Do you remember the headlines? I do. Everyone was concerned about shark attacks on the east coast. Jim Rome was talking about opening weekend of football (the 10th was on a Monday) and how "W" flipped the coin. He said something to the effect of a president should be dealing with bigger things than coin tosses for football. Man, I miss those days. You know the days where you could go to the airport and walk around for a while watching planes land and take off. Go right up to the gate and welcome your family home. Heck, they would even let you on the plane if they had room. Good times.
The world changed the next day. I remember my personal "where you were" moment. I worked at Burton Lumber as a delivery driver. I rolled into work at 5:45 AM. My truck was loaded, but it was not centered so I had to rearrange the load. In the process the bands gave away on a bunk of lumber and it rolled. I had torestack and reband the order and get on the road by 6:15 or so. I remember thinking to myself, "this is going to be a bad day." I had a delivery to a house in Spanish Fork. I liked the early morning deliveries because you don't have to talk to stupid contractors. I undid my load and dumped it onto the ground. I got back in my truck and started to drive away. I was listening to Radio From Hell on X-96, and they did the traffic report. During the report Bill asked the traffic person if it was true that another plane hit the World Trade Center. My initial reaction was laughter, I'm thinking of personal Cesna type aircraft, not the jetliners that did hit. I thought, "idiot, didn't you see the first one?" Having only heard it on radio, I didn't know any better. So I turned the radio to KSL so I could get the news. What I heard was a live broadcast from New York City telling all firefighters to report for duty at their station. Then I realized the gravity of the situation.
I called Aubrey. She had just started working at a law firm. It was her 5th day. I told her to turn on the TV. She asked why, I said, "just turn on the TV." She asked what channel, and I told her I didn't think it mattered. Her reaction was, "oh my gosh!"
I was glued to my radio. I got off the freeway and started to drive back to the lumber yard. As I looked at the people driving I could tell those that knew and those who didn't. The ones who didn't know were happy, listening to their CDs, enjoying their last moments of normalcy. Those who had their normalcy stolen from them looked like they had been punched in the stomach. It was interesting to see the contrast from car to car.
When I got back to the yard production had shut down. We all had our trucks in the yard all tuned to KSL (a lot of stations redirected their broadcast to KSL) and sat and listened. We were there until the first tower fell. Then we had to keep working. The counter people had a TV on the counter with wire strung up in a make-shift antenna. Everyone wanted to watch or hear the news. People on my deliveries didn't talk much. We just kind of looked at each other in a knowing if we talk we might cry but we're men and don't cry type of look. We all felt helpless.
I finally got a lunch break and drove to my parents house. That's when I saw for the first time. Mom and Dad were home, and Mandy was home too because she was at a call center for American Express, and their headquarters was in WTC #5, I think. They sent everyone home.
We were expecting Kimberlie at the time. I was thinking that I didn't want to bring a child into a world that was evil enough to do this. I'm glad we did. I was thinking about it today, Kimberlie has not lived in a normal world..actually, this world is normal to her. Her class will be the first who were not alive on September 11, 2001. What kind of world have we given them? I honestly think that we are still too close to the incident to tell. We know of the changes and inconviences that we have to endure now. I freely admit that I tend to be cynical about it, and I think that the terrorists won. Think about it, we can't roam around the airport, the government takes liberties in the name of defence, and everyone is suspicious of people who have darker skin than they do. Funny side note, once a guy wearing a turban walked into the lumber store, and the manager was eyeballing him and acting all suspicious. I asked her what's up and she said that the people who crashed the planes wore those. My response, "they probably wore underwear too, maybe we should look out for anyone wearing that as well."
About the only thing we can take from September 11 is that we need to love more. I hate the term tolerance, but if that's all you got, use it. I prefer acceptance. Just because their God has 8 arms, or a big belly, or was nailed to a tree is no reason to hate someone. Everyone has the right to live, everyone has the right to be free, everyone has the right to happiness. Let them enjoy those rights and the world will be a better place.
God bless...the world.
The world changed the next day. I remember my personal "where you were" moment. I worked at Burton Lumber as a delivery driver. I rolled into work at 5:45 AM. My truck was loaded, but it was not centered so I had to rearrange the load. In the process the bands gave away on a bunk of lumber and it rolled. I had torestack and reband the order and get on the road by 6:15 or so. I remember thinking to myself, "this is going to be a bad day." I had a delivery to a house in Spanish Fork. I liked the early morning deliveries because you don't have to talk to stupid contractors. I undid my load and dumped it onto the ground. I got back in my truck and started to drive away. I was listening to Radio From Hell on X-96, and they did the traffic report. During the report Bill asked the traffic person if it was true that another plane hit the World Trade Center. My initial reaction was laughter, I'm thinking of personal Cesna type aircraft, not the jetliners that did hit. I thought, "idiot, didn't you see the first one?" Having only heard it on radio, I didn't know any better. So I turned the radio to KSL so I could get the news. What I heard was a live broadcast from New York City telling all firefighters to report for duty at their station. Then I realized the gravity of the situation.
I called Aubrey. She had just started working at a law firm. It was her 5th day. I told her to turn on the TV. She asked why, I said, "just turn on the TV." She asked what channel, and I told her I didn't think it mattered. Her reaction was, "oh my gosh!"
I was glued to my radio. I got off the freeway and started to drive back to the lumber yard. As I looked at the people driving I could tell those that knew and those who didn't. The ones who didn't know were happy, listening to their CDs, enjoying their last moments of normalcy. Those who had their normalcy stolen from them looked like they had been punched in the stomach. It was interesting to see the contrast from car to car.
When I got back to the yard production had shut down. We all had our trucks in the yard all tuned to KSL (a lot of stations redirected their broadcast to KSL) and sat and listened. We were there until the first tower fell. Then we had to keep working. The counter people had a TV on the counter with wire strung up in a make-shift antenna. Everyone wanted to watch or hear the news. People on my deliveries didn't talk much. We just kind of looked at each other in a knowing if we talk we might cry but we're men and don't cry type of look. We all felt helpless.
I finally got a lunch break and drove to my parents house. That's when I saw for the first time. Mom and Dad were home, and Mandy was home too because she was at a call center for American Express, and their headquarters was in WTC #5, I think. They sent everyone home.
We were expecting Kimberlie at the time. I was thinking that I didn't want to bring a child into a world that was evil enough to do this. I'm glad we did. I was thinking about it today, Kimberlie has not lived in a normal world..actually, this world is normal to her. Her class will be the first who were not alive on September 11, 2001. What kind of world have we given them? I honestly think that we are still too close to the incident to tell. We know of the changes and inconviences that we have to endure now. I freely admit that I tend to be cynical about it, and I think that the terrorists won. Think about it, we can't roam around the airport, the government takes liberties in the name of defence, and everyone is suspicious of people who have darker skin than they do. Funny side note, once a guy wearing a turban walked into the lumber store, and the manager was eyeballing him and acting all suspicious. I asked her what's up and she said that the people who crashed the planes wore those. My response, "they probably wore underwear too, maybe we should look out for anyone wearing that as well."
About the only thing we can take from September 11 is that we need to love more. I hate the term tolerance, but if that's all you got, use it. I prefer acceptance. Just because their God has 8 arms, or a big belly, or was nailed to a tree is no reason to hate someone. Everyone has the right to live, everyone has the right to be free, everyone has the right to happiness. Let them enjoy those rights and the world will be a better place.
God bless...the world.
