9/11 put business, home lives in perspective | Sep 25th 2006
by Jacqueline Dooley
vacation is over, kids are back to school and the year is growing old. As a consultant for six ad agencies, I can confidently say it’s a busy time in the advertising and marketing world.
It’s so easy to get lost in the chaos of work this time of year, but there is one day it’s impossible to focus on work. In spite of the momentum we may have been building after Labor Day, my colleagues and I slow down the very next week to reflect and remember one sunny Tuesday morning in September five years ago when the world changed forever.
Even though this is the put-your-head-down-and-work time of year for ad agencies and, thus, for me — I can’t help but push work aside on Sept. 11 to gaze at the sky and wonder why we had to suffer such a tragic loss.
There were so many stories written on or near the anniversary of Sept. 11 in the past week it was difficult to get away from it on any given day, much less not think about it at all. I’ll add to the fray by sharing my own perspective. I personally can’t ignore the impact that day has had on my business, my family and my life.
On Sept. 11, 2001, my daughter was nearly 4 months old. I worked full-time at a Web site development agency and even though I had an infant at home, it was my habit to be at my desk between 8 and 8:30 every morning.
At first, disbelief
I was probably checking my e-mail when a colleague poked her head into my office and announced a plane had just struck the World Trade Center. I remember feeling annoyed with the interruption and wondering why she was so upset. I have a very clear memory of thinking it was a one- or two-person plane, and that it would be OK in a couple of hours.
I remember the rest of the day in bits and pieces: standing in the front lobby with 20 to 30 fellow employees and watching the first tower fall on a tiny T.V., a desperate drive to get home to my baby, a surreal phone conversation with my mother who told me my father had been in Tower 2 that morning for a seminar (he was on the 26th floor and got out unharmed), hours and hours of watching the coverage on CNN and being unable to look away, calls to friends who lived or worked in the city who I couldn’t reach.
What did that day do to my work ethic? It put it into perspective for one thing. It changed everything about what I thought was critically important, including the nature of my work — advertising.
It contributed to the demise of the Web shop where I worked just outside of Kingston (which was actually a tiny division of a much larger direct marketing company). It made me cherish my children and my family more than I ever did, which ultimately inspired me to start my own business so I could build my work life around my family’s (and my own) needs - and not the other way around.
Sept. 11, 2001, was tragic in so many ways. My heart goes out to everyone who lost a loved one on that terrible day. I will stop to remember them each year. I will slow down to reflect on what’s important in life. And I will teach my children to value every moment they have with the people they love.
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This article was published by the Poughkeepsie Journal on Saturday, September 16th, 2006.