Chicago - Day Three

Friday, September 11. It felt very strange to me to be doing a show on such an ominous day. September 11 feels to me like it should be a day of mourning; yet nobody seemed to even acknowledge what horrible day this day was the anniversary of...so before I go any further let me take a moment to say that for anyone who was touched that day by the loss of someone special, I have not forgotten, nor will I ever, the horror of that morning. I hear people talk about always remembering exactly where they were when JFK died. I was too young to remember that. But I will never forget exactly what I was doing, who I was with, and the exact feelings of that morning.

Ray and I lived in his little condo in Antioch. The dot.com bust had made both of us unemployed. I had returned to college, and I was in my home office at my computer doing homework. Ray was in the living room working too. I always have the TV on, but it's usually on Tivo watching something that was recorded rather than live TV. Jillian called me from work and asked if I was watching TV and when I said no she just said "we're under terrorist attack." She then said she was at work and there were news reports of planes having hit the WTC and the Pentagon, so as I'm flipping the TV to a live feed I see the images. I went into the living room, carrying the phone with Jillian on the other end of the line with me. I relayed the news to Ray, who stopped what he was doing and flipped on his TV, and I'll never forget when I said terrorists had flown a plane into the Pentagon he said "why the hell didn't they shoot it down?"

The memories of those who died that day will never be forgotten. We always hear about the first responders, the firefighters and police officers who run into danger to rescue those of us who are running from it. I get it and respect the fact that the people who choose these occupations are heroes and I don't mean to diminish what they do, but I think it's important to recognize the people who were working in those buildings. So to the cafeteria employees, janitorial staff, file clerks, and everyone else who went about their jobs that day only to suffer a horrible end - my thoughts will always be with you and your loved ones. And I am so very sorry that events like this (Stitches and everything else we go to for fun) take our brains away from the respect we should be giving to everyone affected on 9/11/01.

The show went well - it was the busiest day of the weekend. And nothing else that happened that day even matters.