and what I saw.

9/11 was on a Tuesday. I remember this because it was primary elections that day. On the ballot was the primary for the mayors race. Guiliani was stepping down and it looked like whomever won the Democratic primary (either Freddie Ferrar or Mark Green) would become the next mayor.

I was working at NYPIRG at the time and as usual, we had a very extensive Voter Helpline setup. All day New Yorkers could call us up and find out where their polling site was or call us to complain about being turned away or a faulty machine and we would try and put pressure on the Board Of Elections or whoever we could to get the problem fixed ASAP. I didn't work on our voter campaign at the time, but everyone on election day had to take a shift staffing the phones. So i had to be at the office on Murray St. between Broadway and Church by 10:00 to start my shift.

Living in Williamsburg at the time, I came in on the L-train and transferred to the downtown R. As the train came to my stop there was a big announcement on the train that because of an emergency, the next stop, Rector St. would be the last stop on the train. Stopped trains, delayed trains, and emergencies were nothing that unordinary during rush hour so nobody took it as an "EMERGENCY".

It was just about 9:00 a.m.

I got out and came up to the street at Murray on the City Hall Park side of the street and immediately noticed that something was wrong. People were nervously walking through the streets and there was a strange buzz, but i was tired and didn't think much of it. I went to my normal coffee stand on Broadway and walked toward my office. As I approached i ran into my friend Marvin who was NYPIRG's bookkeeper. He shook his head and said "ain't this something."

"What?"

"The plane he said...go look" as he pointed up towards the towers.

From the 3rd floor office you could always clearly see the top of the towers, but from the street, i had to go up to Church to see them. So I started towards the intersection. I get within 50 feet and BANG. The ground shakes, the buildings rock and bow like something out of the Matrix. and debris comes shooting down Broadway past my view. I see something giant bounce off the top of the building on the SW corner of Murray and B-way and then take out the street sign. It was a plane engine. Later on I would see pictures of both the engine on the street and the sign lying mangled on the street.

People were running wildly in every direction.

At this point i still don't understand what was going on. I didn't know that while i was still on the subway, a plane flew into the World Trade Center and until i looked up now, i didn't know a second plane just hit. But when i do look up, I can't look away. I stand on that corner looking at the top 2o floors of the towers on fire. I'm stuck in time with about 30 others on that corner with the burning engine just feet away.

Another friend catches me standing there frozen with my coffee still in my hand and tells me that we should go upstairs to the office.

When i get upstairs the Voter Helpline is still in full swing. Most of the city has no idea what is going on...neither do we really. My boss, and the team running the phones are in discussions on what we should do. There are still a handful of people working for NYPIRG that were in the very same building back in the early 90s when the first bombing attempt at the WTC happened. They, like most other are convinced that this is probably just going to end with a people a little shook up but not much more.

The discussion on whether or not to keep the phones up and open is left to an individual basis. The calls kept coming in and people who were willing to take them, answered the phone. Needing to get outside, I went out with a few co-workers into the same intersection. It was a bad choice. I did not want to see what i saw. Small figures dropping from the top floors of the towers. Unmistakably human figures leaping out of the windows billowing with smoke. As long as I live. That will be my lasting nightmare.

I went back upstairs and tried to answer a few calls. On my way from the elevator, a giant rumble shook everything...everything. I looked out the window to see the top of the tower tilt and fall. Within a minute, amongst muffled screams, cries the rumble and confusion, the whole street was covered in a giant white cloud. The tower had fell!

A very clear thinking co-worker came up to me and said "we have to tape up the windows now."

Our building was old and the window frames were crumbling and smoke was getting in. I went with her around our floor and taped up the windows as best we could. Along our route, i overheard a radio broadcaster saying that the Pentagon had gotten bombed along with the State Department and other federal buildings in other cities. What the hell was going on?

When i got back to the office lobby, a friend that used to work at NYPIRG came in a looked confused. Marianna was her name and as she came in she said "I work at the north tower, i have nowhere to go...i was late for work...i never got inside."

People were trying to call family members but the phone lines kept going in and out. I got a call from someone who used to work for me, Lourdes who was calling from Swarthmore and i got a call out to my sister who was working in midtown. Being a bunch of organizers, we quickly paired off into teams. Each team had a destination and a we made plans to get out of the building. I handed out wet paper towels as makeshift smoke masks. The first team went down the stairs and out. I was in the second team. As we walked down the stairs, RUMBLE. That noise, that feeling, that all was happening again. We ran back upstairs and knew the second tower was gone.

Outside the taped windows was a thicker cloud of black smoke.

The elevator opened and a Police Officer came out covered in soot. He wasn't there to try and tell us to get out. He was caught in the smoke and ours was the only open door on the block. We gave him water and he left with his radio blaring the chaos from the street.

That first team never came back, they had made it to the street and had to run from the black cloud. They were all OK, but Marianna was in that group and i still haven't talked to her to this day. We left 30 minutes later and could not believe what it looked like outside. Everything was covered in feet of soot. It was a very surreal kind of scene and i saw things amongst the rubble i still can't talk about.

I spent a lot of time with good friends over the next few weeksand i spent a lot of time by myself. I was allowed with police escort to return the office to gather some supplies a few days later, and spent the next 6 years trying to sort out my feelings on what happened.

Over the next few months i drank every night at the Raccoon Lodge on Warren St. To get there, I had to show my passport, my social security card, a pay stub with the address in the red zone and answer several questions. Why did i drink there? It was my bar, my friends were there. There were rescue workers and only people with reason to be downtown. That bar kept many people sane and together during a situation of absolute terror.

Tonight is the 6th anniversary of 9/11 and in a few hours i have to go bartend at the Raccoon lodge where now, as fate would have it...i work.