Last week, while Amber was here visiting, we decided to spend a day in New York City. We made time for a couple of things while we were there, and the 9/11 Museum and Memorial was at the top of our lists. It did not disappoint.

Take the subway to the One World Trade Center stop, and it puts you out in this fantastic white building. It looks sort of like an ice-skating rink, but it’s just a subway stop. It felt so up high and overwhelming in there, I had a short-lived panic attack getting onto the escalator. Amber was all, “Oooo, let’s get on the glass elevator!”

“No,” I staunchly refused to get onto that elevator, which isn’t like me. I was all sorts of clammed up. New York City stresses me out anyway, plus I don’t love heights. I was frantically looking all around for quick exits, but there were none. All I knew was there was no way I was getting on a glass elevator. This place made me feel like I was falling, and I have no logical explanation for it, other than to say it was just an odd panic moment.

We arrived to the museum around 4pm, but that was okay because it is open until 8pm on weeknights and 9 pm on Friday and Saturday night. We were there on Saturday evening and hardly even had to wait in line.

Also, it’s worth mentioning, since many of my readers are military, that admission is free for active duty and retired U.S. military members, Of course, several 9/11 related groups such as 9/11 rescue workers and 9/11 family members also get free admission.

If you go on Tuesday evening, after 4 pm, EVERYONE is free.

Otherwise, general adult admission is $26, and it is worth it.

No plans to ever make it to New York City? No worries. I’m going to show you most of it right here.

When you first go in, you go through metal detectors and bag checks and proceed into a large hall with stairs and some steel remains of the twin towers. You immediately pass through a dark hallway with photo displays of people’s faces reacting to the scene of 9/11 taken on that day.

Most areas of the museum allow you to take pictures, but the most emotional, personal part of the museum does not. This is the section that has photographs of every single victim of that terrible day, and it has audio recordings of people talking about the victims as well as slideshows of some of their stories.

According to this CNN article, written in November 2019, 2,753 people died at the World Trade Center site in New York City on September 11, 2001. That is remarkable considering that this sign in the photo above reports that 50,000 people worked in the towers everyday. Those rescue workers, 403 of whom were part of the numbered casualties, did an incredible job of saving lives.

Victims ranged from age 2 to 85 years.

Every single one of us has a 9/11 story. It changed America. We all know exactly where we were when we first heard the news.

If you know me personally, or have read the blog long, you know Alan served in the War on Terrorism for 3 tours of duty overseas. One thing that burned me up the most was when Alan brought home a silver lighter the souvenir stands in Iraq were selling back in 2003 to celebrate what had happened to the U.S. on September 11. The lighter had a picture of the twin towers with a picture of the airplane on the flip-lid. When you flipped the lid, the towers lit up like they were on fire. Oh, and Osama bin Laden’s photo was on the box. Seeing this display glorying over what happened on that day was infuriating.

I couldn’t help but think about things like that and memories related to 9/11 as we toured the museum. It’s amazing how much you kind of forget.

You pass by this large wall with the blue tiles and the haunting quote several times, and you don’t think too much of it, and then boom. There’s this plaque that reads:

Wow. That took us by surprise. Suddenly, you look at the wall completely differently, in a whole new light of deep respect and awe.

Our Best People

What struck me most watching the ladder truck videos and seeing the walls of photos of the victims was just how many of them were rescue workers. So many of the people in the photos had on a fireman hat or a police uniform. They didn’t take just anyone from us. No, they took some of our very best people.

At the end of the museum, you walk through the area with these timelines on the wall and the final column mentioned in the photos above. The timeline doesn’t seem like an emotional thing to gaze at. That seems safe, but by this point in the tour you’ve already faced all of your memories of the event, all the victim stories, their photographs, and the firefighter video, and this was the tipping point for me.

I looked at the timeline, which stretched on to the present day, and I thought, “Yes. Yes. It DOES stretch on to the present day.” On September 11th, 2001, it never occurred to me that I would be directly impacted by the events of that day, other than the same fears everyone else felt back then of, “What will happen next? Where will they attack us next time?”

In 2001, I didn’t realize that a year later I’d be married to an Army lieutenant who was actively training to go join the war effort, a war that was precipitated by this day in history. Standing before this 9/11 timeline, I thought of all the deployments, of the soldiers who never came back, of the day my child ran to the wrong man at the airport because it’d been 15 months since he’d seen his daddy and he didn’t know which one he was.

There was no power to hold back the tears. I stood there and cried. Amber was dealing with these same emotions, I’m sure. Her husband also served overseas in this war. She came over and put an arm around me. And yet, I didn’t leave angry. I mean, yes, I was angry for a few minutes, but that’s not the overriding lesson or feeling of all of this. It isn’t, “Get mad. Look what these people did.”

The lesson is, “Look at how each world event shapes each one of us. How are you going to respond?”

It was sad. I cried at this museum, big ugly tears of dealing with a past I try not to think about. It must be 100 billion times harder for the families who lost loved ones.

But let us not forget why the sacrifices we made. We fought so that this would never happen again, and I am ever so proud of the small part that we got to play in supporting Alan in the War on Terrorism.

They could take away our buildings and even some of our best people, but they couldn’t take away who we are, a nation of good, God-fearing people. Do you remember the way we all pulled together in those days? All those prayer circles we had? I remember standing around Denny Chimes on the University of Alabama campus praying with people, many of whom had probably rarely prayed before, some Christians, some Jews, some just searching, but we all felt the same on that day. We were uncertain as all get out, but we were a determined and united people, and we turned to God for help.

America needed that capture, and I was thankful we didn’t have to drag through any court proceedings because he was dead on the spot, how it should’ve been, if you ask me. I also thought it was fitting they put this display at the end of the museum. We didn’t defeat all of the terrorists. Is that even possible? But we caught many, and we got the mastermind behind 9/11 that day when our special forces took down Osama bin Laden.

By the time we were through with the museum, Amber would probably agree, we were both emotionally, mentally, and physically shot. Also we were hungry. It was nearing 7, so a pretzel from a street vendor would just have to do because we had a bus to catch.

It had been an urgent matter to me to see the 9/11 Memorial (as in the fountains, not just the museum) earlier that day, but by the time we finished the museum I had totally forgotten about the memorial. We walked out the doors of the museum. Amber said, “Hmm, I wonder where the memorial part is though,” and I saw it, half of it. I was in front of Amber, and it was so close I almost could’ve tripped right into it. There was a ginormous water fountain with reflection pool, in a perfect square. The names of the victims are engraved around the fountain.

We gazed into the first fountain for a few minutes before realizing that actually there are two, one for each tower. They give the impression of two giant square holes, standing where the towers once stood. They aren’t as large as the towers, but they are in the exact locations.

I don’t know why staring into water is soothing, but this was yet another awe-inspiring reminder of that day, and it felt like a perfect way to close out our tour. It is all definitely worth visiting when you are in New York City.

I hope this answered many of your questions about the museum and memorial. A list below provides my sources of information for this article, in addition to the tour itself. You can click on those links to learn more.

September 11 Fast Facts, CNN.com, November 13, 2019, CNN editorial research

Memorial Pools Will Not Quite Fill Twin Footprints, NYTimes.com, December, 2005, David Dunlap

One World Trade Center, en.wikipedia.org

911 Memorial and Mususem, 911memorial.org

The post What to Expect at the 9/11 Museum and Memorial appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

Amber and I were so excited to take time out of mom life and go exploring together. We knew what a treat this was!! Meanwhile, we both heard the same comments when our family members heard that we were going to go to New York City together, just the two of us.

“You and Amber are going to New York…….by yourselves?”

“You and April are going to go to New York…by yourselves??

This was always spoken with a questioning tone and probably raised eyebrows.

Amber and I laughed about it. We acknowledged up front that it isn’t perfect. Right. We have no sense of direction. When you add our direction senses up together we are combined a 4 on a scale of 1 to 10, with Amber maybe being a little better off than I am.

But do we know the city?

No. Amber had never even been.

But do we have a stellar plan, complete with subway maps or an Uber app?

Also no. Neither of us have those apps.

What DID we have?

Well, we had optimism, bus tickets, and money. Yes, we obviously have just what we needed for a day in New York City.

Bus tickets. I feel like all great stories begin with the sentence, “we decided to take the bus.” I’m sitting here laughing at my own joke, but the bus TO NYC was probably our best decision of the day. It was getting to the bus that proved to be tricky, and don’t even get us started on the impossibility of catching the TopView tour bus once inside the city.

Let me tell you the story of our day in the Big Apple.

At 8 am, once we’d had our coffee and gotten ready, I realized my driver’s license wasn’t in the little driver’s license slot of my wallet. Then I remembered putting it in my coat pocket the day before, when Amber and I were touring D.C. Also I recalled that things kept falling out of said pocket. Before I even wasted the time hunting around sheepishly, I knew exactly where my license was. It was on the streets of D.C. somewhere, maybe even buried under dead leaves or in a trash can.

I no longer had a driver’s license. Now this isn’t so big of a deal if you live in the state where you are licensed to drive, but of course with this lovely complicated military spouse life I lead, that is not the case. I had a Georgia driver’s license. Getting a new one would be tricky.

Alan did his best to convince us that Amber should drive to the bus station, which is a solid 20-30 minutes away. You could tell he was nervous about this. He packed my extra shoe cushions in my bag (which I was extremely thankful for), checked up on us throughout the day, and stuck all sorts of extra things in my bag.

We took a photo of Amber driving, but I didn’t want to make Amber drive, so we pulled over before leaving the neighborhood and switched drivers. Don’t worry. I drove super slowly. We almost missed the bus I drove so slowly. In fact, I missed a turn, as usual, and we were the last 2 to board the bus. Go figure.

You’ll all be happy to know that I am now officially a licensed Maryland driver. My new license came in the mail Thursday.

We were the very last people on the bus, which meant we couldn’t sit together. The bus ride is over 3 hours long, and Alan had made sure we’d brought phone chargers with us. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the actual plugs, and these seats required electrical plugs not USB ports, so we had to be sparing of our battery usage. Altogether, it wasn’t a bad ride though. Amber sat right in front of me.

We arrived in Manhattan around 12, starving, so we quickly found a Five Guys and ate there.

There really was no trouble until we couldn’t figure out where our Top View bus pick-up was. We purchased tickets for one of those double-decker hop-on-hop-off type tour buses in advance. I’ve always wanted to do one of those in New York City.

It took us probably 20 minutes to find the bus stop, but it felt longer because we were in an uninteresting section of the city called the Garment District. We passed 5 fur stores in a row.

People were friendly to us all day though. I gotta say, after having done a trip with Alan and a trip without him, people, and I don’t mean men, I mean all people in general, are nicer to women traveling without men than to a family traveling with an intimidating looking man like Alan. Alan’s really tall and has a serious face. I guess when it’s only Amber and me we just seem more approachable.

We finally found the bus stop we were looking for, but I was still learning to use the Top View app, so I didn’t know what time it would arrive. We stopped in a pizza restaurant to use the ladies’ room, and that’s when I saw on the app that the bus was arriving in only 2 minutes. Panic!! We RAN from the pizza place to the bus stop, only to watch the bus pull away and not wait for us at all.

Disappointment and despair. There we were, basically lost, and the next bus wouldn’t be around for another 20 minutes.

At that point, we decided to switch plans. We walked to the nearest subway station, and rode it to the Staten Island Ferry stop. The subway was very easy to use, if you know what stop you are going to, and thankfully the Staten Island one is obvious because it’s the end of the line. It’s hard to mess that up, so that was our saving grace.

Ticket salesmen for other tours harassed me from the moment I stepped off the subway until we were safely in the ferry station doors. No one said a word to Amber. For a self-proclaimed “small-town girl,” she is far better at not making eye-contact with people than I am. I absolutely must work on my walking straight forward technique.

The Staten Island Ferry was even easier to get onto than the subway. It’s a free ride. You just walk in the building, wait for the next boat, walk on, and pick a seat. It drives right past the Statue of Liberty, so you take your photos, get off on Staten Island, wait for the next boat and head back over.

People hog the windows, so we learned that positioning yourself well is very important. After missing out on the best windows on the way out, we glued our feet to the best spot we could get on the way back and refused to move until we’d gotten all the photos we needed.

After the ferry, we were hoping to still catch one of those Top View buses we’d already paid for.

The app simply would never update us on when the bus would be arriving. We waited for quite a while, grew impatient with it, plus it was freezing, and headed back down to the subway. After all, the other thing Amber had on her short list of must-sees was the World Trade Center museum and memorial, and it was close by. It’s close by enough to walk to if you’re good at making correct turns, but we decided the subway would be a safer bet for us.

Subway Problems

There’s always some kind of problem. Always. Amber slid her card, and it didn’t let her through, but it took her money. She slid it again. Double charged her and still the door didn’t open. Grrrr! So now Amber’s stuck on the other side, having double paid, and I’m already through. Thankfully, a hip looking twenty-something girl had stopped to ask me directions.

Pause a minute. haha! She asked ME for directions. Too funny. I couldn’t help her, but she did reach over and open some kind of emergency door off to the side, so Amber walked through onto the platform without losing even more money. We thanked her, wished her luck, and moved on. New York City is a tough city to navigate.

We proudly managed to get on the right train and found our stop easily.

One World Trade Center

Time was beginning to run short, but the museum and memorial were important to us, so this was our last real stop.

First, we found this beautiful subway stop. Look at this place.

We even hit a little GOOD luck at the 9/11 museum. Lines for the museum can be long, but we arrived only a couple hours before closing, so lines were almost nonexistent. Tickets are around $26/person, but it was worth it.

The 9/11 museum and memorial did NOT disappoint.

The 9/11 museum is every bit as emotional as you’d expect it to be. We teared up a few times, and the more you stop and take it in, the more it gets to you.

This museum was so powerful. They have a photo wall, where you aren’t allowed to take pictures, of every single 9/11 victim who died. I was struck by how many faces were firemen and police officers. Not only did people die from these acts of terrorism, but we lost some of our best people.

As I looked at the images around us, I thought of how many of us sent our loved ones to war as a result of this day. How many of our brightest men and women never returned. I thought of the souvenirs my husband found (when he was in Iraq the first time, in 2003) of goods celebrating 9/11. Yes, they were selling cigarette lighters that lit up the towers when you’d open it and had Bin Ladin’s picture on them. The U.S. was in mourning. They were laughing and selling souvenirs. It’s beyond maddening.

I’m going to tell you much more about the 9/11 Memorial and Museum in a future post. Between Amber and me, we took a billion more photos of the museum.

After we exited the 9/11 museum, there was the memorial. The memorial is two giant square fountains where the towers once stood and with all the names of the victims on the fountains. It’s a beautiful tribute.

We left with a sense of satisfaction and urgency. What was important, we had seen, and now we were hungry and not wanting to get left by our bus back to Baltimore.

We got onto the train platform without drama, but then I panicked. Nowhere had it said which subway stop to use to catch the bus on 38th Street. Or was it 42nd? I’ve already forgotten. Amber and I froze, staring at the open doors to a train, not knowing whether or not to go in.

And that’s when we met her. Our NYC guardian angel, complete with nose ring and puffer jacket. She jammed herself between the doors and held them back with her arms, making me feel downright silly about that time I thought I was dying because I got stuck in the subway doors. Haaaa!

“Where are you going?” she demanded.

“Oh! Uh..uptown..”

“Yes. Get on this one! This is the one. Get on.”

“Yes! Thank you!” Amber and I shuffle ran onto the train.

We thanked her profusely, and then she asked us where we were going specifically and told us exactly what stop to get off. I honestly do not think we would have made it to our bus on time if she had not helped us. We barely made it as it was.

I run into these kind of people who help me all the time! You will never convince me they are coincidences. God watches over us and nudges people and helps where he deems necessary. I’m one of those people that require constant intervention too. If there’s an angel assigned to me, he’s a busy one!

Once again, Amber and I didn’t get to sit together, but we were right across the aisle, so we were almost sitting together. It was 11 or 12 by the time we made it home that night. Everyone was asleep. My own dog barked and howled up a storm at us for coming in so late. I love what a good guard dog she is.

All in all, New York City turned out to be a fairly stressful adventure. Amber and I might would rather see a waterfall or a state park next time, or maybe that’s just me. I wouldn’t trade those days of getting to hang out with my cousin for anything, though.

We joked all day long about what our mothers and grandmother would say if they could see us now, traveling through New York City on our own. Oh, how they’d laugh. We were both so thankful we got to do this, craziness and all.

Our only advice: Don’t bother with TopView Tour buses.

The post Girls Trip New York City with Amber and April appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

In the Empire State Building

While Alan was at OBC (military training) in Oklahoma, and I was finishing my degree at Alabama, Alan had this spontaneous idea to meet for the weekend in New York City!!

New York City!!

Y’all. To fully understand why this was such a big deal, I should explain that I was not accustomed to this sort of thing. We did not take annual vacations or move from state to state. I lived in Alabama my entire life.

But for as long as I can remember, I have always been a dreamer and a wanderer.

If you look hard enough, you can spot the Statue of Liberty to the left of my head.

I love excitement.

Alan brought a degree of excitement that I had always yearned for. I couldn’t help it. My Aunt Ann, who I adore, used to joke that as a baby my first word was “Go!”

Traveling and seeing new places, sleeping in hotel rooms, and just roaming in general is something I love.

I do not love trying to relax in a hotel room while my 10-year-old and 11 year-old laugh and joke in the bed beside me, interrupting my every thought……but this was years before I had to deal with that. (Those are today’s problems…)

Me in Times Square

My first flight alone

We used the free ticket we saved from when we missed the ball, so we only had to buy one plane ticket. Then we went online and found the very cheapest room in Manhattan that had a private bathroom. (Yes, you can get hotel rooms in NYC that are community bathroom situations….no thank you.)

I was a tiny, timid, clueless, but giddy 21-year-old newlywed college senior. I had only flown twice before, and both times had been since I married Alan.

You wouldn’t believe how nervous I was about flying, by myself, into the biggest city in America to meet my husband inside an airport, take a bus to the subway in Queen’s, and then ride the rails to Manhattan to find our hotel on foot.

Sure, we’d been to a foreign country together, but somehow this seemed scarier. New York City? Queens? Isn’t this a place where people get mugged and there are gangs and people on drugs?

So yeah, I was all full of anxiety, but it wasn’t all bad. It was a happy nervous.

The hardest part was finding Hotel Pennsylvania on foot. You see, this was before iPhones and GPS. Back then, it was just us and some maps and kind strangers giving us directions.

I’ll never forget my first subway ride.

We boarded the train. I’d seen my share of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movies as a kid, so I approached the whole subway thing with great fear and trepidation, let me tell you.

Graffiti was everywhere. Just like in the movies. Thankfully, there were no foot soldiers working for Shredder out that day.

Alan was a little nervous too, though he may never admit it. I know he was because he said stuff like, “Turn your ring around. Keep your purse zipped up.”

I have a happy-go-lucky demeanor, and I think people worry about me sometimes.

Sure enough, the subway train was packed, and this man was walking down the aisles preaching about the Kingdom of Heaven. At first I just thought that was interesting, but then I realized he was doing that to get money from people because after he preached he went down the aisles collecting cash.

Now there was a head scratcher. I’ve been on many trains since then. That’s the only time I’ve ever seen someone pull of a stunt like that one.

Ground Zero Oct. 2002, a year after 9/11.

Saving Money in New York City

You are probably picturing Alan and me as poor college students. How could we afford this? Well, we were not poor college students. I was in school, but I had scholarships, and Alan had already graduated, and had an excellent job.

Lieutenant pay may not be much, but for two young twenty-somethings with no kids, it was everything we needed and then some.

While we were well provided for, we were still smart and careful with our money, but Manhattan was shockingly expensive. Alan to this day tells the story of paying $25 for a small pizza from Pizza Hut, and when he tells it, it was more like $40.

Broadway plays that last-minute were $200/ticket, so that was out.

I think that’s my only regret from that trip. I still want to see a Broadway show.

We did a lot of going TO places without actually paying any money and going into anything.

Statue of Liberty?

It had a long line and a fare to ride the ferry, so we squinted at it from the shore.

Empire State Building?

We were afraid it cost money to go up to the top, so we just walked inside the lobby, looked around the gift shop, and left.

Bloomingdale’s?

We walked around in it for a minute and then moved on.

Tour Bus?

No, thanks. We took the subway the entire trip, and we did a TON of walking.

Refills? What!?

I still remember our surprise when we realized that the restaurant was charging Alan for each of his Dr. Pepper refills. Ha! I’m pretty sure he drank water the rest of the weekend.

……..Overzealous frugality aside, I love that we took that trip.

I still remember so much of that weekend vividly. We argued some, especially over the Empire State building thing. One of us thought we were being overly cheap. We were!!!

But how often do you get to spend a weekend in New York City just wandering around?? I loved seeing Times Square and the UN and Trump Tower, in person. Yes, it was famous even 15 years ago.

We did buy souvenirs.

At the UN, we bought a blue tea set from Romania, which still resides in my china cabinet.

And from street vendors, as in the kind who whip their goods out of a black garbage bag, I bought a fake Kate Spade purse and a drawing of the city.

The purse broke the first time I tried to use it, and I have never made another black market purchase.

I don’t remember saying good-bye to Alan and parting ways again, though somehow we did.

I only remember the sights and sounds of this huge city, unlike anything I had ever seen before. Alan carried me on his back when my feet got too tired from the walking. I can tell you how the icy wind blasts between the skyscrapers.

We remember how friendly New Yorkers were to us. One couple on the train even told us to follow them when we got off to show me Bloomingdale’s.

I was also surprised that there were “newsstands” everywhere. They’re like mini-gas stations, only with no gas and tons of periodicals.

We saw Ground Zero, which was literally a giant hole in the fall of 2002.

Just thinking about that trip brings a smile to my face a mile wide because even with all the stress and anxiety and nervousness, it was an adventure, and we loved it.

Or at least I loved it. I hope Alan did too.

With Alan I felt safe there, and the future looked fun and close. Before long, we really would be together like a normal married couple, and we would experience things like this together.

Being a military wife was awesome, everything I’d ever wanted. How I couldn’t wait to get on with it already!

*****Come back each Monday for  the next story!*****

The post Real Army Wives Series: New York City appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.