Tuesday’s gone with the wind. But the impact will always be there.
But on that fateful day 20 years ago this past weekend, arguably the most devastating Tuesday in the country’s history, we are prompted to remember things and emotions and conversations, so I am doing so right now, on Wednesday — this being after a day or so of reflection with yesterday’s starting day of the week of what transpired in my life on that Tuesday, a deadline day all day at the local weekly, The Star-Observer, where I wrote the sports page(s) for 16 years. Monday night was always a near all-nighter, to get a jump on things, and this is how the popular column I wrote on nightlife, which later became this blog, had its origins.
I would try to get to the office as early as possible after a quick breakfast, usually just a quickly scarfed doughnut, then stop first at Hudson High School to pick up any last sports submissions and scoresheets. This was before the advent of most social media, and I’d race to get together without the local TV news on. So I was not tuned into the carnage and chaos as I drove the three miles to get to HHS. But I did know upon waking, in what way specific to that morning I do not exactly remember, (more on that later), that something big and bad was afoot.
When I got to the athletic directors office, a clearinghouse for anything that had not earlier been faxed (this was before the heyday of email), I floated the idea of hey did you hear, there is some kinda way, way out there, in the news, not yet knowing anywhere nearly how big, thinking I had an ill-formed scoop.
The various staffers, in short order, let me know that this was far beyond even the latest weather disaster.
Back at the office, things were already hopping even more than usual. Everyone there had heard, long before me, that this was a megastory and plans to cover it would not wait until the 10:45 a.m. editorial meeting. We all had the idea to try to wrap up our regular stuff fast, put on hold anything that could wait until the next week, and insert some local reaction and connection to what has been called, unfortunately, the story of a lifetime. The first of a series of hourly deadlines, depending on the news department or section on which it is found, was 1 p.m. That’s when my sports stuff was due, although I often ended up pushing the deadline back a bit, just to try to sneak in Monday night’s game results — with the editor occasionally standing over my shoulder for a few moments if that last headline took too long to compose.
— But enough seriousness. Let’s rock out and roll forward fast in Ellsworth. See Picks Of The Week. And for a tad of trivia on observances from last weekend, dial up the Where Did You See It department. A hint: The answer also involves trucks from fire departments —
Aside from political stances, the fact that the crashing planes would do their evil deed should not have been a big surprise to me. I had been doing karaoke at the old Sports Club with a friend of mine, a gifted psychic, the late Joe Miller. I share with him much of this same ability, which plays out especially with musical out-there-ness and which be written about at length once other more immediate topics are off the plate.
While waiting for the air to clear and Air Supply singing to be concluded, so we could get up there and wail, we looked at each other, then looked away, and then checked out each others eyes even further. Something struck both of us at once. We collaborated a bit and agreed that there was something horrific afoot, and though all was still OK on that particular evening, that it would not be so just days down the line. We also concurred that this joint premonition did not involve any of the usual suspects in our lives, the typical source.
That fateful night that transcended karaoke, was the Saturday before the following Tuesday, which was 9/11.
The rest is history.