Yesterday’s Call, Tomorrow’s Anniversary

Yesterday we received a call that a family member had been found deceased in her home. She lived alone, and when she didn’t show up for work, they contacted another family member. They went over and asked the police to do a well-being check, and she was gone.

I had last spoken to her about two weeks ago while making plans for her to attend my son’s wedding.

I’ve dealt with a great deal of loss over the last few years. Maybe that’s just life when you turn fifty. You start losing older family members — although this family member was barely in her sixties, so far too young.

It all really drives home how quickly everything can change. It makes you want to savor every minute with your loved ones, but it’s also very sad. It’s sobering.

On the eve of 9/11, I imagine all those families who started that September morning thinking it was a regular day.

Someone shared this YouTube video someone had recorded and saved from the morning of 9/11/2001. The first 17 minutes or so is a regular local news program from 2001. There were primary elections that day. They discussed the candidates. There was lots of chatter about Republican Michael Bloomberg. They talk about traffic and the weather. Then suddenly, they get a report of the first plane hitting.

Somebody, somewhere in NYC for whatever reason recorded the New York 1 morning news broadcast on Sept. 11, 2001.

They wound up recording history. It starts at 8:30 a.m. ET.

You get 15 minutes of news from the Before Times.

Then the world changes.https://t.co/1N3J5Stf1M
— Daniel McFadin (@danielmcfadin) September 9, 2026

Watch it tomorrow if you have a chance.4 See the minute the world changed—and not for the better.

We hear about a man driving through the Battery Tunnel and seeing a tire from a plane hit the road. We hear the news anchor notice when the second plane hits the second tower. Another caller is watching from his building and keeps talking about a “plane-shaped hole” in the side of the building. He also mentions the ear-piercing boom when the plane hit the tower.

So many lives changed within minutes that day. Wives lost their husbands, and husbands lost their wives. Children lost their parents. Parents lost their children. Brothers and sisters lost their siblings. People lost cousins, aunts, uncles, best friends, neighbors, boyfriends — and the list goes on and on.

None of it was expected or fair. Only a few even got to say goodbye before they died.

This is gripping. https://t.co/ZpCm6ibmuW
— Michael O’Toole (@mickthehack) September 10, 2026

People born after 2001 really don't understand how that day changed everything. It became really clear terrorists could harm Americans on our own soil.

‼️📺Extraordinary live TV footage from Sept 11th. Just a very ordinary day in New York City, and then…… worth setting time aside to watch this. To remember. Incredible to me how few lessons have been learned about radical Islam. The naivety. In the UK also.. https://t.co/aR1QLcMe0T
— Clarissa Reilly (@clarescastle) September 10, 2026

That's the part that bothers me most going into tomorrow. We haven't learned anything. We didn't take away the right lessons. Honestly, we are more exposed than ever. That's a terrible feeling.