This was the third essay.
This was the third essay, and I am interested in opinions as a writer. My role in the story weather grand or small is not important
The morning of September 11, 2001 started differently for me. Little did I know how intensely the events to follow would test my mettle. Craig and I had been running an errand over at Fort Myer and arrived at the office about two hours late. As I sat at my desk, I heard a morning radio show saying that a plane had just struck the first tower of the world trade center in New York City. I remember asking my boss if that was for real because at the time it sounded contrived to me. After he assured me that it was real I went looking for Craig and a television so we could see what was going on. Little did we know that the TV we were watching and much of the space around it would no longer exist in a quarter of an hour. We watched the second plane hit. I turned to Craig and said that it was intentional--we should call our wives and tell them we would be working late. I figured we would activate the Army Crisis Action Team, and Craig and I were both on that roster for administrative support. I went to my desk and called my wife at the time, Phyllis, and my friend Ryan to tell them to turn on the news. I couldn’t believe what was happening.
I had gotten off the phone with Ryan and had been sitting there for less then five minutes, when time seemed to suspend itself for me. The floor, ceiling, and very air around me rippled with a shock that should have knocked me over. The air shot orange for a second as a fireball ripped through the room. Looking to my right, I saw my supervisor, Sergeant First Class Weaver turn and run as parts of the ceiling gave in. I remember being angry at him, because as a soldier it was his responsibility to take care of his troops. Then the power gave out and the smoke came--a thick black smoke with a smell so foul I will never forget it. All those things happened in seconds, but for me they were as separated in time as hours on a clock; each event burned separately in my memory. Time sped back up all at once, and for a brief instant, alone in the dark, I thought to myself, "It's over, I don't have to worry about anything anymore." Bills and other concerns of life slipped from me, and leaning against a desk in the dark, I almost gave up. Frozen by fear yet liberated from life. I was terrified.
Then I heard the crying people in the dark calling out and I decided I needed to "Just keep moving." That thought kept going through my mind for the next 20 minutes I had no feeling of an end. I just needed to keep moving. I felt my way around to the other side of my cubicle to check on one of my coworkers, a sweet lady in her fifties that always shared her breakfast with me. Her name was Day. As I rounded the corner I found Day praying beneath her desk. I could briefly see people standing in the smoke and I yelled for everyone to get down and follow me. Voices called out in the darkness. A woman cried out that she was stuck, but I couldn't see where she was. I focused on the people I could see.
Loosening my necktie and getting to the ground, I started to crawl to the closest door. I briefly turned the wrong way and got lost in the copy room for a minute or two. Then, following a warm glow from beneath a door, I found the hall. I tested the door first by holding my hand against it. My skin blistered from the heat. There was fire in the hall, I knew we had to go back across the 60 yards of room.
As I set out again, I noticed other groups in the dark being led by other soldiers. Colonel McNair one of the division chief’s voice was ahead of me, and soon I caught up to his little trail of followers. I continued crawling, as smoke pulled at my lungs. The sprinklers were not on. As we reached the halfway point, I felt the water hit me and was glad for it. The smoke was even thicker now, and I felt lightheaded. At this time I realized that people were actually following me. Day was holding my belt as we crossed the mid point of the room and I yelled back, "Don’t let go, Day."
Finally, we reached a point where I could see light. A window up ahead! I knew that windows lined the far wall towards the center of the building and I could find a door if I followed them just forty feet to the right. Forty feet seemed like a long way away. Colonel McNair’s group chose the doors. I chose the windows.
Gulping fresh air, I looked out the window to see that the alley was full of debris, but there was no fire. The window was the shatterproof type, and the blast had warped it in its frame, but not enough to get a body through. Looking for something heavy, I grabbed a laser printer and beat on the frame. Colonel McNair returned from the doors where they had been blocked. He jumped up on the sill and started kicking the frame. When I could get the printer through, I dropped it. As it hit the ground below, it alerted the Navy personnel pouring out of the first floor into the alley. They gathered under the window, calling for us to jump.
Colonel McNair and I started handing people down. After handing down six or so people, I could no longer breathe, so I hung from the sill myself and dropped 20 feet into space. The Colonel did another sweep of the area and followed right behind me.
People started giving orders to move out of that area. I wanted to go back in through the back stair, but was not allowed. I was in a state of shock as they herded away. Coming out onto the lawn of the center court yard, I looked for faces I knew. I saw Day and another woman from my office crying on the lawn. A triage center was already giving IVs and pouring saline on burns. John, the man who sat at the desk behind me, was there with his hands melted like wax candles, but there was noCraig.
Then another commotion started and we were told we had to move through the other side of the building and away, in case another plane hit. We moved out of the eighth corridor, where I was triaged again. I did not know how badley I was hurt. People kept asking me if I could walk and I kept saying that I was fine. Someone started pouring saline on my face and gave me an IV. A Navy Chaplain was asked to stay with me to make sure I did not wander off. I asked him to call my wife, but the lines were down. He kept trying as we sat there for an hour. A few ambulances came and the more seriously wounded were taken away. When a mini-van came up to take us to Arlington Urgent Care, the Chaplain finally got through. I told him to tell Phyllis I was on my way to Arlington.
On the way to Urgent Care, we continued to be affected by the chaos of the day’s events, as the poor Private who was driving kept getting trapped in the sheer volume of traffic. I instructed her to plead with the officers on the sidewalk to help clear a path for us as we went. We eventually had to drive against the flow of traffic in the wrong lane in order to get past the one-way traffic stream fleeing the area.
Ten of us arrived at Arlington and nine were treated and released, but not me. My blood oxygen level would not come back up, and they where covering my face and hands in silvadeen and gauze. I was there for six hours watching as Costco delivered water to the clinic for free, and soldiers and airman with nursing credentials wandered in off the streets to volunteer. Four hours into my stay, they told me my wife was on the phone. She had gone to Arlington hospital by mistake, and they said she should stay there because they were sending me there for further treatment. I was eager to go home.
When I arrived at Arlington Hospital, where Phyllis and Ryan were waiting for me, I made a few jokes to my somber audience as my face started to hurt. The adrenaline was wearing off. The doctors unwrapped my head and I finally saw my face. It was one huge smoke-stained blister. They told me they had to wash it and slipped some morphine into my IV. Moments later I could not feel a thing.
As I lay waiting, they told me I was not going home and started to set up a room for me. Then Major General Tibult walked through the ward looking for soldiers. The General saw me and arranged for me to be transferred to Walter Reed Army Hospital immediately. Around 11:00 p.m., I finally found a bed for the night in the ICU ward. I stayed up the rest of the night watching the news, looking for Craig.
It took four days for my lungs to recover enough to go home. During that time, I watched the news constantly, waiting to see a friend or coworker. I also had a handful of visiting dignitaries. I was visited by the Chief of Staff of the Army and the First Lady, and a representative from the FBI came in to debrief me about the event. I did several television and newspaper interviews as well, but the most impacting visit was General Jack Kean, the Vice Chief of Staff of the Army. General Kean came into my room, standing every inch of six foot four inches. He was a very powerful presence. He asked me where I had been during the attack. After I told him he blanched, saying that part of the building collapsed moments after I left. He showed me a chart, and then asked if I wanted to know about any of my coworkers. I asked about Craig.
Craig and I had always taken our breaks and lunches together. We drove to and from work together every day for three years. We spent more time together commuting than we did with our respective wives. Craig was only 26 and the father of two exceptional kids. Craig never came home.
In the aftermath, I attended 26 funerals in four months, I cried at Craig’s. Loud noises and arguements set me off into fight or flight mode for a few months. And two years later I still had dreams of fire and plane crashes. I was awarded the Purple Heart and our Army’s highest award for peacetime valor, the Soldiers’ Medal. I still have lung trouble every now and then, and my shoulder aches when the weather changes. But more than decorations or old battle scars, I wear the events of 9/11 to this very day. Only a few soldiers who served between Viet Nam and 9/11 have had the opportunity to know how they will act in the face of fear. I do, and it is a powerful knowledge to have.