Life of A Salesman

I have to apologize to a lot of people about why I've flown off the handle a few times today, I know I'm usually a firebrand as it is but today has hit a certain number of sensitivities that exist in very small doses.

8 years ago today I was 12 years old, sitting in my middle school Language Arts class, I can still remember what I was wearing all the way down to my shoes. I can remember walking down the hallway and hearing snippets of what was going on. It's funny how as a kid you take the words "plane crash" with a grain of salt as if it's something you're supposed to expect.

And then we got told the whole mess.

Let's not pretend for one second I was afraid for what was going to happen to me in the future-- I was scared for my dad.

My father is a traveling salesman-- not like in the Bible selling way, but he was the main distributor for parts to computer systems in a Corporate setting. I know it has to do with circuit boards and chips, and the occasional military technology that even at 20 I can't understand.

On September 10, 2001, I got screamed at by a certain traveling salesman for doing something I should have--I probably left my bike under his car, or lost my temper and kicked a wall, or it could have even been the constant skateboarding in my room dinging up the walls; I was a typical 12 year old boy.

On September 10th at 9PM when my dad came to talk to me after cooling down I told him I hope he died-- because I was a 12 year old boy and you never grasp the meaning of your words, just that they sound powerful.

On September 11th at 5:30AM my father woke me up for me to wish him off to the airport. I stoically huffed at him and didn't speak, my own sign of solidarity that I was going to talk to him-- he said "I love you, EJ" and he left.

On September 11th at 9:53AM we were switching classes, I was going from Math to Geography, and I remember in the hallway hearing Mr. Healy (Geography) say to Mr. Turgeon (Language Arts) about a plane crash. I felt like I knew something everyone didn't, and stupidly felt smug knowing something they were going to tell us--and I was just as stupidly wrong.

At 11:30 I was in the downstairs boy's bathroom, just outside the lunchroom, throwing up the majority of my dinosaur oatmeal while my friends were all just silent in the lunchroom, because no one knew what to say or do to the kids who didn't know if their parents were alright.

I was one of those kids who didn't know yet.

It's an unsettling feeling trying to remember all the details from my dad's boarding pass, after all I'd been there when he picked up his initial ticket. We lived right down the street from an airport after all.

That was what we did. On weekends my dad would take me to the airport and pay the five dollars to park in the carport and we'd run up and down the moving walkways and watch the planes take off from the observation bay. Then we'd get McDonald's and he'd narrate the moving walkway for me as I continued to run up and down it doing whatever stupid thing came to mind.

I know that my dad's original plan was not to depart from home this time though, he was going to depart from Logan International Airport in Boston and continue his business in Miami Florida and be home by that Friday so we could go out for pizza at Papa Gino's.

Logan International Airport is now more commonly known as the airport that American Airlines Flight 11 flew out of before hitting the North tower that killed 1,392 people in total.

Imagine being 12 years old and only knowing that a plane from Logan Airport had crashed and killed everyone on board-- they gave no other specifics at that time, just where it flew out of and where it crashed.

I think I fought back tears all day, waiting for the best and worst when I got home.

When I got home on the bus, my best friend, Elijah (who now goes more by Ace), walked me home and said if I needed I could come over his house afterward. I'm pretty sure I just nodded and then proceeded to throw up in my mouth.

I still remember the atmosphere of my house when I walked in-- the TV on and muted and replaying the crash over and over again. The sunny weather almost seemed to contrast it all and it made me feel disconcerted and sick. If you've never experienced that feeling like you've been under water and tried to listen to speaking, you won't understand the overwhelming sense of pressure in my house.

It was about 2:23 when I got home that day, my mom was still a stay at home mom at that time, but even then she would usually be showered and ready by 10AM. When she came downstairs she still wasn't quite finished, like she had just stopped in the middle of it all and forgotten.

The only thing I remember her saying was that she hadn't heard from him, but that it wasn't his flight and that she had been calling the school all day, first my middle school and then my sister's elementary school only to be met with a busy signal. However she hadn't heard from him and to what she knew they were still in the process of grounding all the planes.

On September 11th, 9:58PM our house phone rang, I was sitting in my bedroom reading Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets with the door just ajar. My mom was downstairs watching TV, if I had to guess she was watching Friends. I remember hiding in the stairwell listening to her talk and finally having that comforting reality that my dad was safe-- he had been grounded in Graceland hours earlier and his cell phone couldn't get service in Tennessee.

On September 14th, 6:42PM my father arrived home in his rental car with a less than shaven face and he tossed me a Louisville Slugger and he said "Kentucky says hello, Sport". He'd promised me that he'd come home with a souvenir from Florida, and he was at least true to his word.

I found out years later that he stopped at the official Louisville store because the radio had been warning of highway robbers and looters and he wanted to be prepared and have a suitable gift for his 12 year old son.

The rest is a blur, I remember lots of crying and and remember lots of joking around to try and lessen the mood-- and I know for a fact that night my father checked on my bedroom no less than 15 times, for reasons that are beyond my understanding even still.

8 years later my father and I share an awkward truce, a lot has happened and I'm not 12 any more. I might not like him, but I always love him and I'd be lying if I said I hadn't cried at least once today.

My mom said he'll always see me as I was at 12, and I think I'm not exactly opposed to that image.