A Day I Wish I Could Forget
It’s been twenty-five years since 9/11, but that doesn’t make it any easier thinking about that painful day.
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Months keep rolling by
Live another day, then you die
Ghosts inside your head
We choose our paths
When is all done and said
Once you’re there
Once you’re there
You can’t come back
Nothing lives
Nothing grows
Inside the dead meadow
– “Dead Meadow” Zakk Wylde (Back Label Society), 2003
Twenty-Five Years
Forgive me if I woke up in a somewhat bitter mood today. Every year, it seems I handle this day differently. I won’t hit you this morning with personal remembrances of that awful day. I’d prefer to forget the sights and especially the smells that haunted all of us for years afterwards. It’s too late to avoid the scenes. Zero dark-thirty and the media is already showing recorded footage from New York City’s financial district on September 11, 2001 on every channel.
My children thought I was dead for most of that day. It did take most of that day to get in touch with anyone. Escaping lower Manhattan on foot well after both towers fell, there was no landline service anywhere and no cell service until I had walked to Canarsie, Brooklyn. I had been on the phone when the first (I think) earthquake happened and all phone service went down. The last thing I said as the phone cut off was “It’s getting pretty rough over here. Please tell my boys that I love them.” My sons were toddlers. That person told them too much.
I won’t, in this space, talk about what I saw on 9/11. That would take my blood pressure somewhere I don’t want it to go. I won’t list the names of the 12 personal friends lost. They may have children of their own who read my column. They already know that Mom or Dad never came home. It also hurts me to remember them loving their kids, talking sports or singing out loud in a bar. Sometimes, it’s far easier to pretend that you can’t remember something that you can’t forget.
When I did get home that night, I was still covered in crushed cement and other building materials. I took off my suit in the garage. That is where I left my clothes, shoes and briefcase for about a year until I threw them all out. People who don’t know New York City don’t know that seven buildings collapsed that day, not just the two towers. The towers crushed five other buildings and damaged countless others when they fell. People who don’t know New York City don’t know that the fire at the World Trade center burned into December 2001. They don’t know that we breathed that filthy air (and suffered the consequences) all that time, in order to prevent the U.S. economy from collapsing.
Some folks ask how a former Marine ends up in the Army National Guard after a multi-decade break in service. That’s how. My country was attacked by sick people filled with a blood lust, looking to kill innocents. They tried to kill me. They did kill my friends. Rejected by the Marine Corps due to my age, I went, after my boys were a little older and able to understand, where I could still serve.
Fortunately, the Guard unit that I was with was infantry, surprisingly ready for anything and not a normal Guard unit. It was full of Marines and Rangers, so at least I was standing next to like-minded individuals and not weaklings who think sleeping indoors is a big thing. My first day in the U.S. military was in 1981, my last in 2016, but I was no career man.
I’m really just a Wall Street guy, that’s all. NYSE badge number 986. Now that human traders have been purged from the industry, I guess I will be Sarge986 forever as that badge number will never be worn by another.
So… twenty-five years later, we still pray for the souls of the departed. We still pray for the survivors who remember but wish they could forget. We still pray for the children who grew up differently. Oh, and we still pray for those who answered the bell when their nation called.
The Star-Spangled Banner
O say can you see by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave,
O’er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?
– Francis Scott Key (1814)
Because we are the brave
Yes, we are the brave
We’ll fight tyranny
The name of the free, we are the US of A
For those unaware
That flag is still there
– Dave Bray (Madison Rising), 2012
Ok, I failed again. I swore this time I was going to get through commemorating 9/11 without starting to weep. I failed again. I won’t be able to finish this morning’s note. The memories are difficult enough. Those last two lines in Dave Bray’s version of the national anthem get to me every time….
“For those unaware, That flag is still there”
That flag is, indeed, still there. You bet your tail it’s still there. Test us at your own peril.
Always Faithful.
Economics (All Times Eastern)
08:30 – CPI (Aug): Expecting 0.4% m/m, Last 0.1% m/m.
08:30 – Core CPI (Aug): Expecting 0.2% m/m, Last 0.2% m/m.
08:30 – CPI (Aug): Expecting 3.4% y/y, Last 3.4% y/y.
08:30 – Core CPI (Aug): Expecting 2.4% y/y, Last 2.5% y/y.
10:00 – U of M Consumer Sentiment (Sep-adv): Expecting 51.0, Last 51.7.
10:00 – U of M One-Year Inflation Expectations (Sep-adv): Expecting 3.9%, Last 4.0%.
10:00 – U of M Five-Year Inflation Expectations (Sep-adv): Expecting 3.2%, Last 3.3%.
13:00 – Baker Hughes Total Rig Count (Weekly): Last 588.
13:00 – Baker Hughes Oil Rig Count (Weekly): Last 449.
14:00 – Federal Budget Statement (Aug): Last $-432B.
The Fed (All Times Eastern)
Fed Blackout Period.
Today’s Earnings Highlights (Consensus EPS Expectations)
Before the Open: KR (1.05)
At the time of publication, Guilfoyle had no positions in any securities mentioned.
