Reunion brings together memories of Sept. 11

TRIGAUX E-mail: Click here Archive

© St. Petersburg Times
published June 5, 2002

Friday was the first time I had flown in a plane since before Sept. 11. Not that I had purposely avoided flying (well, maybe a bit). But when trips north to Tallahassee or south to Miami came up, I've found myself behind the wheel and on the road.

So it was a double shock to find myself boarding a northbound JetBlue flight and heading to JFK Airport in New York. When the Manhattan skyline -- minus the World Trade Center towers -- appeared out my window, I was shaken.

I lived in Manhattan during most of my 20s, met my sweetheart and married her there. The twin towers loom in the background of some of our wedding pictures. I worked several blocks south of the World Trade Center.

Now my geographic anchor is gone. How nondescript lower Manhattan looks from the air without those two steel redwoods. South of midtown's Empire State Building, there's nothing to really capture the eye anymore until the Statue of Liberty.

In truth, I was not bound for the city. I hopped another JetBlue flight at JFK to head further north, to Syracuse, where I rented a car and drove an hour southeast through rural towns. Back to a middle-of-nowhere school called Colgate University that I'd not seen in decades for my 25th reunion.

I was not eager to show up. The few college friends I've kept in touch with ganged up on me by phone until I agreed to attend. I'm glad I did.

I'm not about to bore you with amusing and painful details of recognizing classmates after a quarter century. The college, as if extracting some lingering revenge, had the gall to print each person's 1977 graduation photo on his or her name tag.

Hey buddy, I scolded my own image: Get a haircut.

Good news. Most classmates who shared a too-small dorm room or poorly heated apartment with me were there.

It was not long into the weekend before it hit me. For some of my closest college friends, the events of Sept. 11 remain a very deep and raw wound.

Neil lives in Boston where, on the morning of Sept. 11, American Airlines Flight 11, a Boeing 767, and United Airlines Flight 175, a Boeing 737, were hijacked and crashed into the north and south towers of the World Trade Center. Mike, now a Washington lawyer, would look out his office window that September morning at 9:40 a.m. to see the rising smoke across the Potomac River after hijacked American Airlines Flight 77, a Boeing 737, slammed into the side of the Pentagon.

Bob, an employee benefits consultant with William Mercer in midtown Manhattan, was in Europe on Sept. 11 and was forced to wait days before overseas flights were allowed to return to the United States. And Paul, a sworn Manhattanite and a director of Barclays Capital, heard the hijacked planes strike the twin towers from his Broadway office across the street from the World Trade Center.

I had no intention to query them about 9-11. Here in Florida, almost nine months later, the intensity of that horrid day has eased a bit. But in the lulls between conversations, I asked. And they answered.

Haltingly, at first. Paul said he did not talk about the morning of 9-11 for many months. When the first plane hit the north tower, the crashing sound reaching Paul's ear, word spread quickly through his office. Television sets were turned on. People gathered at the windows. A second plane hit the south tower. Another fireball. People are jumping from the highest floors near the fire. Bits of office equipment, building debris, tons of paper and even shoes rain on the streets.

Paul speaks quietly about the scene. He is not dramatic. When it becomes clear these are terrorist attacks, he and his co-workers leave the Barclays building and walk north, away from the chaos. When the south tower collapses at 10 a.m. (the north tower pancakes 29 minutes later), Paul is far enough to avoid the cloud of heavy dust that consumes block after block around the World Trade Center. Numb, he walks home to his midtown apartment.

Five days later, Bob catches the first available plane back from Europe to the airport in Newark. On the approach, already shocked passengers can see the rising smoke from Ground Zero. The Newark airport provides a panoramic window view of the nearby Manhattan skyline to arriving visitors. When his fellow passengers catch sight of where the towers used to be, many fall to their knees, praying. Others wail. Bob speaks of this scene as if there is no other possible way to react.

On his drive home to Westchester County, north of Manhattan, Bob is slowed behind a quarter mile convoy of enormous trucks. They are carrying away immense, twisted hunks of steel and concrete from the towers. American flags are draped over many pieces. Stern-faced drivers are at the wheels.

For Bob and Hope, his wife, and their two daughters, the impact of 9-11 had just begun. For the next week, corporate work was forgotten. Bob volunteered on the piers of Manhattan to help victims. His company, which had a World Trade office, lost more than 200 employees.

Many people who worked and died in the towers lived near Bob and Hope in Westchester's upscale suburban towns. Soon, Bob and Hope attend too many funerals. They see too many children who have lost a Dad or Mom or, in some cases, both parents.

These are not easy stories to recall. Tears well up with ease.

During the scheduled reunion events, classmate-turned-New-York-City fireman Van Don Williams ("Fuzzy,' as we once knew him) shares his tales of 9-11 courage. He offers inspirational words.

Most of the weekend is predictable, reaffirming old friendships grown dusty.

But the shadow of Sept. 11 on such close friends is less expected. I probably never would have heard their painful words had I not come. It is a true reunion and I am grateful to have been there.

- Robert Trigaux can be reached at trigaux@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8405.

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