September 11 - James's Story

I thought I was prepared for the deluge of emotion that would overcome me on September 11 2011 as I wandered the streets of NY. I wasn’t anywhere near prepared.

I met James on the afternoon of September 11 2011, the 10 year anniversary of the atrocity that rocked the world.  I believe James (and the group of firies he was with) was from Engine 54, the 4th ladder, 9th Battalion, but given the 101 conversations going on that afternoon at Hurleys Saloon Bar on 48th Street, this could be incorrect.  However; given the story he told me and the closeness of the ladder to where we were that afternoon, I have reason to believe this was indeed his Ladder. 

Let me set the scene.

The day dawned, hot and humid, minus the rain that had plagued the city for the first four days of our stay in the incredible NY.  I woke up to the live telecast of the Ground Zero memorial playing in the background in our hotel room.  My husband admitted he’d been up since 5am and had already been for a walk around Times Square and was amazed that the city was alive and humming earlier than normal (contrary to popular belief, NY does sleep).

Stepping out of the hotel at 10am I was greeted by a cloudy day and 1000’s and 1000’s of people, a huge increase on how many you would normally see on the streets this early.  There were people crying in the street, huddled together talking to the firemen and police who were out in full force.  Most of the streets were blocked off, down to one lane of traffic, which made the traffic horrendous, more so than normal.  There were sniffer dogs on the streets and in our hotel alone, three dogs with handlers that walked the floors 24x7.

It felt wrong to shop or go sight-seeing that day, so we walked the streets of New York City.  We walked many, many miles and talked to a lot of people.  We ended up in a little, what I could only describe as a wine bar, called Hurley’s Saloon Bar on 48^th Street.  We stopped for a drink, it was about 3pm.  In that bar I was lucky enough to have a very humbling experience with some very brave, sometimes sad and sometimes, very funny, firemen.  You throw some performers from a broad way show in there (who were on a break) and it made for an interesting afternoon…

We were sitting in the corner spot, enjoying a quiet beer when a large group of fireman entered the bar.  They were in full uniform, having just come from a memorial (not THE memorial, the fire brigade and police did not attend the memorial service at Ground Zero on that day - due to limited capacity, so the news reported) and greeted the bar, immediately heading to the function room upstairs.

From downstairs we could just hear them talking, sometimes there was a long, sombre silence, other times their conversation was peppered with laughter.  Some of them came down stairs and struck up a conversation with my husband and myself and the some of the performers from a broadway show (there for lunch), they then proceeded to shout us a drink.

It got a little loud so I wandered outside to the table and chairs set up outside.  I'd been sitting there for about 5 minutes when James came out and introduced himself.  We chatted about nothing for a bit then he went silent.  I looked up at him (he was a giant of a man - well, he was from where I was sitting) and he had tears rolling down his face.  The type of tears that you know are from an incredible sadness that only comes from deep inside.  He started to talk and I began to understand where the sadness came from.  He belonged to a Ladder that lost a lot of people on 9/11 2001.  He was working that day and after the call, jumped on the second truck to leave the station.  The first truck had left a minute before the one James was on and arrived at the towers quickly.  Within minutes the men and women on the first truck were working there way up the towers.  James's truck got stuck in the madness of the traffic and arrived much later, by which time it was evident that sending anymore men and women up was pointless.

To cut a long story short, James had spent and I would imagine he continues to spend, 10 years with an incredible guilt that 15 of his friends had died.  He thought he should have died to and the guilt ate away at him like a cancer.  I sat there and listened to him talk, eventually giving way to tears myself.  Not knowing what else to do or say, I got up, went over an hugged him and wiped the tears off his cheek..  We continued chatting about his love of Australia and how he was saving to visit Melbourne (he'd heard great things about it) and returned inside not long after.  He put on his brave face, bought another beer and wandered upstairs.

I didn't see James again but James, if you are out there in the cloud somewhere and one day you come across my blog and remember our conversation that day, get in touch.  It was an honour and a privilege to meet you.

http://www.hurleysnyc.com/media/hurleys.html

I took this photo, not far from Hurleys on September 11 2011.

 

#NewYork #FireFighters #September11 #911

 

I have tried to portray the day I met James the best I can.  It was a very big day full of a lot of emotions so if you do find James and there is a part of the story that is incorrect, I apologise, I tried to be accurate.