Savvy Talks: September 11, 2001: The Day I Remember

There are days you remember everything about where you were, what the sky looked like and what you were thinking five minutes before the world changed. September 11 is complicated for me because long before 2001, that date already meant something terrible. My dad died in a plane crash on September 11, 1980. I've written about that story separately in my From Marianne column. [Read that story here.] But this is the story of another September 11th, 21 years later. Another date I’d never forget. 

It Was A Beautiful Morning

Before I left the house that morning, I reminded Bob what day it was. Twenty-one years since my dad died. Bob was staying home with our one-year-old baby, while I headed to the gym. It was one of those spectacular September mornings in Chicago. My windows were down. The air was crisp. The sky was perfectly blue. I remember stopping at a light, looking up and thinking:

Nothing could ruin this beautiful day. Except maybe a bomb or something.

There I go with the crazy thoughts, and I kept driving. About half an hour later, I was at the gym. Katie Couric and Matt Lauer came on and people started gathering around the screens to see something terrible happening at one of the World Trade Center towers in New York. Then a second plane hit the other tower. We were being attacked.

All I Wanted Was My Kids

My first thought was, get the kids. Two were at school. Bob was home with the baby and I wanted all of us to be together. The school principal advised parents not to pull the kids out immediately. So we went to the school, explained to them what had happened as best we could, told them we'd be back in a couple of hours. 

Were We Really Going To Do A Radio Show?

I was doing the newscast on Steve Dahl's afternoon radio show on WCKG. And now there was this almost surreal question: Were we going to do a radio show? Our studio was in Prudential Plaza in downtown Chicago. A tall building, exactly where I did not want to be. First the show was on. Then it was off. Then the station told Steve and me it was our decision. Yes. No. Yes. No. It sounds ridiculous now. Finally Steve and I talked. If I was in, he was in. We said yes.

The Eerie Drive Downtown

I was afraid to drive downtown alone, so Bob loaded all three kids into the car and we were off. It was eerie. Chicago was a ghost town. Almost no cars and no planes overhead. Nothing was normal. When we reached Prudential Plaza, I got out of the car and looked back at Bob and the kids. I remember praying that would not be the last time I ever saw them. That sounds dramatic now, but it felt very real and possible at the time. Then I got into the elevator. Suddenly I’m wondering if I should have taken the stairs. What if the elevator stopped? What was I doing inside a tall building when planes had just been flown into tall buildings? Why had I agreed to this?

Five Hours On The Air

The minute I saw Steve, much of my anxiety disappeared. We were in this together. There was no normal show that day. We had TVs everywhere and every time new information came in, we reported it. We talked. We interviewed people. We tried to make sense of what was happening along with everyone listening. And there were no commercials. For five straight hours, one of us was talking. 

At one point I stood up to stretch my legs and looked out the window and I thought about Flight Simulator. I used to play that video game, taking off and landing at Meigs Field along Chicago's lakefront. Now I was standing inside a Chicago high-rise looking at an empty sky and wondering if a real airplane could come toward us. Of all the things that happened that day, I remember that.

What I Remember Most

Steve and I were friendly before September 11. After that day we were bonded by it. Every September 11, we still send each other a note.  

But there's one more thing I remember. The show ended and I walked out of that building. Bob and the kids were there. I got into the car with my family and felt an enormous relief. We had each other. That night, I think that's what everybody wanted. To find their people, to call someone, to hug their children.