25 Years Later, Remembering 9/11

That Tuesday morning, I began my day as I normally did during the third year of my career. At that time, I was affiliated to American Express Financial Advisors, a firm that was eventually spun of from AMEX - maybe they needed to focus on building Centurion Lounges? In any case, as a young man who basically started his career near the top of the dot com bubble, my focus was to continue to be there for my few existing clients and to hopefully get introduced to new clients so that I could finally stop the dreaded cold calling routine which brought me into the office early every day and forced me to stay late as well. It’s not like I had a choice; cold calling doesn’t work if people aren’t there to answer the phone!

Someone walked around the office that morning announcing that a plane had crashed into one of the World Trade Center buildings. I remember thinking it was probably some loss of cabin pressure in someone’s Cessna. I thought that because a couple of years earlier, a golfer named Payne Stewart and others perished in a small plane crash due to loss of cabin pressure. I don’t know why, but that’s where my mind went.

After hanging up with someone during the morning cold calling session I figured I’d grab some coffee and go to the TV in the training room to check out the news. Incredibly, the live video I was watching captured the second plane as it penetrated the South Tower. The fireball engulfed several floors. It was not a private plane. This was no accident.

These two marvels of engineering, symbols of capitalism and American triumph that reached into the clouds became clouds of dust. I stood there in disbelief as did most people who watched this live, simply paralyzed.

As is often the case, out of tragedy came something beautiful. Americans united in a way I had not seen before or since. We weren’t in the red camp or the blue, we put aside petty differences, and we united against a common enemy - indifference. Yes, terrorism is the act that Osama Bin Laden planned and his murderous crew executed. After the attack on Pearl Harbor there was a quote attributed to Japanese Admiral Yamamoto that I will summarize, “I fear all we have done is awaken a sleeping giant….” That is what Bin Laden accomplished. The wars that were born out of this tragic event remain controversial to this day, but the love, mutual respect and friendship that resulted was awe inspiring.

Since 9/11, we have had plenty of crises and controversy, and over time many have returned to their blue or red camp for direction. My hope is that we can somehow unite again because we have important topics to discuss. In my opinion, two key ones are the impact of AI and robotics that are already playing major roles today and the ballooning debt. Of course there are others, but I have limited page space before I lose you. So let finish by saying that I hope we remember how we came together after 9/11.