This is our 9/11 story.
In early September of 1991 Ken and I were living on our sailboat in Key West, Florida, again selling timeshare for Hyatt Vacation Club. Usually we were on Cape Cod this time of year, or maybe Virginia Beach on the Chesapeake Bay, but not this year.
On Tuesday, September 11th, at the end of our morning sales meeting one of the salesman said a plane had just crashed into the Twin Towers in New York City. As we quickly huddled around a television to learn what had happened, we saw the destruction of the first tower and then the second. It was horrifying, unbelievable, impossible. And in that horrifying, unbelievable, and impossible moment our lives were changed forever.
Ken and I had planned a three-week vacation starting Friday of that week. We had reservations at top timeshare resorts in Stowe, Vermont; Newport, Rhode Island; and in Connecticut on the north shore of the Long Island Sound.
How to get there? Flights were cancelled so we drove north. As we neared the New York City area, we could see black smoke tearing open the once safe skies. We headed to Liberty Marina near the Statue of Liberty on the Jersey side of the Hudson River facing Manhattan. In 2000, we had stayed at the marina, a perfect spot across from the Twin Towers to experience Manhattan, especially as the night lights were turned on making the city a sparkling wonder.
Memories flashed by. On that first night there in 2000 we had decided to go see the Statue of Liberty — on our boat — at night out in the New York Harbor! All went well getting to this marvelous icon. From the water, we were awed by its enormous size, its magnificence, and its message: Welcome to America, Welcome to Freedom.
On that not-so-long ago night, when it was time to go back to the marina, we had major challenges as circumstances were quickly changing: we were going against the tide that was going out from the Hudson River to the Atlantic Ocean; the New York Harbor was filling up with huge tankers and ships; it was very dark with only the lights from lower Manhattan to guide our way; and, here we were — by comparison — a small thirty-six foot sailboat bucking all of this! Captain Ken got us safely back to the marina, but not without a struggle.
Instead of enjoying our happy memories experiencing New York in 2000 as we had, now we were witnessing a completely different New York in 2001.
We left the horror of Manhattan behind and drove to bucolic Vermont — village after village, each with its iconic white-steepled church and late-summer flowers adorning every available windowsill. Classic and classy New England. The resort was perfect, but the feeling was eerie and scary. What was going to happen to the United States? The world?
Our next week was in sailboat heaven: Newport, Rhode Island. We had lived there several times, before and after we lived in South Africa, so we knew the city well and felt as comfortable as we could given the scary and sad times we were in.
We decided to skip the Connecticut timeshare week and instead visit Ken’s sister Sheila and husband Fred on Long Island and then head back to Key West. Heeding President Bush’s plea to buy-buy-buy to support New York City, we first had lunch at Tavern-on-the Green in Central Park. We had no problem parking near the restaurant on Central Park West. The sidewalks were over-flowing with flowers and other sad reminders of the tragedy that had just befallen New York City, the United States, our hearts and our sense of safety.
Finding our way from Manhattan to Sheila’s house on Long Island was a problem with so many Manhattan streets and bridges blocked. We looked for Dunkin Donuts so we could get directions from a policeman. We turned a corner — there was Dunkin Donuts and, sure enough, there were two policemen — with the directions we needed.
Soon we were to hear more tragic stories about 9/11 from Sheila and Fred, both Long Island teachers. Long Island is a commuter or bedroom suburb of New York City. On that day, just as they usually did, many people on Long Island had gone to work in Manhattan, many at the Twin Towers, and, just as they usually did, many of their kids had gone to school. As the tragedy unfolded, the schools scrambled to send students home. They put teachers and school personnel on the homebound buses to make sure no child got off the bus unless there was a parent at home. Tragically, many parents did not come home that day. As we drove through their neighborhoods that week, many homes had signs identifying them as victims of 9/11.
In leaving Long Island to return to Key West, we drove across the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge that spans Long Island and Staten Island, and is the gateway to the Atlantic from the New York Harbor. We had sailed under it several times going south for the winter and north for the summer. On the drive over the bridge that painful day we could see what had been the Twin Towers — still burning, still smoldering, still heaving heavy black smoke into the mysterious sky that refused to answer “Why Why Why?”
Everyone has their 9/11 story. As with all tragedies, we remember where we were when we heard the news that our world, our lives, had just immeasurably and forever changed. This is our story. A vacation in the midst of a national tragedy.
Copyright © 2024 by Jane Iddings
Reading this story brought me back to that day. Our daughter called and said to turn on the news because the first tower had gone down. We watched with horror when the second one was hit. A sad memory.
Always loved your adventurous life stories – thanks for sharing ! Hope you are doing fine – good luck on the new adventure!! 💕
Despite the number of years since that tragic day, the memories are fresh.
Oh Jane… You were so close, but not too close to this tragedy. You lived, and could share this remarkable experience with us. Thank you, thank you.