Spring 2023 Contest — Finalist
First Moments Etched on My Heart
September 11, 2001
Published in
5 min readMay 23, 2023
The telephone rang a few minutes before nine that morning as I was in the kitchen pouring a cup of coffee for myself.
“Hi, Ma. First, I want you to know I talked with Dom. He’s ok,” my older son Joe started. “Did you put the television on yet? A plane hit the World Trade Center. I called Dom right away on his cell and he was still on a bus that hadn’t gone into the tunnel yet when it happened. He missed his regular bus and was late for work. His cell phone cut off, but they must have been going into the tunnel then. So he probably won’t be able to call you for a little while. I just wanted you to know that he’s ok and wasn’t walking between the towers like he should have been when the plane hit. He’s ok.”
