LJ Idol Week 15: Busman's Holiday
Aaron and I fell into bed, tired and happy, almost asleep before we could whisper a barely audible “Goodnight” to each other.
It had been a good day - just what you want on vacation. We had gone into Boston, back to Boston University, to spend the afternoon catching up with professors and friends in the journalism department, reminiscing about old times and catching up on what we were doing now.
We had walked by newspaper stands, filled with Boston Globes and Boston Heralds and New York Times, and kept walking, because we weren’t at work and we didn’t need to keep up with the news for once.
We drove back to the house where we were staying, an hour outside of Boston, talking about how I have never been to New York City before and how we should just get up super early in the morning and just go. And then talking about how the car we were driving - lent to us by the couple we were staying with, the same couple who had let me stay with them for six months back when I was an intern at the local newspaper - probably wouldn’t make it to New York City so it was better to just stay where we were.
We were still laughing about it a little when we fell into bed.
It was September 10, 2001.
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We were woken up what seemed like mere minutes later, by the sound of a woman’s voice - Pat - yelling at us up the stairs.
“A plane just hit the World Trade Center!”
We were out of bed and stumbling down the narrow staircase a few seconds later, my tired brain trying to recall what even the World Trade Center was.
We made it downstairs and took what became our respective places on the couch for the day, all of three of us glued to the TV, watching events we could barely comprehend unfolding live in front of our eyes, feeling a little like we were watching a movie but knowing we weren’t.
I still remember the terror of that day, watching and waiting and worrying as reports came in of maybe more terrorists, of the fear that maybe the West Coast - where my friends, my family were - would be next.
And I remember the ache of not being at work. Not getting the call to drive into work immediately, to report for my job as a copy editor, when normally I worked the afternoon to evening shift. To not sit at my desk and monitor the news. To not edit and design the newspaper pages for the special afternoon edition that was put out that day.
To not be doing something except sitting on a couch and watching it on TV when I should have been at work, trying to help make sense of a tragedy that was very much still unfolding.
I talked to my boss in the early afternoon hours. She told me what was happening in the newsroom - who was reporting on what, who was designing and editing what section - and I told her what things were like on the East Coast and promised to pick up papers of the coverage.
I hung up the phone, again with the sense that I should have been there, but there was nothing I could do.
Aaron and I took a walk that afternoon. We went into town, past houses now flying American flags and people looking somber and scared. Everyone seemed to greet everyone, and the mood - even with people filling the downtown area of the small town - was quiet and solemn.
We picked up copies of the newspapers we found, carrying them back to the house, sitting on the couch and reading through them before folding them carefully back up and putting them in our suitcases.
The next day, we went for a drive, all around the Boston area and up into New Hampshire, collecting newspapers wherever we went. I called my boss and told her I was bringing a lot of them back. She told me again about what was happening in the newsroom - about who was reporting on what, about the late hours everyone had been working, about the special editions they had put out while I was gone.
I tried to not to be sad I wasn’t at work. I tried not to feel like I wasn’t contributing to anything.
Four days after September 11, the Boston airport reopened to commercial flights. I was on one of the first Delta flights that left, heading to San Jose, California. Aaron took the first American flight from Boston back to Los Angeles - the same flight and the same route of the plane that had struck the tower.
I went back to work the next day, ready to do my part. For weeks, we covered the tragedy of Sept. 11. We created more special sections, and the reporters wrote more and more stories.
I brought in the newspapers I had gathered when I was in Boston and let everyone look at them. Then I took them back home.
I still have a box, to this day, filled with newspapers from that fateful day. I could find digital versions if I wanted, but there’s something about holding a newspaper in my hand, flipping through the pages, reliving something that still remains so clear in my memory.
I don’t work in daily newspapers anymore. I don’t cover anymore tragedies. I don’t miss the thrill of the newsroom when news breaks. But when I go on vacation, sometimes I find myself buying a local newspaper and flipping through it, sometimes even packing it in my suitcase and taking it home.
Sometimes, there are habits you just can’t break.
Nonfiction.
This was written for Week 15 of therealljidol. I hope you enjoyed it! If you would like to read more entries, you can head over here. Voting should come Saturday night!