Aftermath
I came awake to the sounds of bag-pipes, the mournful sound coming from the always-on television in the bedroom. I rolled over to check the clock...about 4:40 am...the same time I woke up *that* morning two years ago.
The memorial services were being broadcast.
I may finally be ready to write about it--write it all out. The sun is slipping down behind Bluff point as I write this, a ball of red-orange in the hazy autumn air. It has been a beautiful day--cloudless skies--much like that day two years ago.
There's a hole in the world tonight.
There's a cloud of fear and sorrow.
There's a hole in the world tonight.
Don't let there be a hole in the world tomorrow.
--The Eagles
The weather has been clear and mild--much like that September two years ago in the waning days of the summer of 2001 when everything changed. What I write below is based on notes I made during that week in Septemeber two years, a lifetime and a different reality ago...
Long-Winded Prologue
Labor Day had passed and Homer was beginning to quiet down as tourists left. The days were noticeably shorter--a couple early September mornings brought frost under clear skies.
At work, PD had been on leave and I had been working overtime days. I was fighting a sinus infection and so was sleeping a lot, drinking fluids and taking some amoxicillin.
Denny got home from the Aleutians on August 26 and drove to Valdez to spend a couple days fishing with my Dad. He came home on Wednesday with a load of frozen salmon.
By Friday, August 31, I realized that I was itching in a most awkward location and that the amoxicillin had triggered a yeast infection. I applied some generic miconozol that I had on hand, and on Saturday, relunctant to doctor myself for a whole week, I bought some Monostat 3 on my way to work and applied it that night.
When I woke up Sunday, I was still feeling tired and achy. I was not greatly surprised to find red marks on my legs, especially my inner thighs--I always seem plagued by spider-bites in the fall, so I thought no more of it until I got home. By then, when I undressed for a nap, it was obvious I was having a reaction to the miconozol--my inner thighs were puffy and red and the swelling was noticeable on my butt, hands and feet.
I spent a miserable night--woke up in the small hours of the morning feeling chilled and shocky, but figured I could hold on until morning--forgetting that it was Labor Day and the clinic was closed. I tanked myself up on Sudafed and went into the Shelter. I managed to get through my volunteer day, then stopped at the store on the way home to stock up on Benadryl and various anti-itch lotions and creams.
In the meantime, Denny's two-weeks at home were cut short--he had to drive to Anchorage Monday afternoon to catch a flight to Fairbanks for some training before heading out to Cold Bay. So I sent him off and spent another long, restless, uncomfortable night.
Tuesday, I went into the clinic. The PA gave me some Allegra. She could have just as well given me some sugar pills--my hands and face continued to swell and I developed still more hives until I was covered from head to foot. I called her back on Wednesday morning and she phoned a prescription for prednesone into the pharmacy for me.
Blissfully, that did the trick, shutting down my allergic reaction--even my sinuses were clear. I took Wednesday and Thursday off sick from work and basicaly slept the whole time when I wasn't caring for the cats and drinking chicken soup. I worked Friday and Saturday, then felt well enough on Sunday to paint the storage shed.
Those steriods can be marvelous drugs....
About an hour or so into this project, I walked right into the raised backhoe bucket--so busy looking where I was stepping on the uneven ground that I never saw it. I damn near knocked myself out. As it was, I found myself sitting on the ground watching the stars whirl around my head for about half a minute. Once I collected my wits, I put the paint supplies carefully away, went inside, showered, and took a nap.
In retrospect, I should have gone down to the hospital and let them check me out. The thought even crossed my mind. But I didn't have anyone to drive me there and back--what if I was hospitalized? Who would feed the cats?
Anyway, I felt better after my nap and although I developed a large, painful swelling on my forehead, I could pretty much ignore it. (National events would soon take my mind off my vanishing hives and throbbing head--though I realized later that I was probably walking around for most of that week with a concussion...)
The next day, Monday, September 10th, was National Pet Remembrance Day. Our community held a candle-lighting at Bishop's Beach that evening. I had had to work overtime that morning, so I was tired and dehydrated, but wanted to show my support and share memories with the others. We had a nice turn out and it was a cathargic experience. By the time we extinguished our candles and dispersed, the sky was darkening and the breeze off the sea had turned decidedly chilly.
I went home and read a while before dozing off--I had just began the Liaden series and was getting caught up in it. I was scheduled to work the afternoon shift on Tuesday so I planned to sleep in.
Despite being tired, I didn't sleep all that well. I woke a little after four-thirty with a headache and a slightly sick feeling. I went to the bathroom to get some aspirin and a glass of water, then settled back in bed to watch some television until the aspirin kicked in.
I never did get back to sleep.
Channel Two (NBC) was showing syndicated shows--Caroline in the City--but I only had it on for about three minutes or so when NBC broke in with developing news. The scene cut to the World Trade Center streaming smoke into the clear New York morning as the anchors explained that we were seeing the aftermath of a bizarre aircraft accident. An airliner had hit the building--it was hard to judged how big an aircraft it was and I was unfamiliar with the landmarks. I kept wondering how an aircraft could hit such a big obstacle in such good weather? Surely none of the approaches to the New York area airports were so low over Manhattan? It was inexplicable. Any pilot worth his license would have taken his craft into the water before hitting a congested area. Perhaps the aircraft had been uncontrollable... As the news helicopter circled the scene, I kept trying to fathom it.
Then, as I watched, a second aircraft flew in from the right and hit the other, undamaged tower.
I think that for ten seconds or so I told myself that it must have been another news aircraft that had been circling the scene, that it had inadvertently blundered into the building--but the chill of realization caught up with me as the thought crystalized--a thought shared at that instant all across the country--that this was no accident. This was a deliberate act.
That was the moment the paradigm shifted--for me--for millions of others. That was the moment the world--or at least our perception of it--changed forever.
There was a time when Alaska got its television news on a two-day, tape-delay basis. Satellite technology has changed all that. Now I can lie in my bed in Homer, Alaska and watch catastrophe unfold on the other side of the continent. Comparisons have been made to the attack on Pearl Harbor--but Pearl Harbor didn't happen on live TV.
I called Denny in Cold Bay. It was about ten minutes after five and I hated to wake him up, but a bunch of realizations were crowding my mind. The disaster at the World Trade Center was not an accident--it was a terrorist act. These people were hijacking airliners at will. They were killing the pilots and flying the aircraft themselves, because I knew without even consciously considering it that no airline pilot would fly--or allow his plane to be flown--into a crowded building. I knew without a doubt the pilots had been dead before the planes hit their targets.
"Anybody know what that smoke is in lower Manhattan?"
Unidentified aircraft on New York Center's frequency, 8:50 am, Sept. 11, 2001
It was an exhausting week. I didn't sleep well for some days afterward. I was troubled by a dull, persistent headache and work was emotionally draining despite the respite afforded by the nation-wide grounding of all air traffic. The Federal Aviation Regulations were being amended by emergency order several times a day so we would come into work and spend a good forty-five minutes updating ourselves on what the rules were *today*. People turned to us for answers and we didn't always have any for them.
For some time after that awful day, I waited for things to return to normal. Only much later did I come to understand that "normal" would never be what it was before.
The memorial services were being broadcast.
I may finally be ready to write about it--write it all out. The sun is slipping down behind Bluff point as I write this, a ball of red-orange in the hazy autumn air. It has been a beautiful day--cloudless skies--much like that day two years ago.
There's a hole in the world tonight.
There's a cloud of fear and sorrow.
There's a hole in the world tonight.
Don't let there be a hole in the world tomorrow.
--The Eagles
The weather has been clear and mild--much like that September two years ago in the waning days of the summer of 2001 when everything changed. What I write below is based on notes I made during that week in Septemeber two years, a lifetime and a different reality ago...
Long-Winded Prologue
Labor Day had passed and Homer was beginning to quiet down as tourists left. The days were noticeably shorter--a couple early September mornings brought frost under clear skies.
At work, PD had been on leave and I had been working overtime days. I was fighting a sinus infection and so was sleeping a lot, drinking fluids and taking some amoxicillin.
Denny got home from the Aleutians on August 26 and drove to Valdez to spend a couple days fishing with my Dad. He came home on Wednesday with a load of frozen salmon.
By Friday, August 31, I realized that I was itching in a most awkward location and that the amoxicillin had triggered a yeast infection. I applied some generic miconozol that I had on hand, and on Saturday, relunctant to doctor myself for a whole week, I bought some Monostat 3 on my way to work and applied it that night.
When I woke up Sunday, I was still feeling tired and achy. I was not greatly surprised to find red marks on my legs, especially my inner thighs--I always seem plagued by spider-bites in the fall, so I thought no more of it until I got home. By then, when I undressed for a nap, it was obvious I was having a reaction to the miconozol--my inner thighs were puffy and red and the swelling was noticeable on my butt, hands and feet.
I spent a miserable night--woke up in the small hours of the morning feeling chilled and shocky, but figured I could hold on until morning--forgetting that it was Labor Day and the clinic was closed. I tanked myself up on Sudafed and went into the Shelter. I managed to get through my volunteer day, then stopped at the store on the way home to stock up on Benadryl and various anti-itch lotions and creams.
In the meantime, Denny's two-weeks at home were cut short--he had to drive to Anchorage Monday afternoon to catch a flight to Fairbanks for some training before heading out to Cold Bay. So I sent him off and spent another long, restless, uncomfortable night.
Tuesday, I went into the clinic. The PA gave me some Allegra. She could have just as well given me some sugar pills--my hands and face continued to swell and I developed still more hives until I was covered from head to foot. I called her back on Wednesday morning and she phoned a prescription for prednesone into the pharmacy for me.
Blissfully, that did the trick, shutting down my allergic reaction--even my sinuses were clear. I took Wednesday and Thursday off sick from work and basicaly slept the whole time when I wasn't caring for the cats and drinking chicken soup. I worked Friday and Saturday, then felt well enough on Sunday to paint the storage shed.
Those steriods can be marvelous drugs....
About an hour or so into this project, I walked right into the raised backhoe bucket--so busy looking where I was stepping on the uneven ground that I never saw it. I damn near knocked myself out. As it was, I found myself sitting on the ground watching the stars whirl around my head for about half a minute. Once I collected my wits, I put the paint supplies carefully away, went inside, showered, and took a nap.
In retrospect, I should have gone down to the hospital and let them check me out. The thought even crossed my mind. But I didn't have anyone to drive me there and back--what if I was hospitalized? Who would feed the cats?
Anyway, I felt better after my nap and although I developed a large, painful swelling on my forehead, I could pretty much ignore it. (National events would soon take my mind off my vanishing hives and throbbing head--though I realized later that I was probably walking around for most of that week with a concussion...)
The next day, Monday, September 10th, was National Pet Remembrance Day. Our community held a candle-lighting at Bishop's Beach that evening. I had had to work overtime that morning, so I was tired and dehydrated, but wanted to show my support and share memories with the others. We had a nice turn out and it was a cathargic experience. By the time we extinguished our candles and dispersed, the sky was darkening and the breeze off the sea had turned decidedly chilly.
I went home and read a while before dozing off--I had just began the Liaden series and was getting caught up in it. I was scheduled to work the afternoon shift on Tuesday so I planned to sleep in.
Despite being tired, I didn't sleep all that well. I woke a little after four-thirty with a headache and a slightly sick feeling. I went to the bathroom to get some aspirin and a glass of water, then settled back in bed to watch some television until the aspirin kicked in.
I never did get back to sleep.
Channel Two (NBC) was showing syndicated shows--Caroline in the City--but I only had it on for about three minutes or so when NBC broke in with developing news. The scene cut to the World Trade Center streaming smoke into the clear New York morning as the anchors explained that we were seeing the aftermath of a bizarre aircraft accident. An airliner had hit the building--it was hard to judged how big an aircraft it was and I was unfamiliar with the landmarks. I kept wondering how an aircraft could hit such a big obstacle in such good weather? Surely none of the approaches to the New York area airports were so low over Manhattan? It was inexplicable. Any pilot worth his license would have taken his craft into the water before hitting a congested area. Perhaps the aircraft had been uncontrollable... As the news helicopter circled the scene, I kept trying to fathom it.
Then, as I watched, a second aircraft flew in from the right and hit the other, undamaged tower.
I think that for ten seconds or so I told myself that it must have been another news aircraft that had been circling the scene, that it had inadvertently blundered into the building--but the chill of realization caught up with me as the thought crystalized--a thought shared at that instant all across the country--that this was no accident. This was a deliberate act.
That was the moment the paradigm shifted--for me--for millions of others. That was the moment the world--or at least our perception of it--changed forever.
There was a time when Alaska got its television news on a two-day, tape-delay basis. Satellite technology has changed all that. Now I can lie in my bed in Homer, Alaska and watch catastrophe unfold on the other side of the continent. Comparisons have been made to the attack on Pearl Harbor--but Pearl Harbor didn't happen on live TV.
I called Denny in Cold Bay. It was about ten minutes after five and I hated to wake him up, but a bunch of realizations were crowding my mind. The disaster at the World Trade Center was not an accident--it was a terrorist act. These people were hijacking airliners at will. They were killing the pilots and flying the aircraft themselves, because I knew without even consciously considering it that no airline pilot would fly--or allow his plane to be flown--into a crowded building. I knew without a doubt the pilots had been dead before the planes hit their targets.
"Anybody know what that smoke is in lower Manhattan?"
Unidentified aircraft on New York Center's frequency, 8:50 am, Sept. 11, 2001
It was an exhausting week. I didn't sleep well for some days afterward. I was troubled by a dull, persistent headache and work was emotionally draining despite the respite afforded by the nation-wide grounding of all air traffic. The Federal Aviation Regulations were being amended by emergency order several times a day so we would come into work and spend a good forty-five minutes updating ourselves on what the rules were *today*. People turned to us for answers and we didn't always have any for them.
For some time after that awful day, I waited for things to return to normal. Only much later did I come to understand that "normal" would never be what it was before.
