Sometimes I wonder what we worried about before September 11th, 2001. Gas was $1.15 a gallon, my co-pay for a doctor visit was around $15, most Americans had never heard of Osama bin Laden or al qaeda and the only war my generation had seen only lasted a few weeks. I'm sure we all had our own personal problems here & there, but if we only knew how the world would change in the ten years after 9/11/01. If we only knew how good we had it.
I was on the 3 Mile Bridge heading to the beach that morning with the radio off. It was about 7:50, and I knew Marty was about to give the forecast, so I turned the radio on and caught the very end of him saying something about a small plane hitting one of the Twin Towers in Manhattan. Remember, the first plane had hit only a few minutes before that and there were conflicting reports as to how big it was. So, I figured it was a little single engine prop plane and it bounced off and maybe killed or injured a few people on the ground. It didn't sound like a huge deal. So I heard the forecast and turned the radio off. Got to the beach around 8:15, went for a swim and went for a walk. By the time I got back to my chair and turned my portable radio on, it was around 9:00. I turned the radio on and heard Marty say "if you're just tuning in, both of the Twin Towers have been hit by commercial aircraft and are on fire. The Pentagon has apparently been struck by another airplane and there is another flight that appears to be hijacked and nobody knows where it is". I packed up the few things I brought to the beach and went home immediately. Before I got off the sand, the first tower collapsed. I was stopped at the light on Cervantes by Jerry's Drive-In when the North Tower came down, and I cried the rest of the way home. All I could think about was "those poor, innocent people". At some point, it dawned on me that I was going to have to be on the air that day, and wondered to myself "what am I supposed to say?". That was the only day in 15 years of broadcasting that I was scared to go on the air because I had no idea what to do. When I got to the radio station, I walked in on a discussion on whether we should simulcast one of the news networks, or keep playing songs and give updates on our own. After some time, we decided to stay local because at that point, there wasn't really any new news coming from the situation and we had a lot of listeners calling in and asking questions about flights and airport info, where to donate blood, and just questions in general about what was going on. So, as hard as it was, we still played some songs that day, but we were more of a news & info station. I remember the phone calls. Someone on the west side of town was apparently charging $7 a gallon for gas. All flights were grounded, so a lot of people were stranded and wanted to know when the airports would open back up and they were asking what security would be like. At that point, we had no answers. The hardest part for me and a lot of people was the feeling of helplessness. All any of us could really do was pray, and trust in God.
It's easy to get caught up in the fantasy of, "if we only knew how good we had it", but the truth is, we never know, do we? We never know how easy or good life is until change is forced upon us. Whether it's a national tragedy or the loss of a loved one, we can never fully appreciate what we have until it's too late. In all of this, I have learned to put my trust in God, and try to enjoy each day, because I have no clue what tomorrow, or even the next phone call will bring. Maybe we "have it good" right now and don't even know it.
No comments:
Post a Comment