WE MUST NEVER FORGET
It was a day that effected every single one of us and changed our future
After seeing my kids off to school, I headed home satisfied and secure in their safety and the routine of their day. The air was crisp and sweet. My sneakers squeaked as I walked across the yard through dewy drops on the thick grass. Bright sunshine and hints of a vibrant blue sky peeked through a veil of grey overcast mist, promising a luscious day.
With a sense of optimism, I sped into my house so I’d be ready before my obsessively prompt trainer arrived for our regular nine o’clock session. But something was not right. First, he was already there before 8:59 a.m. Second, he was reaching up to turn on the t.v., something he never allowed during our workouts.
I couldn’t make sense of what was on the screen. For this native New Yorker, the image of the iconic World Trade Center was unmistakable. The dark smoke billowing out was not. Eyes transfixed on the television, neither of us spoke. Soon a grey plane appeared. A freight plane, I thought, made a turn and smacked into the second tower.
It felt as though my eyes practically popped out of the sockets as my brain tried to comprehend what I’d just witnessed. “Oh my god, that was deliberate! That was so deliberate,” I said in disbelief. I walked backward, reaching out for the phone on the wall behind me, unable to tear my eyes from the television. I had a terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach, like a piece of me had vanished.
Because members of my family travelled constantly, I had a habit of calling home whenever there was big news, danger, or natural disasters where one of them might be. On autopilot, I dialed my mother. She picked up on the third ring.
“Who was that?” I don’t know why I phrased it like that, and not, “Where is everybody?” like I usually did. But my gut told me I’d just lost someone I loved.
I waited for my mother’s typical “everything is fine,” or that “the news exaggerated how bad things are where we are.” Instead, she said, “I just want to know where your brother is. He was flying to California this morning.”
“It wasn’t him. He’s fine.” I said this with extreme certainty. “I would know if it were him.” It was hours before we received confirmation that he was safe and unharmed. He ended up somewhere in the Midwest when his flight got diverted and made it back home to his family.
For the next forty-eight hours, I kept every television on in the house, glued to the news in total shock and disbelief at the unimaginable horrors that had been inflicted. Early Thursday morning, my kids were in school, the housekeeper was starting on the kitchen, and my husband was upstairs getting ready for work. I was walking from the family room, crossing into the kitchen when the little white television on the wall caught my eye. Turning my head. I saw a black screen and white words scrolling, in what looked to me like credits rolling in total silence. It’s unclear what attracted me to it, but I moved closer, my eyes focusing on the words. But they weren’t words. They were names. Nothing identified what I was looking at, but I sensed these were the names of the passengers on each of the planes. Two names came up to the middle of the screen and seemed frozen there:
Ruth Clifford McCourt
Juliana Valentine McCourt
For a brief second, I actually stopped breathing. Then I turned and ran up the stairs and into the bedroom closet where my husband was shining his shoes.
“Ru…it’s Ru…” I couldn’t swallow, I couldn’t spit it out. My brain was numb. My body paralyzed. I was hysterically crying a dry river.
“Ruth and Juliana were on the plane.”
He didn’t believe me. I didn’t want to believe myself. I ran back down to the television. Newscasters were at their anchor desks. The scroll was gone. I flipped through every channel for the next thirty minutes and then on and off again for the rest of the day. I checked the newspapers on the internet. There was no mention of any victim’s names anywhere.
It couldn’t be. Ruth was a friend I utterly cherished. Juliana, her four-year-old daughter.
My friendship with Ruth blossomed in the mid-80s when we were neighbors. With snow-white skin and a gorgeous head of red hair piled perfectly on top of her head, I thought she resembled Lucille Ball, hold the slapstick, add the humor. She carried herself regally and gave the appearance of behaving in a prim and proper way, while I had a potty-mouth and, unlike her put-together outfits, I preferred ripped sweats and jeans. But on the inside, where it counts, we were both genuine, big-hearted women who prioritized helping others.
Eventually, I was married, moved to Pennsylvania, and had children. Ruth married, moved to Connecticut, and had Juliana. We didn’t speak often. Life with young kids does that to some people. But the infrequent calls never came between us. When we spoke, we just picked up where we left off, as if no time had passed. She knew I loved her, and vice versa.
After the attack on the tower, and seeing the passenger “manifest,” I spent nearly a week doing everything I could think of to confirm whether Ruth had really been on that plane. She and her family had moved to a new house since our last contact, and I didn’t have the new phone number. The only thing I couldn’t bring myself to do was call the last phone number I had for her. I was too afraid. Her mother was living in their old place, and if her mother answered the phone, what would I say if I was right about Ruth, or if I was wrong? And what if I reached her husband? What would I say? So, for a brief time, I did nothing but hope. Soon, the Boston Globe published an article about Ruth. I could deny it no longer. I was overcome, swallowed whole by the beastly devastation.
They were headed to California to take Juliana on her first trip to Disneyland, with Ruth’s friend and Juliana’s godmother, Paige Farley-Hackel. Ruth and Juliana boarded United Airlines Flight 175. Paige boarded American Airlines Flight 11. They planned to rendezvous when they landed. The plane I had watched swerving into Tower 2 carried my friend and her daughter. At the same moment, one of her brothers was in the lobby helping a woman critically burned by the jet fuel from Paige’s Flight 11. He had just gotten the woman out to an ambulance when his sister and niece’s Flight 175 hit.
It’s still an emotional and painful subject for me, so much so that it took me fourteen years to write an essay about it. Partly because of the emotion, and partly because I believed her story belongs to her family, not me. But what I wrote was about my experience and connection with Ruth. The highlight is that I expressed myself and my thoughts in a rare and vulnerable submission to a critique group after I’d moved to New York. The feedback I got was, “Who cares?” and “No one wants to hear about 9-11 anymore.” It felt like someone had poured a bucket of ice over my head. How could people not care? They have to care! No one in the group would listen. I let them take away my voice.
Another eleven years have passed. Juliana, that little four-year-old girl murdered with her mother en route to Disneyland, would have turned twenty-nine this year.
We can not be cavalier about the loss of life, the damage and the terror. So today, on the twenty-fifth anniversary of that horrid day, I will stay silent no more.
Now more than ever—we must never forget!
Last Licks
A Chunk of My Heart Went With Her
This is absolutely heartbreaking, Zelly. I'm so, so sorry for your loss.