Countdown to Triathlon - 223Days, 31.85 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 35 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY -

Wall Street is the only place that people ride to in a Rolls Royce to get advice from those who take the subway. Warren Buffett

The Journey - Installment Thirty-Five

Cindy, Patti and I found our way to Wall and Broad Streets.  The air was full of ash and smoke, still after almost eight weeks since September eleventh.  We turned the corner and  were walking along the perimeter of the fence which surrounded Trinity Church Wall Street.  It was first built in 1798. In the church yard are buried many famous people: Alexander Hamilton, William Bradford and Robert Fulton to name a few.  It is the only active cemetery remaining in the borough of Manhattan. There was ash still all over the grave sites and the fence and yard.  We went inside and were told that volunteers had cleaned up the ash several times, but it was still falling.  Inside, all the pews were covered and there were workmen painting the inside of the church.  Just as we stood, taking it all in, someone from the church walked up near where we were standing and put a stack of cards in the card holder. Since we were first to be there, we each grabbed one.  Below is the front with the church yard photos and the next  picture is from the back of the card.



All the gray is ash.



  

Trinity Church in better days



         We turned a corner, after leaving the church, still amazed at the amount of ash on the church and its grounds and the ash in the air which we were breathing without taking precautions to cover our noses and mouths.  On the next street we came upon a chain link fence surrounding the area where the World Trade Center buildings had been.  The surrounding buildings which were still standing had material that looked like fine netting hanging down the sides of the building covering the windows.  They were fluttering in the breeze and we weren’t sure what they for if not to keep debris out of the remaining buildings.  As we stood looking at the chain link fence, it was covered with flowers, teddy bears and letters expressing sorrow and love.  I remember that as we got to the end of the fence, there was a pile of old flowers, teddy bears, etc. which had been cleared off.  It looked like each day someone pulled everything from the fence to make room for the new items.  But at the time, I thought it was a disgrace that someone did not take the things away, but just left the items discarded in a heap at the end of the fence. It was as if all the love that was being expressed by people leaving these messages, flowers and other items were somehow treated as having no value and worthless.  The picture below was part of what we saw, although it doesn't do justice to all the flowers and items on the fence.  I can't find that we took a very good picture of this area.

        After walking a block and turning another corner which would take us around to the other side of the Trade Center excavation, there was a strip of dirt a block long between the sidewalk and the street. The street was blocked off but we could walk on the sidewalk. There was a huge number of stakes pounded into the ground on the dirt strip with messages which read, “Please respect our loss; do not take pictures.”  We rounded the corner and we could see directly into the area where they were taking down the remaining part of the buildings.  There were dump trucks lined up to carry away the debris.  Many people stood in the middle of the street facing the destroyed building and all of them were taking picture.  I told Patti to go ahead and take some pictures since she had the best zoom lens on her camera and that way all three of us wouldn’t be taking photos.  We couldn’t see how we were disrespecting the lost by taking photos of the disaster, especially since everyone else was doing it. We felt we had to take the picture as a reminder of that terrible day in September.  It was a very sobering moment to see all the dump trucks lined up coming and going with the debris.

Neither picture is very clear but I can assure you that it was a sickening feeling to look at the debris being carried away by dump trucks, all lined up waiting their turn to receive a load.

 (Patti's recollections)

 The church was Trinity Church and it had just reopened that day.  I remember the ash still piled up on the concrete wall, in between the iron posts around the cemetery.  Ash was also still piled on the headstones.  What I remember that was so eerie was the smell of smoke in the air, the smouldering pile of debris, and the papers still floating in the wind, most likely from businesses in the trade center.  I kept some for souvenirs.  Also, as we walked to Ground Zero, I remember the hustle and bustle of business owners reopening their businesses for the first time  since 9/11.  Supplies were being delivered and unloaded, signs were posted in some windows that they were once again, open for business.  (Barb commenting now - "See it's good to have more than one witness because I don't remember about all the supplies being delivered or the shops reopening.")

 As for the picture taking, I remember feeling that I should heed the signs, but that it felt disrespectful NOT to take pictures.  That it was necessary to show people what really happened and what the site looked like.