Turning the radio off on my way in

In the days and weeks, and now years, that followed, everyone develops their own reactions, opinions, emotions, and understanding of what that day means.

By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

“9/11” of course, is shorthand for four coordinated terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda, an
Islamist extremist group, that occurred on the morning of September 11, 2001.
The attacks killed 2,977 people.
A dozen years later, nearly every American can recall what they were doing that morning, and has some sort of story.
Maybe not profound, or inspiring, or perhaps even interesting, the stories mark the watershed moment for their owners.
Like many days, today for example, my experience started when I hopped in the car, and headed to work at our office in Woodland Park.
Editor Donna Richards was on vacation that week, and the lead reporter at the time, Charles Jones, was charged with putting together the paper that morning.  Usually, both before and after —even today,  I listen to the news on the radio on my way up the Pass.
But for some reason that day, I snaked my way up U.S. 24 in silence.
It is odd, but I remember John Shubin, who was in charge of publicity for "Cruise Above the  Clouds," was scheduled to meet me that day to go over the upcoming event.
When I arrived at the Courier, at about 8:15 a.m. in 2001, it was surreal how subdued and troubled everyone was. Still completely in the dark, I sensed immediately that something was terribly wrong (but until that moment of arrival, was clueless).
In the days and weeks, and now years, that followed, everyone develops their own reactions, opinions, emotions, and understanding of what that day means.
I recall talking later to my Dad about that, and the similarities of his recollection of the attack on Pearl Harbor, many years prior.
"Before, with Pearl Harbor, we were gathered around, trying to figure out what was happening by listening to a car radio."
But this was different.
"Much more terrifying and real," he pronounced. "I saw the planes hit the building, I saw people leaping, I saw the building drop. I saw them dying."
Since, I have talked to a few who were there in New York, and in Washington, and in planes kept in the air, and others who went there shortly after to help.
I saw the whole experience change people, and it probably changed me.
Todd Vess, a fellow publisher at the time at the Windsor Beacon, was at a conference in Washington then. I recall him telling me later, that what he saw that day, prompted him to scrap the journalism gig, and become a firefighter.
Since that time, locally we have been through the worst fire in Colorado history, and then a worse one, and then another. In the Pass, the guardrails are still choked with debris from a killing flood and slide. We endure wars in the Middle East, theater shootings, correction official assassinations, campus evacuations, and the threat of even worse. But endure, we do.
On this anniversary, 12 years and counting, it is odd that I run into to Vess, once again, as make arrangements to bury my dad. Vess is still a firefighter, and a part-time funeral director,  and we all are still changed.
I plan to turn my radio off on the way in today, when I hop into the car and head for Woodland Park.  We have 'Cruise Above the Clouds' story and photos in this week's paper.

Appreciate you picking up the phone.

All the time I was growing up in a small town in southwestern Colorado, a strange, faceless phone with no dialing mechanism hung right on my dad’s side of my parent’s bedroom.  I think there might have been as many as eight of them (exactly alike) hanging in various locations (homes and businesses) around the small town of 800 residents.

All of them were the property of the local volunteer fire department.

Whether it be night or day, the loud, unremitting, urgent ring would sound continuously at the breakout of a fire -- until someone picked up and answered the call.

If the call was judged not to be a prank, or false alarm, then the lever on the black box next to the phone was shoved over, all the way to the right, and the fire siren down at the town hall would begin its mournful summons of the 25 or 30 volunteer firefighters in the area.

Later, of course, heavy, boxlike pagers were worn on volunteers’ belts and the siren (that also served as the noon whistle, because it was necessary to test each day), became obsolete. I am not sure what they use today in that town.

The volunteers serving on that department – all by choice – and all continuing to work their regular jobs or at businesses to pay the bills and feed their families, would drop everything when the siren wailed.

I considered that carefully this week, as we continued to evaluate how fortunate we are, and what a debt we owe, regarding firefighter’s response and effectiveness when called to serve. When everyone else is running out, they are unselfishly, and usually anonymously, running in.

Of course, this week we are lining the roads, making signs and remembering (quite correctly so,) to mark the firefighters recent efforts.

Wouldn’t it also be appropriate to also recall the locals, and on a regular basis, the efforts of people like Pineville Hot Shots Kathi Beck, Tamera Bickett, Scott Blecha, Levi Brinkley, Douglas Dunbar, Terri Hagen, Bonnie Holtby, Rob Johnson, Jon Kelso or Missoula smokejumper: Don Mackey, and McCall Smokejumpers: Roger Roth, Jim Thrash and Helitack Robert Browning, Jr., and Richard Tyler?

Or perhaps Oregon wildland firefighters: Zach Zigich, Retah Shirley, Jacob Martindale, Danial Rama, and Bart Bailey?

After all, it might be night or day, and they may have to drop what they are doing to hear our urgent ring.

Much like that faceless phone of my youth, we might forget about them for the most part, and never remember their names, or what kind of sacrifices they may have to make.

But local volunteers, paid professionals, and others who travel from across the country to help -- pick up, and answer the call anyway.

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