Reviewers’ Comments about A TIME TO…
“The best, most original book I have read in years. A TIME TO... is captivating right from the beginning. The author’s use of words draws readers directly into the story and captivates their interest by making them feel as if they were there... Overall A TIME TO... is well written, relatable and well thought out. I would highly recommend it.” — Michelle Danko, Faith Filled Family Magazine
“A GREAT new spiritual book! I have had very little time for discretionary reading these days, so when I not only read a book, but call it a page turner, that ought to say something. That is precisely what I would call A TIME TO... The message is one that ought to resonate with every man, woman, and child.” — Rutherford Cardinal Johnson, Anglo-Catholic News Service
“Thousands of deaths make it easy to not see individual stories within those thousands — A TIME TO... A Baby Boomer’s Spiritual Adventures — is a novel powered by a memoir as Ronald Louis Peterson tells the story of an individual who embraced the second half of the twentieth century and found spirituality and life through it all, before facing the tragedy of 9/11. A TIME TO... is a thoughtful read.” — Able Greenspan, Midwest Book Review
“If you enjoy exploring issues of trust, faith and hope, A TIME TO... will provide you with many hours of reading pleasure… In the end, the purpose of even the most difficult events of the protagonist’s life becomes clear, as he chooses to respond with faith rather than bitterness, and compassion rather than revenge. I enjoyed reading this book, and my soft heart was melted to tears more than once.” — Shaeri Richards, Dancing with your Dragon author
“A TIME TO... is not a book merely to entertain. It is a book that could provide a healing venue for those who lost loved ones on September 11 and the days afterward. Al Masterson represents all the victims of this tragedy… I highly recommend this book to readers who enjoy a well-written novel intertwined with historical facts.” — Tannia E. Ortiz-Lopés (catholicfiction.net) and publisher of http://timewithtannia.tripod.com
“A ‘Must Read’ for Peace Corps Volunteers, Past and Present. Al’s Peace Corps experiences in Ethiopia evoke particular memories and life lessons learned for this former Peace Corps volunteer… the old but true adage that material things don’t equal happiness; that we need to give back; that life isn’t always fair; that we should always try to look at the “big picture”; that taking risks can cause the discovery of unknown talents; that smiles can equal an “international currency”; that it is so important to “listen to your soul”; and many more. — Barbara Henkin, Peace Corps Volunteer (Jamaica, 1969 - 71)
“A TIME TO... is quite the pleasant surprise. Not your typical 9/11 tale, this story takes you on a personal journey to rediscover the best qualities of humanity — a great juxtaposition to see how one of the darkest tragedies in history can serve as the backdrop for some of the most beautiful examples of what makes life worth living. A great read.” — Lauren Staniszewski
A TIME TO...
A Baby Boomer’s Spiritual Adventures
A Novel by
Ronald Louis Peterson
Copyright © 2008 Ronald Louis Peterson
Smashwords edition
All rights reserved.
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
ISBN: 978-1-4524-3127-7
http://www.ronaldlouispeterson.blogspot.com
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 - A New Day
Chapter 2 - Ode to the City
Chapter 3 - News, News, News
Chapter 4 - A Dream ... A Cartoon ... and God
Chapter 5 - Why Risk It?
Chapter 6 - One Small World
Chapter 7 - The Bag Lady
Chapter 8 - Not Just Another Day
Chapter 9 - An Historic News Day
Chapter 10 - A Journey through Hell Interrupted
Chapter 11 - Childhood Memories
Chapter 12 - School Bullies
Chapter 13 - Magical Dad
Chapter 14 - Dad to the Rescue
Chapter 15 - Parent-Teacher Conference
Chapter 16 - The Dysfunctional Teacher
Chapter 17 - The Good Teacher
Chapter 18 - Mature Spirits
Chapter 19 - Ahhh, Coney Island
Chapter 20 - Spook-A-Rama
Chapter 21 - The Fortune Teller
Chapter 22 - Imagination
Chapter 23 - A Special Gift
Chapter 24 - A Missing Father
Chapter 25 - The Awkward Years
Chapter 26 - Follow the Leader
Chapter 27 - The Peacemaker
Chapter 28 - Dying to Live
Chapter 29 - The Hell Gate Treasure
Chapter 30 - Man, What a Body!
Chapter 31 - A Big Misunderstanding
Chapter 32 - The Road to Manhood
Chapter 33 - Bumping Into an Old Foe
Chapter 34 - Aiding the Enemy
Chapter 35 - Blood, Good Numbers, and Valuable Coins
Chapter 36 - Betting Against Yourself
Chapter 37 - Betting on the Big Game
Chapter 38 - The Game Within a Game
Chapter 39 - True Friends to the End
Chapter 40 - Losing Faith
Chapter 41 - A Concerned Son
Chapter 42 - Another Place ... Another Time
Chapter 43 - So Many Questions
Chapter 44 - Searching for Answers
Chapter 45 - The Wise One Speaks
Chapter 46 - A Lack of Faith
Chapter 47 - The Cost of Living
Chapter 48 - Political Turmoil
Chapter 49 - The Shoeshine Boy
Chapter 50 - Cross-Cultural Training
Chapter 51 - Food for Thought
Chapter 52 - Metaphors Galore
Chapter 53 - The Greater Challenge
Chapter 54 - Self-Discovery
Chapter 55 - Shadows and Light
Chapter 56 - Special Bread
Chapter 57 - Money Isn’t Everything
Chapter 58 - Leveling the Playing Field
Chapter 59 - First Day on the Job
Chapter 60 - A Mysterious Request
Chapter 61 - Mistaken Identity
Chapter 62 - Trick or Treat
Chapter 63 - God’s Voice of Love
Chapter 64 - New Beginnings
Chapter 65 - A Ghost of a Chance
Chapter 66 - News Flash
Chapter 67 - The Crooked Chiropractor
Chapter 68 - Realigning the Chiropractor
Chapter 69 - One Good Turn Deserves …
Chapter 70 - Marathon: Going the Distance
Chapter 71 - Tic Toc ... Tic Toc
Chapter 72 - Twisting the Truth
Chapter 73 - Revealing the Truth
Chapter 74 - Making Peace with Himself
Chapter 75 - Truths and Lies
Chapter 76 - Good-bye Dairy Land
Chapter 77 - Hello Top-Twenty
Chapter 78 - The Name of the Game
Chapter 79 - Packaging
Chapter 80 - The Road of Good Intentions
Chapter 81 - Pick Up! It’s The Cosmos on Line 5
Chapter 82 - Psychic Powers
Chapter 83 - Psychic Journey
Chapter 84 - What’s Wrong with This Picture?
Chapter 85 - In The Name Of ...
Chapter 86 - God? No Way!
Chapter 87 - Watch Your Back!
Chapter 88 - Taking a New Road
Chapter 89 - Al Finds Himself at the Zoo
Chapter 90 - Spinning For Fun and Profit
Chapter 91 - Public Relations at Work
Chapter 92 - Memory Enhancement
Chapter 93 - One Mystery Solved
Chapter 94 - From One Mystery to Another
Chapter 95 - Love Survives
Chapter 96 - Faith Survives
Chapter 97 - Hope Survives
Chapter 98 - Answered Prayer
Chapter 99 - Together Again
Chapter 100 - Deciphering the Truth
Chapter 101 - Charity Survives
I know that for some 9/11 was a turning point in their lives; but, for others, it was just another day.
This story is dedicated to those who, like me, were deeply touched by the events that took place on that beautiful fall morning—especially families and friends who lost loved ones and those who have called New York City home at some time in their lives. As a New Yorker by birth— who has since lived in other cities, states and countries—it will remain a day that forever changed the way I look at life in general and my life in particular.
May the rest of your days be at least a little brighter in some way after reading A TIME TO….
Ronald Louis Peterson
Like the lives of people everywhere in the world, the life of Al Masterson, a fifty-year-old risk manager in New York City, unfolded day by day to the rhythms of the people, places, and circumstances around him. He was good at adapting to whatever came up, but at times he found himself wondering, “Who am I really?” Even at fifty, to his amazement, he still wondered if his destiny and his reality were in sync. This was one of those days.
It’s been a difficult question to answer because he had only vague ideas about his special or unique gifts. Sure, there were times when he had insights, but they didn’t last because something came up to challenge them and he lost his sense of self once again. In spite of the setbacks, he was confident that one day all the right circumstances would arise and then he would live the rest of his life in complete harmony with himself and everyone else in the world. Until then, he just maintained, as he was doing with his shaky employment situation.
A New Day
Al awoke at 5:30 a.m. on September 11, 2001, to the Byrd’s song Turn! Turn! Turn! playing on his CD alarm clock.
“To everything— turn, turn, turn. There is a season— turn, turn, turn; and a time to every purpose under heaven. A time to be born, a time to die …”
He liked the song for its strong, driving rhythm, its rich harmonies, and, most of all, its lyrics for their depiction of life as a series of events and emotions that define us at any given moment— each balanced with its opposite: “A time to be born, a time to die.” They were comforting because they told him that if he was suffering, something good would follow: “Turn, turn, turn.” They were disconcerting because they reminded him that the good times don’t last: “Turn, turn, turn.”
So as he dressed and got ready to begin work on this day, he wondered if it would be the day that he’d lose his job, like the sixty others at his company who had been terminated in downsizing moves over the past few months. While there was no indication that his job was on the line, he remembered what those who had lost their jobs had told him as they cleared their desks, “Didn’t see this coming.”
“Honey, just think … by this time tomorrow we’ll still be sleeping in a hotel overlooking a beautiful beach in Mexico,” said Helen, his wife, spiritual advisor and confidante, as he kissed her good-bye. When the world closed in on him and attacked his spirit, she was there to reconnect him with the One who could do something about it.
“Yes. Just need to get through today,” he replied with the same anticipation that she had expressed in her voice. “I need to tie up a few lose ends at the office,” he added, not wanting to ruin the thought for her with his job loss concerns.
Ode to the City
There was no way to really describe New York City and do it justice. It had too much history squeezed into its three-hundred-plus years. Lots of cities were older, but few had evolved at its pace. Its metabolism was off the charts. Living life in the fast lane, that was NYC. Take any aspect of life. NYC sped it up. It was as if time-lapse photography condensed the life-cycle of just about everything and everyone in the city. Institutions like Wall Street and Broadway, which measured the nation’s business and cultural developments, were cases in point.
The ebbs and flows of business were documented minute-by-minute with the flailing arms, hands, and fingers of traders on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. The marquees on Broadway theaters lived weeks, maybe months, before being replaced by the next show, the next hit. The same could be said to one degree or another of most institutions in NYC, and by default, those served by them. In this world, people had to make a special effort to stop and reflect on what they were doing and why.
News, News, News
“Go figure,” “Yeah, right,” and “No-ooooo!” were Al’s commentaries to himself after quickly scanning the USA Today headlines as he walked past the newsstand at the Newark, New Jersey, PATH train station that would take him to his office in the World Trade Center.
“Thank God for slow news days,” Al mumbled to himself as he trotted to catch his train.
As Al boarded his commuter train, Ann Weir, a thirty-five-yearold teacher from Astoria, Queens, found a seat on her subway train as it pulled out of the elevated Grand Avenue BMT station. She was on her way to a job interview at an investment firm’s World Trade Center office.
Ann was a good teacher but was ready for a new challenge that didn’t include weak administrators, unaccountable parents, and disruptive students. Ann wanted a job that tapped her sharp, disciplined mind, opened doors to a whole new world, and raised the ceiling on her earning potential.
She had followed in the footsteps of her mother, who had been a public school teacher in Queens for thirty-three years. The dynamics of a public school teacher’s job had changed for the worse in recent years. Her mom’s teaching experience had been much different during her tenure. The environment in Ann’s school district, especially in the last few years, had deteriorated. The focus was less on teaching and learning, and more on dealing with wider social issues. Ann wasn’t a sociologist; she was a teacher. So, while it was a difficult decision because she enjoyed the interaction with bright young minds, Ann had jumped at the opportunity presented in the online ad that had read, “Wanted—Teachers Looking for a Better Job. You’ve got great communication skills. Why not put them to work for a global financial services company that will double or triple your salary?”
As Ann’s train approached the Queens Plaza station, at the foot of the 59th–Street Bridge that linked Queens to Manhattan, she looked across the East River to the renowned skyline and smiled.
“Why are you smiling?” asked the elderly, casually-dressed woman sitting next to Ann. “I don’t mean to be rude. I’m just curious.”
“I didn’t realize I was smiling,” replied Ann. “I guess I’m happy about the possibility of taking my life in a whole new direction. I’ve got a job interview with a big company this morning.”
“That explains it. What do you do?”
“Well, I’m a high school teacher, but the job interview is for a position as an investment counselor.” Ann’s faced glowed warmly, like a candle on a birthday cake.
“A teacher?” the woman pondered. “I had some real good ones and some real bad ones. Both kinds had an impact on my life. The good ones were those who brought out the best in me, saw things in me that I didn’t see myself, encouraged me to build on my strengths, and nurtured my curiosity.” She smiled and nodded at Ann.
“And the bad ones?” Ann chuckled.
“Ah, the bad ones? I’d rather not think about them, because they did just the opposite,” the woman said, twisting her face as if in pain. “The one that I remember most is Mrs. O’Malley. ‘Forget about sciences,’ she told me over and over. ‘No reason for you, or any female student, to take science courses in college since you’ll never get a job where you’ll use them,’ she had advised me.”
The woman’s face then lit up as she told Ann, “I recently retired from Kraft Foods where I was a senior nutritionist. I guess O’Malley was wrong. It’s strange for me to say this, but maybe I should thank her because proving her wrong helped me push myself harder when things weren’t going too well in college and when I was looking for a job.”
“My mom was a great teacher. She loved her students and they loved her …” She paused a moment to reflect and then added, “She did all the things you just mentioned that define a good teacher … and more.”
“She’s not teaching anymore?”
“No. She took early retirement ten years ago. She didn’t want to retire, but they gave her an offer she couldn’t refuse, if you know what I mean. Her school had to cut its budget and thought the best way to do that was to replace her with a young, inexperienced teacher at half her salary.”
“That’s a shame. I wonder if the powers that be will ever stop thinking of us all as just interchangeable parts.”
“Well, my mom’s definitely not an interchangeable part in the classroom. I could tell you stories that you wouldn’t believe. In her first year as a teacher, there was a boy who was having all kinds of problems and …”
Just then, their train pulled into the Lexington Avenue station in Manhattan.
“Oh, this is my stop.” The woman got up from her seat next to Ann and looked down at her. “I’m on my way for a morning walk around Central Park. Good luck with your interview.”
“Thanks. Enjoy your walk.” Ann smiled and watched the train doors close behind the woman.
It was a beautiful day for a walk. The sun had just risen and the forecast called for a clear day with mild temperatures in the sixties.
A Dream ... A Cartoon ... and God
At St. Peter’s Catholic Church on the lower east side of Manhattan, in the shadows of the World Trade Center’s imposing twin towers, a NYC fire department chaplain contemplated the dream he had had the night before.
He struggled to find meaning in it since the situation he had found himself in was so out of character. After all, when was the last time I cleaned my living quarters? He wondered. I have had a housekeeper for as long as I can remember.
But there he was in his dream, dusting furniture and vacuuming dirt from the floors. The other strange thing about his dream was that he couldn’t get rid of the dust. In fact, the more he cleaned, the more dust would appear. Finally, it got so bad that he had begun choking on the dust, and that’s when he had woken up.
As he sipped his coffee, a passage from the book of Genesis came to mind. “For you are dirt, and to dirt you shall return.” Maybe that was it, he thought. The night before, he had discussed death at length with several fire fighters at Ladder Company 6. It wasn’t a subject the fire fighters spoke of often, even though they each had had friends who lost their lives while battling fires. A couple of them at Ladder Company 6 had almost died on the job. Frank was one.
“It happened so fast. One second there was a clear path to the door out, the next, nothing but flames between me and it,” Frank had told Father Tom with horror in his voice. “I looked all over for another exit … other doors … other windows. Flames and smoke were everywhere. We’re trained to deal with every situation, but for the life of me, nothing came to mind that would save me. My heart was racing. I was dripping sweat and thought I was about to die.”
“Oh, thank God you didn’t,” Father Tom interrupted. “How did you get out?”
“A strange thing happened. ‘God help me, God help me’ I whispered over, and over. Then all of a sudden, images came to mind of some cartoon I used to watch when I was a kid on Saturday mornings. The next thing I knew, I was running through the flames that blocked my way out, just like the character did in the cartoon. I don’t know how I got out without being burned.”
“That’s a good story. Do you mind if I use it in a homily some time?” Father Tom asked.
“Why? Don’t you think it’s weird?” Frank looked around the room at his colleagues to confirm its weirdness.
“Not at all, God works in mysterious ways.” Father Tom gave Frank an affirmative wink.
“I guess so. Sure, you can use it,” Frank said, shrugging his shoulders.
Father Tom swallowed hard. “I’ve told you guys this before, but let me say it again…” He paused to look around at the faces in the room before continuing. “You are my heroes. God has truly blessed you so that you can put your life on the line again and again for people you don’t even know—‘For there is no greater love than to give one’s life for someone else.’”
“Father, can I ask you something?” Steve, another firefighter, whispered.
“Certainly, anything.”
“Does God determine when we all die?” Steve asked, looking and sounding like an inquisitive, innocent child.
Father Tom contemplated his question for a moment. “Let me first ask you this before I answer your question. Does God determine when we are born?”
“My mother and father had a lot to do with it,” Steve noted with a playful smile, evoking laughter from his colleagues.
“Ha, quite right, just as their mothers and fathers had a lot to do with their entrances into this world, and so on to the beginning of life on Earth.” Father Tom paced back and forth as he spoke.
“I don’t get it. Did you answer my question?”
“No. No. But now I can.” Father Tom stopped in his tracks and turned to Steve. “You see, God created all life and everything in our physical world.” He spread his raised arms to emphasize his point. “The natural forces that God created continuously reshape this world. You know ... the weather, the ocean tides, and earthquakes. So when someone dies in a natural disaster, God did determine that death to a degree. It’s not that God willed that untimely death; he just lets nature take its course.” Father Tom studied Steve’s face to gauge his reaction.
Steve leaned forward in his chair, stroked his face and looked into Father Tom’s eyes. “What about death by disease, accidents, murder, war? You know… things that come out of nowhere that take some lives and not others? It seems like God just saves some people.”
“Wait a minute. You’re getting ahead of me. As I was saying, God lets natural disasters, like tornadoes, take lives. Why God set up this world to have all kinds of life and health-threatening risks is a question only God can answer. I’ll include sickness and disease in this category. Then, there are those other risks that you mention, accidents, murder, and war that have more to do with the human condition.” Father Tom started pacing again. “We have some control over these things. I say ‘we’ in that they are tied to human activity and our free will. These wouldn’t be risks if God didn’t make our bodies so fragile and he didn’t let us decide how we use our bodies.”
Tim, another firefighter, entered the room just as Father Tom paused to look at Steve.
“What the hell is going on in here? Why so quiet?”
“Shush,” all the other firefighters urged, pointing to Father Tom, who was hidden from Tim’s view, on the other side of the room.
Tim turned to see Father Tom. “Oh!” He zipped his lips, and nodded awkwardly before taking a seat at one of the tables.
Father Tom nodded at Tim and picked up where he had left off. “Again, you’ll have to get the answers about why this is so from God. We just need to understand and accept that this is life. It’s up to each of us how we respond to it. Oh, almost forgot to mention evil and how it can influence the choices we make. So for reasons known only to God, we have natural disasters, all kinds of diseases, a body and a mind that bruise easily, and evil at work all around us that is responsible for lots of bad choices, including the taking of another’s life. The good news is that God helps us make choices when we listen to what he whispers to us.”
“So God doesn’t determine exactly when we will die; he’s just involved in the bigger picture?” Frank summarized.
“That’s the way I see it. And the bigger picture includes our eternal life with God. Life on Earth is like a school where we learn lots of things to grow our spirits. And, upon graduation, we go to one of two places: heaven or hell. Not all suffering is bad. For some reason, often it helps us to graduate with honors if we let it.”
My dream about choking on dust, that must have been it, Father Tom thought to himself as he finished his morning coffee. The conversation I had had with the men at Ladder Company #6 just got me thinking about our dust and the hereafter. He wondered what God was trying to tell him with his dream as he headed out the door to begin his day.
Why Risk It?
As Al’s train made its way to Manhattan, he quickly organized his work day in his mind. Anything he couldn’t finish would either have to wait until he returned from his vacation, or he’d ask a co-worker to lend a hand in his absence on pressing matters. With his day mapped out, he could relax. An advertisement on the opposite wall of the train caught his eye and sparked some thoughts. The headline simply read, “Why Risk It?”
“Risk what?” he asked himself. Being a risk manager, it was an interesting question for Al. Before Al continued reading the ad, he played a game with himself to guess what was being sold. It was probably insurance of some kind, he surmised. Americans spent billions of dollars every year to keep from being hit by big unexpected expenses: life, health, home, auto, and accident insurance topped the list. Job loss and identity theft insurance were among the newer varieties gaining popularity, he reminded himself.
So, yes, he knew people were now insuring more things to manage more of their lives, to buy peace of mind. But before he went with insurance as his guess, thoughts about other kinds of risk that weren’t covered by traditional insurance came to mind. For example, advertisers were quick to point out risks to those who could use their products or services to protect themselves against everything from bad breath and other social concerns to crime, financial insecurity, personal development, legal concerns, and other threats.
Al shook his head in amazement as he began to comprehend, perhaps for the first time in his life, that he and everybody else in the world had so much at risk in just living every day. And it bothered him that advertisers often sold things as insurance against threats, perceived or not, so they could present their goods and services as a means to reduce or eliminate risks. In doing so, they found creative ways to generate consumer demand because they seemed to know consumers better than consumers knew themselves.
Then Al wondered if it was an advertisement that prompted him recently to consider buying a gun for the first time in his life. After a few seconds, he remembered seeing a TV news story about the elderly learning how to shoot would-be attackers. It reported that a growing number of elderly were enrolling in firearm education classes because they didn’t want to be victimized by younger, stronger assailants.
Al was so wrapped up in his mental gymnastics that he almost forgot about the game he was playing. He looked back up at the headline on the advertisement: “Why Risk It?” Armed with his new insights, he deduced that the ad was probably about financial threats since this train served business people commuting to and from work. To confirm his guess, he read the rest of the ad and then laughed out loud—which prompted strange looks from those who were closest to him.
It was selling an adult diaper for people who had lost some control of their body’s functions. Al hoped the advertiser had misdirected it. If not, he learned more about his fellow commuters than he wanted to know. Or worse, the message may be a foreshadowing of things to come for him.
One Small World
While Al switched trains, halfway around the world in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, it was early evening. Tenaye Tiruneh expressed her concern to her husband, Tadesse, via phone about their son Alemu. Tadesse listened to her carefully explain that Alemu, a fifteen-year-old high school student, had been arrested by Addis Ababa police. Tadesse was in a New York City taxi cab, on his way to a very important business meeting that would determine the fate of his dream to open a vocational school in Addis for poor, uneducated children living on the streets of that city.
The boys would be taught to make furniture for homes and businesses locally and abroad. Upon graduation, they would have good-paying jobs waiting for them in Tadesse’s furniture factory. The girls would be taught the finer points of growing, roasting, blending, and packaging gourmet coffees for export. While the exporting of world-class coffee beans had been going on in Ethiopia for decades, Tadesse’s dream was to sell the finished product, where most of the profits were made. Something a Peace Corps Volunteer teacher had said to him twenty-seven years ago stuck with him.
The teacher, a colleague at the high school where Tadesse had taught woodworking, had been fascinated after learning that the world’s first coffee beans had been grown, roasted, and consumed in Ethiopia’s Kaffee province. He had told Tadesse in light of this fact that he was surprised Ethiopian coffee didn’t have the same associations around the world as, say, Russian vodka or Swiss chocolate. “How can Ethiopia give the world this international drink, including its name, yet not get the credit and profits others do?” the teacher had wondered.
Since then, Tadesse had often thought about that observation until he finally decided he’d do something to correct the injustice. He wanted the words “Ethiopian coffee” to roll off the tongues of consumers around the world whenever they talked about premium coffee. Armed with his successful furniture factory as collateral, and his dreams, Tadesse had come to New York to change some lives in Addis Ababa for the better.
As the taxi he was riding in darted from one lane to the next, stopping and starting to keep from bumping into the traffic all around him, Tadesse held his head in one hand and his cell phone in the other.
“Arrested! Alemu? Why? How?” he quizzed Tenaye.
Through her tears, Tenaye told Tadesse, “He was on his way home from school with a group of his friends. The police arrested them for vandalizing city property.”
“No! No! I don’t believe it! Alemu would never do such a thing!”
“It’s true. I talked to Alemu at the police station. He said they just drew pictures with colored chalk on the sidewalk, making fun of a rival group at their school. The school principal filed a complaint with the police because he thought they were making fun of him,” Tenaye explained.
“That’s crazy! Even if they were making fun of him, they didn’t break any law.” Tadesse clenched his teeth and strained his neck muscles as he spoke.
“The police said there have been many incidents recently in the area where city property was destroyed, and they see what Alemu and his friends did as the same thing.”
“It’s not the same thing. They can’t make up laws to suit themselves. Tenaye, listen to me. It will be OK.” Tadesse harnessed his rage to console his wife. “I’ll meet with the police and Alemu’s principal. This is his first year at the school. He doesn’t know Alemu.”
“I shouldn’t have called before your meeting. Good luck. I love you.”
“It makes me more determined. If something like this can happen to our son, imagine what the poorest street kids have to deal with. I’ll call you tomorrow, before my plane takes off. Good-bye. I love you,” Tadesse said tenderly.
As Tadesse hung up, his taxi came to a screeching stop—hurling him into the security partition that separated him from the taxi driver. With his face just inches from the driver, Tadesse’s chauffeur turned his head until their eyes met. While the driver saw terror, Tadesse saw an amused, smiling face, as if they were in a bumper car at an amusement park. In an attempt to calm Tadesse and to blame the other driver for the near collision, the taxi driver began yelling and pointing his finger at the other driver.
Tadesse’s face suddenly lit up with a soothing grin because the taxi driver was cursing out the “crazy, donkey’s ass” driver in Amharic, Tadesse’s native language. All of a sudden, this strange, huge, intimidating city became less so. It also gave him renewed hope that his proposal would be approved. After all, if the daredevil taxi drivers of Addis could find work in New York City, then anything is possible.
“Wendeme’, Taynahstiling. Indemineh?” Tadesse greeted the driver in Amharic. Instantly, they began a conversation that lasted the entire trip to Tadesse’s meeting place. Tadesse looked forward to eating dinner that night at the Ethiopian restaurant the driver told him about.
The Bag Lady
Lower Manhattan, home of Wall Street, the World Trade Center, and Battery Park, was bathed in the sunlight of a dawning day. As thousands of workers rushed to their offices in the area, a bag lady slowly rose to a sitting position on the train station bench beneath the World Trade Center where she had spent the night. As she wiped the sleep from her eyes, the Statue of Liberty glistened from the warming sun’s rays on nearby Hudson Bay. Soon, the bag lady would be out on the street again to bask in the warmth that had departed, like all the workers, at nightfall.
Anyone who looked at this woman felt something—compassion, contempt, resentment, fear, and more—depending on their own personal biases. She unwittingly was a catalyst of emotions for everyone who saw her. Sometimes she benefited from this phenomenon and other times she was victimized by it.
She was always amazed when people responded to her so differently, even though she did nothing different, and this day was no exception from her last thirty or so nights and mornings in this station, on this bench.
“Please take this,” said the well-dressed business woman who was about her own age as she gently placed a five dollar bill in the bag lady’s hand that rested on her lap. As the bag lady looked up to thank the kindness, the woman had already disappeared in a wave of business people in a hurry to get to their jobs.
“Ah, this will be a good day,” the bag lady said to herself as she carefully placed the bill in a pocket of her tattered, stained, over-sized coat.
Crash went the rusted toy wagon she used to transport two shopping bags full of her worldly possessions. Sprawled all over the floor in front of her were clothes, a few kitchen utensils, some treasured photos of her previous life, and an angry young office worker who hadn’t been looking where he was going before tripping over the bag lady’s wagon.
“Hey, are you trying to kill me or something? I ought to have you arrested, you bum,” he screamed as he got up off the floor, dusted himself off, and kicked the two shopping bags.
“Tim, good one. I’d give you a 5.5 on your landing. Want to try for a 6.0?” chuckled one of the two co-workers he was with as they continued on their way.
“Maybe this won’t be a good day,” the bag lady mumbled to herself as she gathered up her stuff.
Her photos, the most recent of which was five years old, were bundled together in one stack by a rubber band. As she held it in her hand, she closed her eyes and wondered how she sank so low. In spite of everything that had happened to her, she fought daily not to give in to the temptation to see herself as a victim, and as a result she remained, for the most part, the same person she had been. Things just happened. People responded. She made choices, and here she was. It was as simple as that. If she could have done it all over again, she would do things differently.
But now she found herself trapped in a life she hated, searching for answers that would lead her out of this hole she had helped herself dig. To ease her pain and her frustration, she drank, giving her temporary relief. Unfortunately, her drinking made things worse because it blurred her 15 thinking and interrupted her sense of purpose to reclaim her lost life, or maybe start a new, better one.
Her drinking began innocently, like taking an aspirin for a headache. But, because she took responsibility for what had happened back then and because just one drink lost its soothing effect, one drink led to another, slowly transforming her into just another nameless street person. In her lucid moments, like now when she tightly held onto the photos of her previous life, she knew that she had to stop drinking. In the past, just when she thought she had resolved to do that, a new wave of blame, guilt, and circumstances had knocked her down. So she had turned to alcohol as her lifeline.
As she stared at the photo on top of her collection and placed herself in a happier time, she finally realized that she couldn’t get from here to there on her own. And she wept as she gathered up the rest of her belongings while on her knees.
“Are you hurt? Can I help you?” a passerby wondered as he stopped and leaned over to help the bag lady.
“Hurt? Yes. Can you help me pick up the pieces of my life?” she replied as if she were talking to herself while wiping away the tears.
“I was thinking more about picking you up from the floor,” said Al as he offered her a hand.
The bag lady waved off his hand, saying, “I’m OK. I’m just packing up my stuff. Some guy tripped over my wagon.”
“Do I know you? Your voice sounds familiar, but I can’t place the face.”
The bag lady looked up and recognized Al from her previous life and quickly turned away. She didn’t want him to make the connection. She had gone out of her way to find places that were far from her former life.
“I doubt it, mister,” she said with a hint of fear.
Al’s curiosity soared as he heard her distinctive voice again—a voice he had associated with unhappy times some ten years ago. He squatted down next to her and looked at her face-to-face, studying her features. His memory bank worked hard at matching the raspy voice, the puffy, weathered face and sad, sunken eyes with someone he had known in his life, but he couldn’t place her, and he didn’t want to make the situation any worse for the bag lady by staring at her any longer, so Al stood up and walked away.
But after taking a dozen steps, Al turned back and caught up with the bag lady, who had quickly gathered her things and was walking as fast as she could in the opposite direction. “Valerie? Is it you?” Al asked as if his question was absurd.
“No!” she said while walking away even faster.
“That’s what you said to me at the office when you walked away from me the last time I saw you. I’ll never forget that day, and how you looked from the back as you walked away. It is you, but it can’t be!”
The bag lady stopped in her tracks, opened her teary eyes slowly while looking into Al’s inquisitive eyes with fear and humiliation. “Yes, Al. It’s me, Valerie,” she said as she wiped her tears. “I don’t believe it. What happened to you?” Al shook his head in amazement and said, “I’d like to talk with you to find out but can’t now.
Please call me,” he said as he handed her his business card and ten dollars.
How ironic, she thought to herself. Just when she was ready to accept help from someone, the someone offering help was Al.
“I will,” she said while turning her face away in shame and gratitude. “Thank you, Al.”
Not Just Another Day
Few buildings in the world struck such a majestic pose as the twin towers of the World Trade Center. Each of their one hundred and ten stories stood high above everything around them and served as a gateway for those flying in and out of the city. Many pilots routed their planes above lower Manhattan on their way to and from the airports so their passengers got a good view of the towers. Meanwhile, some fifty thousand people from around the world worked in and visited these landmarks daily. No other buildings in the world better symbolized international commerce and demonstrated what was possible when people worked together for their common good. The World Trade Center was like a garden where hopes and dreams were planted. Ann Weir and Tadesse Tiruneh were among those who had come to them on this day to do just that.
As Ann pressed the elevator button that would take her to her 8:30 a.m. job interview on the seventy-seventh floor of Tower One, Tadesse was getting out of his taxi in front of Tower Two.
“Izo,” said the driver to Tadesse as he closed the door of the cab behind him. It was good to hear an encouraging “Make it happen. You can do it,” in his native language as he was about to sell the biggest business proposal of his life. Before walking to the building’s entrance, he reflexively took a deep breath and looked up at the sky as if to say, “OK, God, any help you’d like to provide would be appreciated.” He was amazed that for him to see the sky, he had to look straight up because the building just kept climbing. If he hadn’t seen it from a distance, he would have sworn now that it stretched to infinity.
Tadesse’s appointment was for 9:00 a.m. but he wanted to arrive early just in case he ran into delays on his way. He decided to use the half hour of extra time he had to review all the important points he wanted to make in his presentation. In the lobby, he found a Starbucks Coffee shop and made it his temporary office. Maybe he’d get some last-minute inspiration for his Ethiopian coffee venture from Starbucks. He was amazed at all the many different flavored coffees on the menu. After ordering a cup of plain black, Tadesse understood that while flavored coffees weren’t big in Ethiopia, they apparently were in the United States. But his flavored coffees would have to be distinctive and be branded Ethiopian.
Why not name different coffee flavors after Ethiopia’s emperors? This would give his coffees unique distinctions that were tied to Ethiopia’s rich culture. But he knew that getting people to order a cup of Haile Selassie would take a lot of work and money—except in Jamaica where Haile Selassie was regarded as God incarnate by a pot-smoking cult called Rastafarians.
Before becoming Ethiopia’s last emperor, a reign that stretched from 1930 to 1974, Haile Selassie had been called Ras Tefari. He had also traced his lineage back to King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. While Ethiopians acknowledged Haile Selassie’s roots and even called him the Lion of Judah and King of Kings, they didn’t regard him as God and were baffled as to why a group of Jamaicans would. “Must have something to do with all the pot they smoke,” Tadesse would tell those who asked him about it.
An Historic News Day
With just fifteen minutes before his meeting with the investment company on the eighty-third floor of Tower Two, Tadesse put his papers away to spend a few minutes watching the news on the shop’s TV. And while Father Tom entered the neighborhood elementary school to talk to the students about his fire chaplain’s job, Al was at his desk answering emails from co-workers around the world. He had a great view of upper Manhattan out of his huge office window that covered the wall behind his desk. On a clear day like today, he could see past the Empire State Building all the way to Central Park.
Al was a student of risk. It was his job to manage it, but more than that, he found risk and how people responded to it fascinating. While some enjoyed living on the edge, defying risks of all kinds, others were just the opposite. Al fell somewhere in between, so when he heard an explosion and felt his office tremble, he wasn’t sure what to think and do.
“Hey, Bill,” he blurted to his co-worker in the adjoining office, “what the hell was that?”
“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out,” Bill said as he rushed into Al’s office.
“It felt like an earthquake, but sounded like a bomb.”
“Let’s not get carried away. A bomb?” Bill chided.
“I guess you weren’t around when a truck bomb blew a big hole in the basement garage here and killed a bunch of people in ninety three. But even that didn’t shake the place like this and didn’t make the bang we just heard.”
Al and Bill walked through the main office area to talk with their colleagues about what they had just felt and heard, to learn if anyone had other insights. After a few minutes of conversing with everybody around, the cause remained a mystery. Al and Bill headed back to their adjoining offices. Al was sorting through some papers a few minutes later when he heard Bill shout.
“Look out your window! What’s that?” Bill ran to the window in his office.
“Hard to tell,” Al shouted back as he watched a shower of debris fall to the ground from above while he stood at his office window. “Something must have happened on the upper floors,” Al said as his eyes shifted upward.
“Our phones are out,” shouted someone else from a cubicle.
“So is our power,” screamed another.
“Let’s get out of here, Al,” Bill urged as he rushed into Al’s office, his eyes filled with panic. “Something is very wrong.”
“Look, an office chair,” Al said in amazement as he pointed out of his office window. “What the?” he interrupted himself when he saw something else fly by from where the chair had come, just a few feet from them on the other side of the window.
“A man! A man! A man!” Al screamed in horror.
When they ran to the window and looked down to the street, they saw a growing crowd of people gathered around the World Trade Center complex. Flashing lights of fire engines and police cars were converging on it as well.
Without saying another word to each other, Al and Bill packed up their laptops and brief cases to get out of the building as fast as they could. They’d have their questions answered later. As they packed up, Al’s cell phone rang. It was a very concerned Helen telling him that Fox News had just reported that a plane had crashed into his office building about ten minutes ago. She described the live pictures of the crash site she was watching in horror, as a large fiery gash, about twenty floors from the top, spewed huge flames and billowed massive black clouds of smoke. Since Al’s office was on the seventy-sixth floor, it meant the crash and the fire it started were about ten stories above them.
“Get out of there!” Helen pleaded.
“I’m on my way. I’m with a group from my company. I love you. See you soon,” Al said—his heart pounding in his throat.
With his computer strapped on his shoulder and briefcase in hand, Al left his private office and rounded up all those there in his company to report what he had just learned.
“A plane crashed ten floors above us. We’ve got to get out of here now because the fire is going to spread quickly. The stairs are our only option.” Al told them as he and Bill led the way out.
“Incredible,” said one who closed his eyes and shook his bowed head.
“Those poor people who were in those offices up there,” said another, his arms folded across his chest as he stared blankly at the floor.
“I have some friends who work on the ninety-sixth floor,” said another who just realized that they were probably dead. “No! No! Tell me this isn’t happening,” he said as he held his head in both hands.
A couple dozen people from Al’s office entered the office-lined hallway, telling everybody else who they saw what had happened and urging them to flee now. The group, now triple in size, walked past the power-starved elevators to the stairway around the corner. Except for a few panic-stricken people who darted in and out, pushing people out of the way to get to the stairs first, everyone was composed.
They found the same situation on the stairway, where the traffic was relatively light. Just as Al was about to take his first step down, he realized that he had left his cell phone on his desk. Seeing that there were no impediments to his exit down the stairs, Al ran back to retrieve his phone. On his way, as he passed others rushing to the exit, he assured coworkers that he’d be right behind them.
Al’s phone was where he had left it on his desk; he swiped it and slipped it into his jacket pocket before making an about-face and running back to the stairs.
A Journey through Hell Interrupted
Just as he was about to enter the stairway, Al’s phone rang again. The voice on the other end of the line was that of a distraught woman, sobbing as she said, “Al, I’m sorry. Please forgive me.”
“Who is this?” a very impatient Al huffed.
“Valerie. It’s Valerie. Can you forgive me?”
“Valerie, a plane just crashed into the World Trade Center. I’ve got to get out of here. Can’t talk now ... call me later.”
Al put away his phone and opened the stairway door. But this time he entered alone and ran into two middle-aged men carrying, on a chair, a young woman in her twenties. She was badly burned and in shock. They were the only ones coming down the stairs at this moment. One of the men, short of breath, called out to Al as they passed him, “Hey, one floor up. We thought we heard someone crying for help.”
With a hint of burnt jet fuel in the air, and images of the young woman—her anguished face, charred flesh and burnt clothes stamped on his mind—Al hesitated for a moment. “It’s OK. The fire is … is about … ten flights… up from here,” said one of the men. Al’s heart raced as he leapt up the stairs two steps at a time.
In an instant, he was on the seventy-seventh floor, but didn’t hear anything. When Al opened the stairway door, nobody was around, and silence filled the hallway. Just to make sure, he walked around the corner. Still nobody, but he heard a faint tapping or clicking sound coming from an elevator. He walked over to it and the sound, still faint, got louder. He put his ear to the door where the tapping was coming from; now he also heard the muffled voice of a woman crying, “Help. Help. I’m in here.”
“OK. I hear you,” Al screamed at the door. He tried pulling the doors apart with his hands, but couldn’t. He needed a crowbar but he settled for a metal sculpture that was hanging on the wall behind the receptionist’s desk in a nearby office. It was a welded piece of modern art about three feet long.
Al slid a flat edge of the piece into the seam of the elevator door, working it in to give him leverage. He then pulled hard to one side, opening the door a few inches. He was then able to grip the door with both hands. With all his strength, he and the woman inside pulled the door open enough to place the sculpture between the doors to hold them open. The elevator car was stuck between floors. Ann Weir was standing in it with her waist at about floor level.
Ann was embarrassed, not scared. Apparently, she was on her way down when the plane had crashed into the building and cut the power. “Thank you so much,” she told Al as he pulled her out. “I was afraid I’d be trapped in here for a while.”
“Come on. We’ve got to go,” Al declared as he ran to the stairs.
“What are you doing? Are all the elevators broken?” said a confused Ann.
Realizing that Ann didn’t know what had happened, Al told her, “A plane crashed into our building about twenty minutes ago. All the power is out and there’s a fire about ten stories up that will be spreading down here soon, so there’s no time to waste.”
Just then, the elevator car that Ann had been trapped in suddenly disappeared down the shaft, leaving an empty space that startled Al and Ann. They stared at the open shaft for a moment, and then they heard ominous roars, like booming ocean waves crashing on the shore. The roars quickly grew louder and louder just before flames from above shot past them down the shaft. Al grabbed Ann’s hand and led her to the stairway without saying a word. They ran as fast as they could.
This time when Al opened the door, there was a lot of traffic on the staircase. After they went down about ten flights, several young, exhausted fire fighters passed them on their way up. They asked Al and Ann if they had seen anyone else on the upper floors who needed help.
“No. Everybody we’ve seen is making it down OK,” Al said as the rescuers trudged past them to the next floor. “You shouldn’t go up there. The fire shot down an open elevator shaft on the seventy-seventh floor and is spreading fast.”
“You’re probably right, but we’ve got to see for ourselves,” said one of the fire fighters as he wiped the sweat from his brow. The heat was now much more intense than it had been and the sickening odor of jet fuel was getting stronger, making it more difficult to breathe. “By the way, another commercial jet crashed into the other twin tower about ten minutes ago. This was no accident,” said one of the firefighters, who was already up the stairs and out of sight, just before the door on the next landing slammed behind them.
“Were they kidding?” Ann’s lips trembled.
“Why would they?” Al turned and waved his hand to get her moving again.
Ann tapped Al’s shoulder to stop him and looked into his busy eyes. “Thank you for saving my life.”
“I hope it’s more than just a reprieve,” replied Al as he waved his hand again and continued down the stairs.
They walked as fast as they could under the circumstances. The temperature was now over one hundred degrees, the jet fuel fumes more intense, and the stairwell was pitch black. Holding on to the handrails helped them determine when they got to each landing so they wouldn’t trip or fall. In the darkness, they heard people crying out in pain and fear from time to time.
Al and Ann had been carrying their jackets over their shoulders to get some relief from the heat. When they got to the sixtieth floor, they carefully placed their jackets in the corner of the landing because carrying them now was more trouble than they were worth. Hopefully nobody would trip over them in the corner.
Their race against time and for their lives was slowed when they came upon a group of firefighters carrying down a disabled man in a wheelchair. They followed them for five flights until the firefighters stopped to rest. Al couldn’t imagine how they were able to carry the man down when he himself was so weak from the intense heat and the dizzying fumes that just carrying his jacket was too much.
“Keep going,” panted the firefighter closest to Al as he pulled Al’s arm around him and the invalid. As Al and Ann squeezed their way past them, they heard the man in the wheelchair tell the firefighters, “Please, save yourselves. I don’t want you to die because of me.”