The Only Way to Go is Up
At the Luminary, I admit it, there are certain things we don’t cover very well. Take last Valentine’s Day for instance. We blew it. There wasn’t even a mention of the event in your local paper.
We also do a poor job of covering high school sports (Grigs still offers the best professional sports insights in the business, though). There are other topics, I’m sure, that we miss regularly, but there is one occasion that I assure you we will never forget to cover – at least as long as I am publisher — and that is the events of September 11, 2001.
On the day of the attacks, I called my parents, who were sitting on their balcony at The Admiralty condominium complex at Monmouth Beach, NJ. From their sixth floor perch, they could see everything unfold. They watched calmly, but in shock, as the smoke billowed across New York Harbor and the Air Force provided air cover. They were probably wondering if they were witnessing the end of the world. I remember my mother asking in frustration, “why would anyone do something like this?”
I had left New York City only two months before the attack and didn’t really know how to handle the situation. I had lived about ten blocks from the World Trade Center before moving to Kansas City. And even though almost everyone I knew who worked in the World Trade Center had survived (although my hometown of Middletown lost more people in the attacks than any other single city), it felt like I should be doing something. Those emotions actually led to me leaving the profession of journalism for a while. I didn’t see “the story” in my beat anymore. Nothing seemed important.
Today, I still feel occasional bouts of fury whenever I think about the loss of the Towers, the deaths of those inside, and the ensuing attack on the Pentagon (which local resident David Rainey survived, a story featured in earlier editions of the Luminary). Those incredible little bastards that did this.
I feel great frustration towards my government as well. For instance, when our president can’t complete a sentence during an interview on the subject, it really rankles me. When he calls a bunch of guys living in caves “masters of public relations,” it drives me nuts. When I listen to House Democrats saying that we’ve already lost the war, it makes me want to throw things.
Today’s front page features a collage of photos of Ground Zero that I took from my hotel suite at the Centennial Hilton on the night I proposed to my beloved wife Nancy. When we entered into the room, we just stood at the window and stared, saying nothing. That night, after I had asked for her hand, we looked over the site again. It wasn’t romantic or lovely - it was moving and powerful – and it didn’t signify anything specific for a young couple in love but it did represent one thing: the future.
There was no place to go but up.