NYC...9/11...and pre-9/11 photos from 1979

The morning of September 11, 2001, I was at work in my little cubicle at PAIIR. My desk faced a large window, and the sun was pouring in here in Minnesota much as it was pouring in windows at the World Trade Center in New York.

My office mate was late for work due to a personal crisis of checkbook theft, so I was going it alone in the office. So I was the one to answer the phone when it rang.

It was my Mom. “A plane just hit one of the World Trade Towers.” Huh? I couldn’t wrap my mind around what she was saying. You see, we’ve been New Yorkers. We could see the Towers from our “backyard”. I had my ears pierced when I was 6, at a shop in the World Trade Towers.We both assumed it was an accident and were discussing this terrible “accident” when she exclaimed “Oh NO! Another one!”We both needed to hang up…we were both upset and didn’t want to reveal to one another how upsetting this was to us.

I felt the need to share this news with others in my building. So I went downstairs and entered the main office. “The World Trade Towers were hit by airplanes.” That was the most I could say before I broke into tears. I’m sure those women thought I was nuts. “Did you know someone there?” “No, but all those people! Do you know how many people are in those buildings?” They just didn’t understand. The size of the buildings. The number of people employed there. That there were gaping holes in these two buildings.

I returned to my office to listen to the radio and attempted to go online to see photos. I was able to see some pictures that just seemed surreal to me.

I had to go to our local food bank to pick up food (usually my office mate’s job, but she was otherwise occupied.) I was almost there when the news came on the radio that one tower had collapsed.

I had to pull to the side of the road.

I couldn’t fathom only one tower standing in Manhattan.

I got back on the road and picked up the food as I was expected to do.

Then the news of the second tower collapse.

What? How can that be? No towers in NYC? This was the only skyline I knew…now gone. And the people. OMG, the people.

I recorded news on videotape because I just wanted all the news I could get. I saw the sculpture that was in the courtyard of the towers. It was still there, but dented. It’s new home to be in Battery Park. (Where you go to catch the ferry to Liberty Island, and the Statue of Liberty.)

I cried. A lot.

I most remember a show that had recorded inside one of the towers after both planes hit. I remember the thuds of people’s bodies hitting the ground who had decided to jump from 100 stories up. Sickening. Gross. Heart-wrenching.

It just can’t be real.

But it is.

I’ve wanted to return to NYC since we moved away. But after 9/11/2001, it’s not the same place that I left all those years ago.

And that makes me sad too.