Seven years ago today I woke up in a motel room in Piqua, Ohio. I went down to the breakfats bar, like I always did when on the road, grabbed enough doughuts to cover my carbs and calories for a week, filled my coffee mug and then headed back to my room to watch CNN, as I always did. The reporter was talking about an accident where a plane had flown .into one of the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center. As he spoke, another plane veered in behind him and it too flew into the WTC. At that point I knew it was no accident.
I headed to Edison State College, to find that the campus was locked down and my lecture was canceled. I tried to call my wife, but the phone lines were either busy or down... even my cell was getting an all circuits busy signal. I headed back to the motel to check out, and began the drive home -- 4 1/2 of the most surreal hours of my life -- wondering what the hell was going on in the world. Fortunately, Neil Conan of NPR was doing yeoman's work as a news anchor, and I managed to make it home without suffering any of the gas price gouging that was rumored. Then Conan said a plane had crashed in Pennsylvania, but that there was no word on whether it was related to the planes that hit the Twin Towers or the Pentagon.
Of course, it did not take too long to find out what had happened. America had been attacked. There was much gnashing of teeth and finger pointing, but one newspaper ad in the Columbus Dispatch said it all for me, and still does. The Columbus Crew, of Major League Soccer, took out a half page ad stating, "The Greatest Victories are of the Spirit. America Remains Undefeated."
Nothing I had heard, or have heard since, says it better.