How time flies. How easily time forgets.
25 years ago. I was 26. Jesus, to be young again, but at the time I was in Orlando, working as an intern for the UCF athletics department.
One of the cool things of living in a new city, outside of Georgia, was the variety of programming on the radio we had. I listened to Howard Stern on my drive in to work each morning, and when he was talking with Robin about planes flying into towers, I thought he was doing a schtick.
When I got to the office, the coordinator was pulling up images on a dial up modem and I watched the images slowly, methodically unfurl. First the tops of the towers, then billowing plumes of flame and smoke. It was real, and at the moment, it felt we were all doomed.
I had my first trip to New York City a year or so earlier, and went to the top of the World Trade Center. It still stands out as one of the modern wonders of the world that I got to experience in person. Amazing. My mother’s birthday is September 11th, and we had planned a trip to NYC around the same time of the attacks. We had to cancel because of an event at UCF. Weird how time and chance works.
I loved my time in the City. Dean and Deluca, Patsy Grimaldi’s, Katz’s Deli, street hawking faux cologne, walking in to a Chinese gambling parlor by accident, drinking at “Irish” pubs. MOMA. Street fights. It was exciting, real, and raw. When I was trying to get back to the Paramount I thought I could cut through Little Brazil and walk the one single block, but found myself surrounded by crackheads and prostitutes so I walked into the middle of the street and took my chances. On the way back to JFK a cab hit a pedestrian in front of us. The driver saw it and said “that’s normal”. I was shocked, disturbed, but the plane left on time and the cab driver received his fare and a tip.
It was life and it was what it was. Another day of life and death in NYC.
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In my time, as I mentioned yesterday, I’ve had a charmed life. I consider myself lucky, regardless of divorces, medical events, or whatever. I watched in Mrs. Bibby’s third grade classroom as Challenger went up in flames. I watched Columbine unfold on live TV. I saw 9/11 in the coaches room at UCF’s basketball arena.
I was sitting there with a bunch a 6 and 7 feet tall monsters, basketball players, watching on a big screen. One kid jumped up and ran from the room screaming about his mother, who worked in the vicinity of the WTC on the day of the incident. I should’ve known who he was, but I didn’t. I can’t imagine his fear or his pain, but I can understand.
It was an event that called me into teaching. I wondered what I was doing throwing out free t-shirts and cups at games. I was running the clock for football games and announcing the down and distance at the Citrus Bowl when Tennessee played Michigan. The referee sitting next to me at the clock and PA told me I had a future in this field and a talent. It didn’t matter. It didn’t seem to matter to me, anyway.
Next thing I know, I’m teaching sixth grade science at the school I attended for junior high, because that seemed to matter, and that made the difference. I married, and would divorce, two fellow teachers. It is what it is. But, at the end of the day, I’ve lead a charmed and purposeful life.
People were thinking they were doing that in New York 25 years ago, and they’re gone now.
So it goes, as Vonnegut said.
25 years. How quickly we forget.