CHAPTER ONE 9/11
Hesitantly, I climbed the steps of the Lexington Avenue subway station, back out onto Park Row, across from the entrance of the Brooklyn Bridge. It wasn’t five minutes ago I had raced down these same subway steps for the train that would take me to the Bronx. I see before me now, if the situation wasn’t so horrible, a Winter Wonderland. Everything is covered in white; buildings, cars, trees, and people are covered in what looks like white powder. Through the haze of the white powdery mist falling from the sky, I see silhouettes of people walking toward the Brooklyn Bridge, others to the Municipal Building, and still others to Centre Street.
I feel I have fallen into a nightmare. Everyone appears to be covered in this white powder, except me. My blue navy suit I wore to work that morning, with a string of fake pearls, was still blue, and my hair was still black.
I ran down the steps into the subway station because someone yelled, “It’s falling – It’s coming down!” People screamed and start to run in panic. The ground shook and the horrible sound of steel screeching made the nightmare all the more real.
Tower 2, the one I called the State Office Building, plunged into the earth. Shaking and crying, I felt like my legs would give way. People were running past me, yelling, “The World Trade Center is falling! The building is coming down!” I can hear the loud roar of the building collapsing and the screams of people behind me. Once down into the subway station, people were lining up at the bank of payphones, frantically calling relatives. Others jumped the turnstiles to get to the subway trains below.
I looked back at the token booth clerk, thinking I need permission to go under the turnstile. The token booth clerk seemed to be in a trance. I ran down to the lower landing, where there was a train already waiting in the station. I thought about getting on the long telephone lines and calling my family, but I realized the train would take me to the Bronx sooner than I could reach a pay phone. After a few minutes of waiting, an announcement came on the loudspeakers, “Due to the incident at the World Trade Center, no subway service is available at this time.” Along with my fear and panic, I became angry. “Why can’t they let the trains run uptown? At least people will be able to leave the area.” I began the climb back up the stairs and onto the street. Since nine o’clock this morning, I had walked down sixty-one flights of stairs, run across Church Street, looking back at the two towers on fire, and then down these subway steps. My legs felt like two tree trunks, but I was able to join the crowd of people covered in white powder and began the walk up Park Row going north.
Tower Two had just fallen and I could not bring myself to look south because I did not want to see just one tower standing. I turned my back to the World Trade Center and start the walk north with the throng of people, some covered from head to toe in the white dust, hoping I could make it home. One police officer, himself covered in dust, yells out to the crowd, “Go North!” “Keep Walking North!” We, the crowd of survivors, walk quietly up Centre Street, like a parade without a band. My dark blue suit was still navy blue, my shoes, blouse, hair and book bag remained unscathed by the catastrophe.
My feet and the calves of my legs ached. I could feel the little cut under my foot from stepping on glass that came through my shoe when I was in the mall of the World Trade Center. This only made it more uncomfortable to walk. Compared to the horrible tragedies of the other victims, this was only a minor inconvenience. I had to call my family to let them know I was still alive!
Every block I passed, there were long lines of people waiting to use the public telephones. Not many people had cellphones, then. Cellphones were a luxury until September 11, 2001. People who did have cellphones were vigorously pecking numbers, trying to get a connection. We continued the walk now on Centre Street, passing Worth, Leonard and Canal Streets, where store owners stood and stared at us in bewilderment. The parade of survivors, some covered in white dust, others crying, or walking in a deep trance, slowly moved up Centre Street. Spectators and shop owners passed out bottles of water or ripped off sheets of paper towels and held them out to us.
We continued our march up Centre Street, passing Grand, Broome and Houston Streets. Our slow march to anywhere began to pick up when the sound of rumbling made us automatically pick up our pace. The screams began again, and people instinctively started to surge forward. The store owners on the sidewalk were pointing skyward yelling, “OH MY GOD, THE OTHER BUILDING IS COMING DOWN!” Since the buildings were over one hundred stories tall, no one could measure how far we had to run so that we could be safe.
Even blocks away you could still hear the rumblings of the tower falling. So we ran, and kept running until we could not run anymore. My heart was beating out of my chest; I could not catch my breath. I did not want to look back, but I felt compelled to do so. This was Tower One falling, my building! The building I worked in for over twenty years. People I know could still be in there . I felt how Lot’s wife must have felt; I loved this place. I stopped running, leaned against a parked car and looked back. I wanted to cry out, to scream, but I couldn’t.
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