Tuesday, September 11, 2001, was a beautiful clear, crisp morning in New York City.
The summer’s heat had dissipated, replaced by fresh and invigorating breezes from the north. The character of daylight had changed, too, as it always does after Labor Day. Gone were the sweltering chords of sunlight at some Godforsaken hour. Sol’s light had already become softer, later in the morning, and more diffuse. The canyons of Manhattan transformed that reduced lighting to shades of blue and grey between brick, glass, and steel.
Everyone was back from summer vacation. The streets bustled again with the kind of frenetic activity you remembered from before the summer.
Part of that hustle was getting kids back to school, like every September.
The Bernard Olcott Story 