[DL]

[Michael Cone <Michael.Cone@phoenix.edu>]

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 Sep 2001 18:32:08 -0700 (PDT)
From: knick_nevin@yahoo.com
Subject: Re: [DL] Attack on America or the News is Overrated

a friend of mine from New York got ahold of me just
now, she doesn't live or work anywhere near the
carnage, but her brother worked four stories below
where the first plane hit, he got out, he is alive,
and only has a few bruises. 
I think the figures the news is giving are ridiculous,
and I predict that most of the lives lost will be
rescue workers and not actually people who worked in
the buildings. Most, not all.
But again, as has already been stated, it is far too
early to make assumptions, and it is far too early to
be needlessly insulting. We understand if you've had a
bad day, I think everyone in the country has had a bad
day today, but please check your ego at the door. 

This is supposed to be a Deadlands forum, please.
:D
-doc
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--

You're right. It is a Deadlands forum. But there is far more to it than
that.

Patrick, I want you to sit down and think while you're reading this. These
words from me are coming straight from the heart. I hardly know where to
begin. I'm going to try and place a sense of scale to this, if I can. I hope
you take it as the small measure of clarity that it is intended to be.

You said that New York was burning and you were correct. Your friend's
brother's survival was a stroke of luck or act of God depending on your
belief. In the Twin Towers, there were more people at work than those who
lived in the town I grew up in.

More firefighters, policemen and Emergency Medical technicians died when
those buildings came down than attended my entire High School.

And for those people from this forum who have met face to face, they have a
face, or faces, to place with this scene of loss. I personally know no one
from this list, but to hear that Patrick Phalen worked nearby, or that
Sandor Silverman has a brother that was in Midtown Manhattan yesterday,
well, I can relate all too well with what might have been running through
their minds.

Yesterday morning I sat with my wife as she dialed again and again, trying
to reach her sister in Midtown. Not just any sister but Big Sister. The
sister that welcomed her into the family as an adopted two year old child.
The sister that was wed in St. Vincent's Cathedral last year, at which we
were in attendance. 

A Big Sister that she could not find.

I cannot convey the terror in her eyes. The awful wondering that must have
plagued her as she dialed and then emailed. And then waited. 

We were one of the precious few lucky ones. Big Sister and her husband had
escaped from their respective offices in Lower Manhattan and were safely at
home. We are lucky beyond belief. There are faces upon faces upon faces that
were not. Too many faces.

This is no attack on you, Patrick. Please keep that in mind. But please also
keep in mind the faces of others here on this list and around you. 

Some of us are missing today. Mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, uncles,
aunts, cousins. There are far too many missing.


Be safe.

Michael K. Cone