Look out I’m on my soap box again.
Well I had another post in mind, but then it all came flooding back. What does this have to do with horses? I’ll get to that.
I was just bringing Bob’s horse into the barn to ride when I got a call from my neighbor, who was also born in Brooklyn. He told me that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. We both figured it was a small plane that would have been landing at the small executive airport near the Ferry at the tip of Manhattan. I used to work right there on the sixteenth floor and often saw sea planes go past the window.
I turned the horse back out and went in to check out the TV. I had just come out to ride and had been watching the news before I did, and nothing was going on. At that point the second plane came in and hit the other tower. The realization hit that we were under attack. They just attacked my home. I grew up in Brooklyn, Staten Island, and New Jersey, Manhattan was my backyard. They attacked my home!!! I ran out to tell Bob who was mowing, as Bob always does. Bob was born in Brooklyn and grew up in Staten Island, worked there all his life. We ran back into the house and watched as the events unfolded. What gets me still is that Bob said to me those towers are going to come down. I said no, they must have safety measures to protect in a situation like this. He, being in demolition for years said, Jet fuel burns so hot that the steel will melt, those towers are coming down. He was right. The whole world was in shock, all except Bob. I sat there and tried to think of who I knew that was working in the WTC. Several came to mind and I put out calls. The WTC was just a few blocks from where I used to work, but I remember them starting to clear the land for them when I stopped working in N.Y. I found out that everyone I knew there was either at a different office that day, or had gotten out.
Bob said to me yesterday “Enough, let them leave 9/11 alone.” I yelled No!, we can’t leave it alone. Yes it still hurts, but we must never forget what happened that day. We must remember that these wacko people are still out there and it will happen again. People are trying to say that the Holocaust never happened. Really? Then where do we get all these horrific pictures from? Why do I know people whose families died there? Why do I know people whose arms were tattooed with their numbers on them. People, now-a-days want to rewrite history leaving out all the bad things that they don’t want to remember, or refuse to believe, but these things happened, and will happen again if we don’t remember and do something about them.
So what does this have to do with horses? Simply that Budweiser put out a Tribute, a few months later, at the Super Bowl that horse people will never forget. The infamous Clydesdales coming across the Brooklyn Bridge and stopping at the foot of the bridge with the New York Skyline in the background. The Skyline where the WTC should have been, and was no longer, then all the horses bowed down. I still cry when I think of that commercial. They didn’t run it again. They didn’t want to make money off what they did, but they did want to honor those lost. If you get a chance go on line and watch it either for the first time, or again. Spoiler alert! bring tissues.
I know exactly where those horses stopped in Brooklyn. I remember that spot from my childhood. I think they now have made a park out of that area. The Clydesdales are so much apart of my life. I miss my two girls very much. That commercial honors my home, the people who died, and the horses I love and miss.
Never forget.
