2996 Project:

In honor and memory of Bernard Pietronico
World Trade Center, 9/11/01

How do you pay appropriate tribute to the life of a man you've never met?

How do you remember someone that you were denied the privelege of ever knowing? I'm not sure you can, but I'm going to give it my best attempt.

I take the responsibility of being a part of the 2996 project very seriously, and so these are questions that I have been asking myself over and over.

I remember precisely where I was on the morning of September 11, 2001. I remember where I was standing, what I was thinking as I first saw the live footage of the second plane flying into the World Trade Center, right before my eyes.

That morning, I had been awakened by the lilting voice of my very energetic five year old. I turned the TV onto PBS for her, flipped the power switch over on the computer and headed into the kitchen for my first cup of coffee.

Email downloaded while I poured the milk into the cup, and when I saw an email with a question mark as the subject line from my husband pop up before I even sat down, I opened it right up.

"Turn on the TV, will you? Something is going on with the World Trade Center. Something about a small plane hitting it."

I took the remote from my child and apologized to her, changing the channel to see the news. Just as the picture came into focus, I saw a sight I will never forget.

It was United Airlines flight 175 crashing into the South Tower.

I stood in front of the television with my mouth hanging open, unable to believe what I had just seen, and all I remember is that my daughter began tugging my sleeve and asking, "Mommy, where did the airplane go?"

If I can remember with such haunting clarity what that morning was like, as it was being seen hundreds of miles from New York from my living room, how clear must the memories be for the families of those who perished that horrible day?

I cried for them, for the wives, the children, the parents. Yet I knew that no matter what sadness I felt myself that I could not begin to fathom the losses that they had suffered, and my own sadness was overshadowed with respect and awe that they were surviving it.

I remember being especially troubled by the news that more than six hundred employees at one firm, Cantor Fitzgerald, were killed when Tower One collapsed. As I read about the people who had perished there, I was horrified at seeing how many of them were so much like...could have been... like my own husband.

All they wanted to do that day was go to work and provide for their children. They were responsible, upstanding people.

It wasn't right and it wasn't fair. That feeling has stayed with me. It will never be right, and it will never be fair. For five years, when I have thought of the Trade Center, I have thought of Cantor Fitzgerald.

Here, five years later, I signed up for Project 2996, and I was given the name of the person I am to remember today. Then I see the face and name of Bernard Pietronico; a corporate bonds trader for Cantor Fitzgerald.

I look at his picture and read the words that people said about him and I am angry. I am livid, I am outraged that I was robbed of any opportunity I might have had that somewhere, at some point, in this big wide world, I might have gotten to meet him.

I am overwhelmed, thinking about his family, his friends, his town. All the people who had someone very precious stolen from them in an instant, and for what? For intolerance; for radicalism, for the inability of mankind to get along and realize that we are all mothers, fathers, sons and daughters.

We all have the right to live.

I can tell you from the articles that I've read that Mr. Pietronico was from Matawan, New Jersey. That he loved to play basketball. That when he was a kid, he always picked his younger brother Michael to be on his team.

I can quote to you from the New York Times, which wrote of him:

"On weekdays, Bernard Pietronico, who was 37, was a corporate bond trader at Cantor Fitzgerald. The rest of the time he was a husband, a son, a father, a coach in his Roman Catholic parish's youth-basketball league. And a brother, to two sisters and to Michael, who still proudly remembers his schoolyard nickname: "Little Bernard."

"Little Bernard", you see, was six feet five. He sounds like exactly the kind of guy you would hope would coach your child's little league team, or be on the neighborhood youth activity committee or something. He appears, from all I have been able to read, like he was such a good man.

I can't tell you that from personal experience, you see, because I will only ever know Bernard Pietronico by what others can tell me about him, but I can tell you this.

Bernard Pietronico had a wife, and children, and a mother and brother and sisters and scores of friends who loved him, and that speaks volumes about the man that he was. He was very much loved.

I hope that knowing that people have not forgotten that day, have not forgotten him, or them, may mean something to the people who loved him, no matter how little.

I wish I could tell his family and friends that remembering September 11th is not a big thing in my house only because the date is coming around again, and especially not just because this date marks five years since it happened.

We honestly, truly, do remember, every single day in our family, what happened.

We talk about it, it always comes up in some way, one way or another, in our home every day.

Maybe some have forgotten what the impact was, or maybe those who were too young at the time like my child was then to really understand what was going on that day are just now getting an idea of how dark that day truly was.

As long as I have a voice, and as long as I can give any honor or dignity to those who were stolen from this country on that day by speaking, I will speak.

There needs to be permanent memorial, no one should ever, ever forget.

Bernard, I wish I'd known you. Even though I didn't get to meet you, I won't forget you. The world is a darker place without your light shining in it.

To read more tributes in the 2996 Project, please click this link. Thank you.

Justice has put together a blog linking 2996 tributes up so far for those who were in the Cantor Fitzgerald family. The page is just beautiful, please click here to visit.

~R.C.

Note: The 2996 site has been swamped and has crashed its server. They are in the process of getting a new domain up. In the meantime, you can check the comments on this post to see more participating 2996 blogs, or I recommend that you google "2996". Thanks.

A Personal Note added on 9/11: There is a lot of talk going around now about "Right/Left now and trying to say that this project is political. When I signed up, I saw nothing, nor do I see anything now, about politics on DC Roe's website. Most of the blogs I have seen have not made this about politics.

I just hope and pray that for one day, for one mission, at least, we can leave right or left out of this. It has nothing to do with that.

It is about the people lost that day. About honoring and remembering them. Lets keep our focus where it should be, please. Please.