Like most Americans, I experienced the trauma of September 11, 2001, through my television. My wife, 1-year-old daughter Lauren, and I had just moved to the Cleveland, Ohio area, and I was a stay-at-home dad.

That morning I was in my living room while Lauren watched a children’s show. Our landline phone rang, and my brother-in-law said: “Turn on the news.” I changed the channel over Lauren’s protest.

Smoke billowed out of the first tower.

Watching a national tragedy unfold in the presence of a 1-year-old made an already surreal experience even more bizarre. I was unsure what to do first. I did not have relatives I needed to call in New York City, but then what? Call my wife at work? Call my parents? Shield my child from the images? At that point it was not clear whether the explosion was an accident, terrorism or war. In shock, I did nothing for a few minutes, taking in the news and tending to Lauren with split attention.

Soon, I talked to my wife; then a plane hit the second tower, and my mind froze. The awareness of needing to parent an increasingly fussy child, however, helped me focus. There was nothing I could do, and my oblivious daughter needed me. After a few more minutes of impossible news, I decided to take a break and walk Lauren to the park nearby.

But there was no escape from the media. At the park, a mom and her young child arrived with a radio on. After we talked about the third plane that had now hit the Pentagon, we heard more chilling news: a fourth hijacked plane was reported to be “over Cleveland.”

My mind refroze.

The entire country seemed vulnerable to planes falling from the sky. Keeping Lauren safe suddenly became a more pressing mission. As we now know, that fourth flight was United Airlines Flight 93 that eventually crashed in Shanksville, Pa., after heroic efforts by American passengers.

Impact of 9/11 remains hard to convey

Today, Lauren is 19, and her sister, Lindsay, is 16. As they grew up and started learning about 9/11, it was difficult to convey the shock, fear, and anger felt by so many Americans at the time. To my surprise, I found that watching Flight 93 together, a film which recreates that flight’s horror and confusion in real time, probably brought their teen minds the most understanding.

Ironically, Lindsay is now an aspiring filmmaker, and we recently visited New York City to tour film schools. By chance, we were in Times Square on July 13 when a blackout hit Manhattan at about 7 p.m. At first, the scene was not alarming. The sun had not set, some lights remained on, and people remained calm. But soon we started hearing and then seeing multiple firetrucks race through darkened intersections. After some fears of terrorism, word spread (thanks to cell phones) that the cause was electrical.

We also learned, however, that the firefighters were rushing to rescue people stuck in pitch-black, oppressively hot subway stations and elevators. As we watched Broadway theatergoers empty into narrow streets, a truck full of firefighters stopped right in front of us. We saw their intense faces as they jumped into action and headed into a building people were leaving.

At that moment, it hit us: first responders really do run into harm’s way for all of our sakes. While most of us change the channel, walk away or hail a cab out of danger (as Lindsay and I did eventually), first responders race to the dark places. The 2019 Manhattan blackout was no 9/11, but the faces of those firefighters in Times Square made the abstract concept of heroism concrete.

On the drive across Pennsylvania from Cleveland to New York City, my daughter and I had seen signs that read: “Safety Corridor Next 5 Miles.” That phrase struck me as what parents try to provide for their children for at least 18 years. By extension, a “safety corridor” is what firefighters and other first responders try to provide for all of us for the rest of our lives. The appropriate amount of gratitude is hard to convey.

September 11th was the day I finally realized the person I was dating at the time was going to be the woman that I marry.

It’s as vivid now as it was 18 years ago. My girlfriend, Jessica, had a doctor appointment on the morning of 9/11 near my apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Rather than stay at her place downtown and commute directly from her job on the 99th floor of the South Tower at the World Trade Center, she spent the night at my apartment so she could arrive at her doctor’s appointment on time.

On the morning of September 11th, I felt like a boxer getting a round of jabs to the head.

Punch. A dizzying feeling in my midtown office as the first phone call came in from Jessica’s best friend. She was hysterical, crying because she saw the flames from her morning commute on the Staten Island Ferry and knew Jess worked in one of the towers.

Punch. No one was able to reach my girlfriend on her cell phone. Did she race down to the office after her doctor appointment?

Punch. More calls streamed in from my friends, family and Jess’s family as the entire world watched on their computer monitors and television screens the horror that unfolded. Still, no communication with my wife. Most cellular service halted in New York City and everyone feeling fearful, confused and horrified. Our office closed for the day and sent everyone home.

In my gut, I knew she was OK because I saw her early that morning on her way to the nearby appointment. But I longed just to hear her voice to get confirmation that she was safe.

We finally connected later that afternoon. She never went into her office that day. She lost her boss and mentor, several friends, and numerous colleagues in the 9/11 tragedy. The silver lining is that day brought us closer together as we cried, grieved and supported each other in the aftermath. We will never forget.

Others can give you a more riveting account of that day. What they saw. What they felt. What they smelled. 

Stories that are breath-taking and heartbreaking in the same sentence. Someone living out a surreal real-life action movie.

Nothing extraordinary happened to me that day – Sept. 11, 2001. I was just one of the millions of spectators. But as I cut through Union Square in Manhattan on my way to St. Vincent’s Hospital in Greenwich Village to give blood, I do recall one lightning bolt of a thought flash across my mind.

There is no way I’m bringing a child into this world.

I was 25, single, and under no threat of the ladies forming an ovulation line at my doorstep at any point in the near future.  But the sentiment was there. Fuck this place and everyone in it. What’s the point of building anything – of trying – if the worst, most reckless impulses of this species can wipe it away in the blink of an eye.

And I’m not just talking about the terrorists. Shortly after 9/11, a store on my block covered their window with a huge sign that read “NUKE THEM ALL.” It was still there when I moved away nine months later. For all I know that sign is still there today. The person who put it up probably has a Cabinet position now. I could see where 21st century America was headed. 

Twelve years later, my wife and I brought our first child into the world. So, what changed? 

It’s human nature to be defiant. We’re hard wired for it. Here I am writing this and here you are reading it. We’re both products of millennia of defiance. Ancestors who faced famine, war, disease, persecution. People with less resources at their disposal than you or I. And yet they soldiered on. They held a tiny baby in their arms – your great-great-great-great-whatever – and made a bet that things would get better. Diseases would be cured, famines would pass, education be acquired, representative government truly attained. Maybe not in their lifetime, but sometime. Maybe even in a far off and distant land. 

What can I say? I’m a product of people who took a chance that things will get better. So are you. So are we all. 

I had the same thoughts on 11/9/16 that I did on 9/11/01. And I had more skin in the game to boot, with a wife and daughter. What made it worse, was that this time America did it to itself. I’ll be honest, if I see the wrong headline at the wrong time, I wonder if I did the right thing bringing life into the world. It’s easy for despair to get a toehold.  

And yet, almost a year to the day later, we welcomed our son into the world.

Irish playwright Samuel Beckett once wrote, “I can’t go on. I’ll go on.” Is the damage done this century to our society, our environment, our world irreparable? I don’t have a crystal ball – but I’ve got two bets on the future that says it’s not.  

Photo by Jason Greene

Kids growing up in New York City have reminders of the Sept. 11, 2001, tragedy over every shoulder.

Every firehouse has names on the outside honoring lives lost on that day. Plaques across the city memorialize men and women who made the ultimate sacrifice, and those who went off to work, but never came home.

All these are reasons why I did not hesitate to bring my own children with me to visit the National September 11 Memorial and Museum in lower Manhattan.

We were feeling the heaviness of the 9/11 Memorial and Museum just while waiting outside. Upon entering, we were greeted by a smiling employee. She bent down and talked to my 6-year-old and engaged him in a short conversation. She then gave me the rundown of places I might want to avoid with the kids. We were handed a brochure on how to talk to kids about what happened that day.

And then, the 2-year-old bolted. She was done being quiet and wanted to run. She wanted to escape the museum and be free from constraints. Ditching my group, I ran after her. A not-so-happy security guard yelled at me and told me to keep her close. I informed him I was doing my best. He muttered something under his breath as we walked away.

Most of the 9/11 Memorial and Museum is intense but manageable with kids. We walked and talked throughout the museum, but stopped just shy of going into an area about those who jumped from the Twin Towers. I did not enter and not because I was with kids, but because I didn’t want to watch the footage and see the photos. I remember them from that day and are still etched in my memory.

The 9/11 Memorial and Museum is a place that will stay with you long after you leave. It is an important place and one that should be visited. There are many stories that might cause nightmares in the young, but there is hope found in the museum as well. Stories of people coming together. Stories of brave souls who prioritized other’s lives above their own.

My kids and I talked before, during and after visiting the museum. It is still an ongoing discussion. One that happens after each firehouse is passed and, on every Sept. 11 when the lights flow up to the heavens.

If you are planning on taking kids, stop by the kiosk for a brochure on how to talk to kids about what happened. You can also get information about having that discussion from the museum’s website.

Strollers are permitted in the museum, but it is easier in some areas to store the stroller and wear the child in a baby carrier.

I spent two hours at the museum but would have stayed longer if I was by myself. There are plenty of places to sit and I recommend bringing sketchbooks to help older kids experience the museum.

9/11 Memorial and Museum hours, tickets:

9/11 Memorial: Daily 7:30 a.m. — 9 p.m.

9/11 Museum: Sun.–Thu., 9 a.m. – 8 p.m. with last entry at 6 p.m.
Fri. and Sat., 9 a.m. – 9 p.m. with last entry at 7 p.m.

You can purchase tickets and get directions at the National September 11 Memorial and Museum website.

A version of this first appeared on One Good Dad. Photos: Jason Greene

I’ve never had a good memory. I’m not great with names at parties. I frequently forget items on my mental shopping list when I go to buy groceries. I’m forever trying to remember where I left my sunglasses, before realizing they’re perched on top of my head.

It’s not a product of aging – I’ve always had a hard time remembering stuff. My husband and daughter get frustrated when they have to remind me about past conversations.

“Dad,” Riley said to me the other day, “Did you sign that form?”

“Honey, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I gave you the form last week, and I told you I had to give it back in by today so that I can go with my class to the Getty.”

I looked around my desk area, under piles of miscellaneous clutter. “Are you sure you gave it to me?”

“Are. You. KIDDING ME?? We had a whole conversation!”

Sure, it doesn’t matter that my frustrated daughter is the same kid whom I have to ask five times to wash the dishes, clean her room, or do anything related to cleaning, the same one who claims absolute amnesia when I say “I told you yesterday to write your grandparents a thank you note!”

Irrelevant. In our house, I’m the guy who doesn’t have his shit together, the one who gets more reminders than he should need, who is constantly a few steps behind the rest of the world, asking his daughter when Parent-Teacher Night is, or asking his spouse, “Wait – that dinner with your boss is tonight?”

That’s me during most of the time, throughout most of the year. With one exception.

September.

September is my daughter’s birthday month. (This year, she turns 15. Zoinks.) And every September, my memory skills become very sharp.

My daughter has no idea. She probably wouldn’t even believe me if I tried to describe it to her.

Any parent knows this feeling: every year when your kid has another birthday, you look at her, at who she is, who she is becoming … and you think about what life was like when she was brand new.

I may not remember whether I bought half-and-half at the store yesterday, but I remember everything about the first few months of my daughter’s life.

I remember that the two weeks prior to her birth, the entire nation was reeling from the destruction of the Twin Towers on 9/11.  I was walking around wondering how I could possibly raise a child in a world where something so horrific could happen, so close.

I remember how 9/11 faded as soon as she was born. I went from watching and rewatching footage of the smoking, crumbling skyscrapers to becoming extraordinarily focused on learning how to diaper my kid’s butt without letting anything leak out the sides.

I remember being awake at night with her during those first months, curled up on the couch with her for late-night feedings. I remember the milky, vaguely sweet smell of formula. I remember being absolutely sure that I would never be allowed to sleep more than two hours at a time again, for the rest of my life.

I remember that, to pass time during those late nights, I’d put in a Buffy the Vampire Slayer DVD and watch episodes on mute while Riley dozed in my arms. I also remember sometimes choosing not to press play, and simply letting the quiet blanket of night wrap us both up, the rhythm of her breathing being all I needed.

I remember drinking two pots of coffee and a Red Bull every morning during the first six months of her life to make sure I could stay awake at work after a night of no sleep.

I remember the music that served as my soundtrack that first autumn, an oddly random mix: My Chemical Romance, Maroon 5, Elvis Costello, Roxy Music and the new Depeche Mode that had just come out. One extraordinary CD still stands out to me: the artist was Poe, and her album was called Haunted. It was a pop/rock concept album about her relationship with her father before and after he passed away. I did not know this was the theme when I first listened to it. Not really the kind of thing you want to hear when you’re already stressing about being a good dad for your newborn kid. I listened to it over and over and over, possibly to freak myself out on purpose.

I took books on our long stroller walks, books by less-than-famous, wonderfully trippy writers: I was rereading some favorites, short story writers, magical realism, trippy stuff. Kevin Brockmeier. Aimee Bender. Jincy Willet. George Saunders. T.C. Boyle. I would balance a book on the stroller canopy when I would go with Riley for our marathon midday stroller treks through Balboa Park in San Diego. We would hit the road around 10:30 a.m., make our way past the zoo, past the park fountains, cruise through the arboretum, cross the beautiful bridge over the 163 freeway that goes downtown, and we’d spread out a blanket in a certain quiet grassy area on the other side to hang out for a while, find our toes, chew on grass and bugs, and then head back home … just in time for one or both of us to go down for the afternoon nap.

I remember Baby Einstein videos being on constant replay in the afternoon, after naptime was over. I remember thinking that maybe all those parenting articles were right: if I play Mozart for Riley, maybe it will make her a math genius. (Spoiler: not so much.)

I remember the soft spongy blocks we played with. They had farm animals on each side.

I remember putting her in this bouncy/swingy baby seat thing that hung in a doorway, and worrying that she’d bounce so hard she’d actually spring up and bonk her head on the top of the doorframe.

I remember solving the puzzle of How to Do Laundry With a Baby in a Bjorn Without Bending Over and Letting Her Fall Out. (It took some trial and error.)

I remember exactly what we were doing the first time she laughed. We were playing Grab Daddy’s Eyebrows And See What Face He Makes. I remember the delight in her eyes.

I remember Mr. Froggy, Mr. Turtle, Mr. Pony, Mr. Unicorn and Mr. Crinkly Crab. (Yes, I know it’s ludicrously sexist that I made all of her stuffed animals male, and with boring names. It wasn’t intentional. I was just super tired.)

I remember the time she was so squirmy while I was changing her diaper that I swear she was trying to fall off the changing table. She came very close to succeeding, several times.

I remember the tiny socks with butterflies on them. And the overalls, and the bow fixed to her wispy hair, and the post-bath towel that had a hood with baby bear ears on it.

I remember the first time she was in her crib crying and stopped when she saw me, because she recognized me as the guy who can make things better.

This is why I don’t mind when my family teases me about forgetting things. I remember what’s important. Particularly this time of year.

I really should write some of that stuff down, though. Just in case.

It’s hard to believe my daughter lives in a world in which the Twin Towers no longer stand, that when she’s studying about the tragedy of Sept. 11, 2001, in school textbooks, she’ll probably feel as far removed from it as I do from JFK’s assassination, Pearl Harbor, the Holocaust, and so many other significant historical events.

So how will I teach my daughter about 9/11? About how the world changed and didn’t change when those planes hit the towers, another hit the Pentagon, and a fourth was brought down by courageous passengers over Pennsylvania during the worst foreign terrorist attack on American soil?

I guess it will be through the memory of actually living through it, just as my mom must have learned from her parents who fled Poland during World War II and my dad must have learned about living through the Great Depression from his parents.

Fact: I was in Manhattan on that day.

Fact: I was not near the destruction nor do I know of anyone personally who perished, but like almost everyone I know, I know people who knew people – the husband of one of my wife’s friends; my father’s always pleasant acquaintance. And so I’ll describe to my daughter what I saw and lived through, things she can never truly learn from textbooks.

What I remember about 9/11

The most lasting image I have of 9/11 is standing on the roof of my office building on 22nd Street and 2nd Avenue, watching the Twin Towers burning while across the street, a handful of boys played schoolyard basketball under an azure sky. It was eerie, seeing life change forever and go on simultaneously, watching innocence up close and evil in the background. I never saw the towers fall — I’d left the roof just before the first crumbled so I could call my dad who worked in Chinatown to make sure he was OK, so like most people, I only experienced that devastation during the constant loop that was on television over the next few days.

I remember one of the professors at my work being stranded in Florida, how she was frantic, unable to contact her firefighter husband for days while he bravely helped victims and then worked all hours clearing Ground Zero. I will tell her how many such intrepid people eventually succumbed to cancer and other illnesses thanks to toxins they were forced to breathe.

I remember my dad picking me up at work, us driving to Queens, and me staring at a Manhattan skyline where a giant dust cloud had displaced the World Trade Center.

I remember attending the only candlelight vigil I’ve ever been to. It was held that night in front of my apartment building. Strangers cried and hugged each other.

I remember the city, the country, the world coming together.

What I will pass on about 9/11

I will tell my daughter how the entertainment and pop culture machine screeched to a halt for the first and only time in my life, and that when it returned, it did so cautiously; David Letterman’s sadness and weariness, his wondering if it was OK to laugh again; me attending my first ever World Series game, Game 3 between the Yankees and Arizona Diamondbacks at which President George W. Bush threw out the first pitch as snipers lay still as stone on top of Yankee Stadium.

I will tell my daughter about the grief that consumed the city, but also the love and unity.

I will take my daughter to the World Trade Center Memorial and wonder if she can feel the presence of the iconic Twin Towers as we stand in front of the beautifully designed fountains in which are carved the names of lost citizens and police officers and firefighters in the shadow of the Freedom Tower, a building that for her will be part of her normal landscape, but for me will always feel something like an intruder.

I will show her the giant purple beams of light that appear each 9/11. I will let her watch the names of the lost being read by their loved ones. And when she’s old enough, I will show her United 93 and explain the visceral reaction I had when I first saw it, the film being one of the very few I’ve seen that really hit me emotionally, and how I often watch it on 9/11 as my way to remember and honor the thousands lost that day.

I will be there to answer any questions she might have and will do so openly and honestly, and I will hope that she never has to experience something akin to or worse than 9/11, something that will forevermore necessitate the word: Remember.

A version of this first appeared on Raising Sienna.

Photo: via photopin (license)