Sunday, September 11, 2011

Where Was I Ten Years Ago?

I was in El Paso, interning for the minor league baseball team there. I was running late, as usual, but I didn't think it'd be bad this time of the year because the season was over.

When I drove over to the stadium, I usually put on the local spots-talk radio station. This time around the host was talking about the Twin Towers for some reason, and he was doing so in a somewhat concerned but more distracted manner. I thought something happened to David Robinson and/or Tim Duncan, the two big men and best players on the San Antonio Spurs at the time and referred to as "The Twin Towers."

When I got up to the office of the stadium on the second floor and headed to my office in the corner of the lobby, I didn't see anybody. What I usually did was check the break room to see if there was any free food laid out. What I saw instead was everybody in the front office, looking up at the TV. I joined them.

I looked up and saw, I believe, rubble and people running and screaming. A few minutes later, I saw the replay of, I think, the first plane hitting the first tower. And I thought, Oh my God.

I don't remember doing anything productive the rest of the day. There wasn't a whole to do since the season was over, but I think I spent half of my workday watching the TV. When I was at my desk I called my parents (got Mother; she was her somewhat diffident self: "Oh my God, did you see that? They're all dead. We're all scared") and tried to call my best friend living in Manhattan. Later, either for work, just because I wanted to or an attempt to call him again, I finally reached him, almost half a day after the planes hit the World Trade Center. And although my heart still goes out to all those who lost a loved one that day, I knew then that my world remained intact.

Ten years. Ten fucking years since 9/11. Can you believe it?

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