By Cris Italia
Going to sleep was out of the question, I had jitters moving up my spine in anticipation. My return to Ground Zero was something I was both dreading and putting off to the last possible moment. Witnessing the second plane explode into the South tower of the WTC, from Broadway and Cortland Street was traumatic. It was a scene and a day etched in my mind forever. What followed, has been like a nightmare I never woke up from.
Roger and Rose Marti needed all the support they could on this day. It's been a year and it seems like they lost their son Michael just yesterday. We boarded the "M" train in Queens, "Metropolitan M train bound for Fulton Street," the conductor said before leaving the first stop. We were nine all together. Mike's parents, his cousin Mario, Uncle George, best friend Shane, girlfriend Elena, her friend Kathryn and his childhood neighbor Tim. It felt like an entourage, just like it would be on a night out with him.
As the city approached us the train car filled, usually New Yorkers would stare right at you on a train, sometimes looking for eye contact, but today there was none, we stood out from the rest; people knew who we were as soon as they boarded. I never heard a train car so quiet.
It's about 8:30 when we arrive at the platform on Fulton Street, and at the same time firefighters were coming off the same train. Our entourage met theirs and the moment was overwhelming. As they walked with us I felt their pain for a brief moment. "I just want you to know, that it's a great honor just walking with you guys to the site," I said to one firefighter.
"We're just regular guys, the honor in all this, has been doing it in New York, doing this for all the people," he said. Amazing, how just one firefighter's words can be picked so finely, as if he had planned to say that someone all day.
Reaching Cortland Street, my emotions immediately began to take over. I began to pant, bracing for the moment I would take my first steps back. Since leaving the rubble after working there for three consecutive days, I had never gone back, never looked at a picture, never wanted to. The winds were blowing hard, the dust looming over the grounds brought back the haunting reminders of smoke coming off the smoldering remains of the WTC. The empty hollowed grounds were now in full picture.
Mike's mom began to break down but continued on a path everyone seemed to be following. "This is where my Michael is," she said.
We stood around Mr. and Mrs. Marti like the secret service would stand around the president and his wife.
And finally we reached the stage where Michael's name would be heard throughout the world along with thousands of others who perished. And so the names began to be read off. Of those I knew, Firefighter Joe Hunter, Firefighter John Giordiano, Firefighter Adam Rand, Lt. John Moran, Volunteer EMT Richard Pearlman, Jennifer Mazzotta, Dominque Pandolfo, Sean Powell, and Michael Marti. With each name a new tear.
After Mike's name was called we began our descent into Ground Zero. The ramp felt as if it was never going to end. With each step down I remembered each step up on the rubble. The bucket brigade, firefighters and rescue workers crying, horror in the faces of those fleeing downtown and remains of so many I was exposed to.
It was like yesterday; I closed my eyes and envisioned where the piles were, where I fell of exhaustion, where I walked away, and my final glance. So much had led to this moment, so much fear and sadness. There wasn't one dry eye among us.
Mrs. Marti had embraced the mother of another victim. Mr. Marti wanted to do what he came here to do. Place his flower, say a prayer, and remember his son for what he was, not where he might be. Finally the names had ended.
"DETAILS," bellowed a FDNY captain. All uniformed officers, firefighters, police officers, Port Authority officers, EMS workers, Marines, National Guard, Army, and Navy surrounded us. Saluted us. And the play of TAPS began. I looked up once only to catch a tear streaming down a round, robust face that belong to a firefighter. "They felt pain too," I thought to myself, "If not for themselves then for us."
I knelt down and picked up a rock. I remember the last time I was here I was reluctant to take anything. I didn't want to remember this. I didn't want a piece of this with me, but it was impossible to forget, impossible not to have it with you. I remember a firefighter saying he hated this place: "People think this is a place we come to just to be close, and that we feel proud to be here, but I hate this place. I really hate this place."
Everything seemed so similar. The dusty air. The blue sky. I didn't feel the fatigue of standing for hours, my vision was cloudy, but this time it wasn't because of the smog in front of me, just welled up tears still waiting to fall.
I hugged Mrs. Marti, Elena, and Mr. Marti. A year ago this was all surreal and now it was about the most real I've felt throughout this past year. It all became a reality to me. Seeing this place and what it's become, watching the families all together. I had never experienced anything like this. "This really means he's gone," Mario said. "I just kept hoping he was going to come through that door."
When Mike would play basketball and usually hog every shot, there was this saying he had every time he chucked one up. "I see the promised land, and it's goooood," he would say in a high-pitched voice. It was like he knew, and he would never miss a shot when he said it. He didn't miss this time either.
Rest in peace, my friend.
