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Pastimes : Clown-Free Zone... sorry, no clowns allowed -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Monty Lenard who wrote (124165)	9/22/2001 11:58:34 PM
From: James F. Hopkins	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 436258

Monty; Here is a story for you ADAM MAYBLUM `Democracy won' I am alive today and committing this to paper so I never forget. So we never forget. I arrived as usual a little before 8 a.m. My office was on the 87th floor of 1 World Trade Center. My associates and I were getting set for the day when the first plane hit a few stories above us. The building lurched violently and shook as if it were in an earthquake. People screamed. Light fixtures and parts of the ceiling collapsed. The kitchen was destroyed. We were certain that it was a bomb. We looked out the windows. Reams of paper were flying everywhere, like a ticker-tape parade. Smoke started billowing in through the ceiling. I called home. My wife had taken our 9-month-old for his checkup. I asked our nanny to page her and tell her that I was on my way out. I took off my T-shirt, ripped it into three pieces, soaked it in water, gave two pieces to my friends and tied my piece around my face. We all started moving to the staircase. One of my friends said he was staying until the police or firemen came to get him. On the 85th floor, an associate and I headed back up to our office to drag out my partner. There was no air, just white smoke. We made the rounds through the office calling his name. No response. We left defeated in our efforts and made our way back to the stairwell. I called my parents and told them we were all on the way down. We were bored and nervous. I called my friend Angel in San Francisco. He said that there was another plane on its way. I did not know what he was talking about. By now the second plane had struck Tower 2, but we did not hear anything. On the 44th floor my phone rang. It was my parents. They were hysterical. I said: Relax, I'm fine. My father said: ``Get out! There is third plane coming.'' I still did not understand. Firefighters and police officers started coming up, and I told them about a heavy-set man on 53rd who couldn't go on and my friend on 87th. I later felt terrible about this. They headed up to find those people and met death instead. On the 33rd floor a man said that two small planes had hit the building. We now knew that there were potentially more planes coming. We understood. On the 3rd floor the lights went out, and we heard and felt this rumbling from above; now I know that it was Tower 2 collapsing next door. We emerged into an enormous room, filled with smoke, and soon realized it was the second floor, the one that overlooks the lobby. We were ushered out into the courtyard. My first thought was of a TV movie I saw once about nuclear fallout. There was at least five inches of this gray, pasty, dusty drywall soot on the ground as well as a thickness of it in the air. Twisted steel and wires. I heard there were bodies and body parts as well, but I did not look. It was bad enough. My friend Kern and I came upon a post office. A worker said that Tower 2 had fallen. I looked again and sure enough, it was gone. My heart was racing. I finally got through to my parents. Relieved is not the word to explain their feelings. `I FELL TO MY KNEES' A girl on a bike offered us some water. Just as she took the cap off her bottle, we heard a rumble. We looked up, and our building, Tower 1, collapsed. My phone rang. It was my wife. I fell to my knees crying when I heard her voice. She told me that my partner had called her. He was alive. My brother met me in midtown, and we managed to get a cab. I cried on my son and held my wife until I fell asleep. Today the images that people around the world equate with power and democracy are gone, but America is not an image; it is a concept. That concept is only strengthened by our pulling together as a team. This is the ultimate failure of terrorism against the United States and the ultimate price we pay to be free, to decide where we want to work, what we want to eat, and when and where we go on vacation. The moment the first plane was hijacked, democracy won. ------------------- Jim