Chicken Soup for the Soul of America (8 page)

As I stood there, a simple and haunting melody came into my head, and the words I was reading practically flew off the page and rearranged themselves in stanzas in my mind. The next day I took off from work, booked an afternoon in the studio and recorded this song live.

Although “Prayer Flags” is a very sad song, I like to think of it as a healing song, and one that is very respectful to the people who helped it come to be—and to whom it is dedicated:

Prayer Flags

have you seen him
have you seen him
brown hair blue eyes 5 foot 10
have you seen her
here's her picture
she's my wife
she's my best friend

have you seen her
have you seen him
he's got a mole on his left hand
if you've seen him
here's my number
please call as soon as you can

have you seen him
have you seen her
she's wearing a yellow dress
a tattoo on her right shoulder
says baby I am the best

have you seen her
have you seen him
he's wearing a wedding band
and the words on the inscription:
may 12, 2000, forever, ann

have you seen him
have you seen her
he was on the 100th floor
she's my mother
he's my brother
she called me at 9:04
from the stairway
from the hallway
from her cell phone
from the roof
if you've seen him
won't you tell her
please
we love her so

have you seen them
have you seen them
walking in the by-and-by
from the rubble
through all the trouble
into the beautiful blue sky

Marc Farre

One mile from Ground Zero, the flyers that inspired “Prayer Flags.”

Photo ©2001 by Viviane Bauquet Farre. (9/15/01). All rights reserved.

New York Cabbies

New York cabdrivers are legendary. Countless jokes have been made at their expense about the way they zip through traffic, narrowly missing other cars and fixed objects, coming within inches of any pedestrian foolish enough to think he can make it on a flashing “don't walk” sign. And anyone who has ever been a passenger knows that wrenching feeling of speeding up to go one short block then stopping short to avoid a car stopped ahead. Somehow, cabbies never seem able to remember the adage that you can only go as fast as the guy in front of you. And no New Yorker is ever surprised when a cabbie leans his head out the window of his taxi and offers some important comment on another's driving ability or indeed on his personal attributes or lineage!

But three months after September 11, when I spent a week in New York City, the cab rides I took were slow, the cabbies quiet, subdued. I asked a few of them where they were and what they did on September 11. One driver didn't want to talk about it; then he did. In fact, he had so much to say that when we reached my destination, he put up the meter and I just sat there listening.

“Traffic came to a complete stop that day. No busses or cabs or cars could go anywhere. Which is just as well because it was a hell and no one knew where to go to be safe. I was at midtown, stopped in traffic, and I had a fare when the first plane hit. We heard it first, then saw it. Both of us thought it was an accident. Who knew . . . ?

“But then the second plane hit. I dropped my fare and got out of my cab. By then there were so many sirens and emergency vehicles headed south, you couldn't move. So, like everybody else, I watched from the sidewalk. Then . . . then they started to come down! It had been a beautiful sunny day but the air changed in a minute. Suddenly it was black and gray and you couldn't breathe. I turned my cab around to head north. People banged on my window. I told them to get in and we just drove away from it. I don't remember where I left them off.

“Someone flagged me down—stood right in front of my cab. He flashed an ID. He was a doctor and he wanted me to take him to NYU Med center. I did. There was a line of cabs at the hospital. The police wouldn't let us leave. So we all went in and gave blood. Later, the only vehicles allowed out were ambulances. I said, ‘I'm a good driver. Let me help.' They put me on an ambulance with another driver. We started taking supplies down to NYU Medical Center downtown.

“Later that day, I got my cab and drove around. There were people all over, just walking dazed and crying. I couldn't do anything for them except give them a ride so I did. Many of them were going from hospital to hospital trying to find a family member who had worked in the WTC. I took one group—a father, mother and two sisters—to five different hospitals. At the last place, I left them because there was someone who fit the description of their loved one. I never found out if it was him. . . .”

I tried to take notes the whole time the man was talking but I couldn't write fast enough. So I just listened. I know I got the whole story. It wasn't one I could forget.

Another cabbie told me how he spent his time trying to take people home. “They were walking, walking anywhere—across bridges, in the middle of the streets. People were leaning on each other. I stopped and took an elderly man and the person he was leaning on to the Upper East Side. They looked like walking dead. . . . We picked up some others along the way. One lady said she had to stop to tell her son that she was okay. Her phone wouldn't work so we stopped at his office around Fiftieth Street. He was outside, just staring south. When he saw his mother, he started crying. The lady decided to stay with him. So I looked for some more people to take.”

I had heard that in the hours and days that followed, New York came to a standstill. There was no public transportation available for days. But every one of the cab drivers I spoke with was busy in those hours—taking people home, carrying medical supplies, and transporting emergency personnel. Whatever any of these able-bodied people could do with or without their cabs, they did. They found ways to help. Of course I didn't have to ask if they ever let the meter run during any of those trips. They would have been insulted if I had.

The cabdrivers of New York City are a microcosm of society. They are black, white, Indian, Muslim, Hispanic—every race, creed and color imaginable. They go about their day like most people, earning a living, getting the job done. For the most part, they are ordinary people. And ordinary people find ways to do extraordinary things when called upon. A lot of people did a lot to help others that day. They used what skills they possessed to save lives, give hope, help others. Those skills included being able to perform emergency surgery and being able to drive a cab. Each was needed and important in the aftermath of the horror of September 11.

It's absolutely true what they say about New York cabdrivers—they are legendary.

Marsha Arons

Anxiously Awaiting

T
here are only two ways to live your life.
One is as though nothing is a miracle.
The other is as if everything is.

Albert Einstein

As usual, I was dozing on the bus on my way to work on Tuesday, September 11, 2001, when I heard someone say, “My God, look at the World Trade Center!”

We were still in New Jersey. I looked in the direction of the Twin Towers and saw smoke pouring out of all the windows of the upper quarter of the North Tower. Someone else on the bus was listening to a Walkman and said a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. I asked if they said which tower it was, and he said he thought they said it was Tower Two. Tower Two was not visible from the angle we were looking, so I knew he must be mistaken.

I said, “My husband works in the World Trade Center. I know that is Tower One. Of all the days to forget my cell phone.”

I was in a state of shock. I don't know how long I sat staring, but I turned to the woman next to me and asked if she had a cell phone I could borrow. She smiled and said she had just asked if I would like to use hers, but I did not hear her. She was kind enough to dial my husband's number and hand me the phone. All I heard was a recording that all circuits were busy. I handed her back the phone and started to pray: “Dear God, please keep him safe.”

I did not realize it, but she had continued to try to reach my husband by hitting the redial button. She finally got through and handed me back the phone saying she had my husband's voicemail. I don't remember what I said, but I left a message and handed her back the phone.

By this time we were in the Lincoln Tunnel, and all I could think of was getting to my office and checking my voicemail and e-mail for a message from my husband. As soon as we got out of the tunnel, I got off the bus with well wishes from everyone on the bus saying they would pray for us.

Running to the bus stop to catch the cross-town bus, I saw people's mouths moving, but I could hear no sound. All I could think of was getting to my desk and hearing a message from my husband.

As I arrived at the Chrysler Building, I walked through the lobby and could hear the guards saying, “We are evacuating.” I kept walking as fast as I could, afraid I would be stopped from going up to my office. I reached an empty elevator and got in, praying the door would close. One of my coworkers, Verne, got on and said, “Did you hear about what's going on at the World Trade Center?” I broke down and said through tears, “My husband works there.” I did not hear his words but felt his support as he put an arm around me for comfort.

We arrived on the sixteenth floor, and I heard my boss from his office saying, “Rosemarie, have you heard from your husband?”

I said I had not and ran to check my messages. Jeff asked if my husband had a cell phone or a beeper. I told him Eddie did not have the cell phone with him.

There were no voicemail messages from Eddie.

The first person to call was my sister, Carmel. She was in tears as she asked if I had heard from him. I told her I had not. We were both on the verge of hysteria. She said she was fine. (She worked one block from the World Trade Center.) She also told me my niece, Sharon, was fine. (She worked in the South Tower.)

My other sister, Mary Lou, called also inquiring about Eddie. I again said there was no word from him. She hung up asking me to call as soon as I heard.

I turned on my computer and scrolled through my e-mail messages hoping to see my husband's name. No e-mail messages either.

I spotted an e-mail message from my youngest daughter, Jillian. She and my second daughter, Jessica, attend the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania. It said, “Please e-mail back as soon as you get this and let me know what is going on with the World Trade Center. I tried calling you and Daddy, but I can't get through. I need to know if Daddy is okay. Please get back to me as soon as you can.” I called her and told her I did not know anything yet.

Everyone in the office was very supportive and concerned. My boss asked the secretary next to me if she would answer my phone if I was away from my desk. She agreed and offered me a cup of coffee. My supervisor came to my desk and asked if she could do anything to help.

The fire alarm went off, and they announced on the PA system that they were evacuating the building. My mind was in turmoil. I did not want to leave. I did not know where to go or what to do. My boss started telling me what to do, and I responded like a robot. I felt like I was watching what was happening from outside my body. Jeff instructed me to change my voicemail message to say that I was not in the office due to the incident at the World Trade Center and to tell my husband, if it was him calling, that I would be at my mother's, to give my mother's phone number, and as an alternative, to contact my boss on his cell phone and give his number.

At that point my other daughter called, and I told her I had not heard from Daddy and that I was going to my mother's because we had to evacuate the building. I told her I would call her when I got to my mother's. We all just kept praying.

The phone rang again. I picked it up. I heard a voice on the other end say, “Hi, Ro. It's me.”

Eddie was sitting in a conference room, facing a window near his office on the seventy-fourth floor of the North Tower when he heard the plane crash into the building above him and felt the building move about a foot. He saw flaming debris falling and smelled the jet fuel. He went to the nearest emergency exit and started down the stairs. He met one of his coworkers, and they stayed together. He said everyone was very orderly and acted in a calm manner. They stayed to the right of the stairs, allowing the injured people to go down past them. When they were approximately halfway down, they met firemen coming up. The firemen assured everyone that it was safe down below and to remain calm and to continue going down to safety. He was still in the stairwell on the way down when someone with a radio said a second plane had hit Tower Two. That's when he realized it was an attack and not an accident.