Living History

Denver Broncos wide receiver Ed McCaffrey broke his leg during a Monday Night Football game in early September 2001.

The all-pro and three-time Super Bowl champion would miss the rest of the season.

At about 7:00am Pacific Time, the next morning, I was woken up with a call from a very close friend and a huge fan of the Broncos.

He said turn on the TV.

I said what channel.

He said, “it doesn’t matter.”

It was September 11, 2001 and Ed McCaffrey, Monday Night Football and the Denver Broncos no longer mattered.

Like the rest of the country and the rest of the world, I spent the day watching TV.

Seeing, but not believing any of what I was seeing.

Living in Los Angeles at the time, I felt the pain as an American, but I certainly could not relate to what the people in New York were going through.

It was sad, devastating, horrific, scary, disgusting, alarming... any word you want to use, they all apply.

September 11, 2001 changed the world forever.

But living 3,000 miles to the west, there was no way I could comprehend what what life and death meant in Manhattan.

If this comes off the least bit insensitive, I sincerely apologize.

As a student of history, I am fascinated by the events that have shaped this country.

Unfortunately many times its the bad news that grabs our headlines.

My dad and I took a trip to Dallas, Texas when I was about nine years old.

We went to a Texas Rangers baseball game.   That was a given.

We also went to Elm Street.

THE Elm Street, where JFK was assassinated just 13 years earlier.

I will never forget visiting Pearl Harbor as a 14-year old on December 7, 1981.

Forty years to the day after our country was attacked.

It was a pure coincidence that we were in Hawaii on that exact date, but it only added to the significance.

When my family took a vacation to Hawaii a few years ago, I made sure to take time away from the beach to see it again.

My kids might have been too young to truly appreciate it, but there WILL come a day when they will remember it.

We took my daughter to a dance event at Robert Clement Park in Colorado a few years ago.

We parked in a lot within walking distance.

When I got out of the car I looked up and saw a sign that read, Columbine High School.

I could barely breathe.

I knew it was nearby, but I had no idea that we were actually there.

A few weeks later I took my kids back to Columbine, where we visited the Memorial area.

Each of us read each and every plaque, but never said a word until we got back to the car.

When I visited New York in the spring, I made a point to go down to Ground Zero.

When I got there, I saw... nothing.

Nothing but an area that appeared to be a construction site.

It was up to my imagination to connect with what I was really looking at.

And I could barely contain my emotions.

Now living in New York, on this, the 11th day of September, there is no way that I could avoid going back to where the World Trade Center once stood.

Just nine years ago.

Honestly I have no idea what I will see.