Obligatory 9/11 Post

I was in the orchestra room in high school, which happened to be above the auto mechanic shop in the vocational building. The In-School-Suspension room was next door to us as perhaps additional punishment. And definitely more for them than us. That one hour when our Strings class was in session playing away on our poorly tuned, gently used violins, violas, cellos, and basses was probably the low point of the day for the "bad kids" on the other side of the wall. Our low point was dragging out instruments through the motor oil scented garage downstairs and up to the tiny room we'd been assigned for the year. 

Still, we were sitting at our stands, instruments at the ready, when a note from the office came. Mr. Hawthorne, our orchestra teacher took it and shook his head in confusion. 

"What is it?" We wanted to know. We had been working on an arrangement of Dvorak's Symphony Number 9. The piece has since become one of my favorites. 

"It's a note from the office that says a jumbo jet has just crashed into the World Trade Center?" And he shook his head again and put the paper down. 

Jumbo jet? If they had said plane, it might not have seemed like a joke. But I remember kind of raising my eyebrows and dismissing the issue. We picked back up where we left off in the sheet music. 

I suppose now that in my mind's eye I saw an empty plane accidentally crashing into an empty building. The word "crash" itself to me implied an accident. Cars didn't "crash" intentionally. It all seemed so ludicrous. 

It was our next class in the main building of the school that made me realize the severity of the issue. Televisions were on everywhere. People were crying. And I realized that we in the orchestra room had been the only ones still working after we got that letter. 

But "Jumbo Jet?" It was only one letter off from Dumbo Jet. And besides, there was no way for us to know any better because of our location!

I later found out that we had been moved above the auto mechanic shop because the new principal, to whom we used to 'Heil Hitler' when she turned her back, had asked Mr. Hawthorne to move Orchestra into the band room. He had refused, and the motor oil reeking vocational room was the principal's revenge.