September 11

September 11 is forever marked by a series of acts of cowardice perpetrated by people so different from you and me that we cannot possibly fathom why such heinous acts would even have been dreamed up. The horror we felt that day was infinitesimally smaller than what must have been felt by those trapped in the twin towers as they began falling, by the people in the Pentagon, and by the passengers on Flight 93.

I was at work in my suburban Maryland office that morning, interviewing a woman for a position in my company. One of our field technicians radioed me that he'd just heard on his truck radio that a plane had hit the World Trade Center in New York. I recalled that a plane had once hit the Empire State Building and mentioned it to the lady sitting in front of my desk as a way of apologizing for the interruption. A bit later in the interview, the same technician called me again to say that he was on I-295 and that he could see black smoke from over near the Pentagon and asked me if I knew what was going on. I told him I didn't and went on the the interview.

When the interview was over and I'd escorted the lady out to the lobby, one of our salesmen stopped me and asked if there was something wrong with our telephone system. He'd been trying to call a supplier in New Jersey and couldn't get through at all. We went upstairs to the president's office where he and the executive VP had the TV on and the horror of the day was becoming apparent. I watched for a while, unable to comprehend, then went back to my office and turned on my radio. It was tuned to a commercial classical music station, but there was no music. Instead, they were advising people to go home, to get away from Washington, and to stay calm. I went into our dispatch center and told them to get on the radios and recall the technicians, to pull them off jobs and send them home.

During the next couple of hours, I spent my time going up to the president's office, watching the gut wrenching news video of those huge buildings collapsing and the fire at the Pentagon, of the mystery of Flight 93, then returning to my office to try to work. Our company was situated about 6 miles east of the Capitol Beltway, but we released the remainder of the employees. I saw the news reports of the massive traffic jams and decided to stay at work. By 3:00 PM or so, I was the only one remaining in the building. The quiet was disturbing, so I went outside for a breath of air. A normally fairly busy railroad line ran along side our parking lot, but no trains had passed for hours. The greater Washington DC metropolitan area has three major airports, but there was not a plane in the sky. At some point I saw a pair of military jets fly over.

Around 5:00, I shut down my computer, checked the building, set the alarm system, walked out and locked the entrance doors. Out on the road, it was eerily still with the lack of traffic. In my 15 mile drive home, I only saw a few other cars. At home, I went into the back yard and just stood, my mind a jumble that still did not comprehend. The silence was deafening. There were no children playing, there was no sound of traffic from the highway about a quarter of a mile away, and there were no aircraft in the sky. Back in the house, I sat in the living room in silence for the longest time, this vision of those towers collapsing and the huge fire across town at the Pentagon running like silent films through my mind.

My son called from Texas to make sure I was OK. He'd heard about the Pentagon, but didn't know if my office was anywhere near it. I assured him that I was fine, that the Pentagon was across the city from me. After he hung up, I broke down and sobbed, crying like a baby.

Every morning now, when I go downstairs and turn on the TV, I'm relieved to hear the cheerful voices of the news crew, indicating that something unthinkable like happened on 9/11 hasn't recurred while I slept.