I’ll be the first to admit that I’m kind of a nerd when it comes to vacations. Maybe it’s because I miss the point, which is what? To vacate your life? But what if you like your life and it’s not something you want to completely vacate? Well then you do the exact same thing you always do anyway (which in my case is watch sports). Thus, the basis and the appeal for my trip to the Big Apple late last week.

However, even though the Royals’ four games against the Yankees took me there initially, I can’t say that that will be the part of my trip that I will remember forever. In fact, I can guarantee that I’ll forget all of the final scores within the next few days. I’ll soon forget everything I learned about the subway system. And many of the details surrounding my first Broadway play as well. So what will stick with me no matter how far removed I get from my first trip to New York City in 10 years? The eerie feeling I got standing across the street from the hole where two very tall buildings once were.

I’ve wanted to visit Ground Zero for years now, but getting the opportunity to do so was much more emotional than I had expected. I guess that has something to do with the fact that I didn’t really plan on taking the guided tour. I didn’t plan on hearing the stories of some of the survivors. I didn’t plan on hearing the stories of those who died in the Towers that day. I didn’t plan on being changed forever. Looking at a construction site isn’t supposed to do that to you…right up until the time your plans are changed for you.

I was sitting by myself in one of the World Financial Buildings that provides a good view of all of the work being done when a tour guide walked up with a group and apologized if her talking would bother me. I wasn’t bothered at all…quite the contrary actually as I felt myself leaning in to hear what historical perspective she would provide as a native of New York City. As it turns out, she not only lives there, but she worked on the 17th floor of Tower 1. She could tell the tale of that day in greater detail than anything I saw on the news…even if it meant reliving her life’s greatest horror week in and week out.

She went to work on that Tuesday beneath the brightest blue skies she’d ever seen, taking the short trip up to her office that she’d grown to resent. She had no view at all from the 17th floor and always envied her friend, a VP of human resources, who could see everything New York had to offer from his 90th floor window in Tower 2. If only she could have that office, she’d have it made. If only she had that office, she wouldn’t be embarrassed to tell people where she worked.

That all changed the minute she heard a rumble so loud that it shook the building she was working in. At first, she said she thought it was some of the construction work that had been going on a floor above her. After announcements were made that everything was OK and that everyone should go back to their desks, she saw the debris falling outside the windows nearby and decided to evacuate. At that point all fire drill evacuation plans went out the window. She also didn’t know that she was about to see a similar tragedy take place.

She went across the street underneath a slight overhang where she started to hear thunderous noises all around her. At first she thought it was just the sound of chaos. At least that was the case until she realized it was the sound of the people who had jumped to their death from above Tower 1’s 80th floor.

The ground started to rumble beneath her. Her first guess for this was the subway train that ran along the line below her. Instead, it was the force caused by the second plane that crashed into Tower 2 as she stood watching. It was then, amid fear and the realization that this was no accident that she began running… past friends and co-workers…all the way across the Brooklyn Bridge to a bus that would take her out of harm’s way (wherever that ended)…all the way to her house where she crawled under her bed and began shaking and having panic attacks…a side-effect of excess adrenaline that wouldn’t subside for two years.

She said it took about as long in therapy to also realize that she NEEDED to give these tours as another way to heal personally from the damage that had been done. She also needed to tell the stories of some of those who didn’t make it. Her friend, Ed, was the one she shared with us the most.

Ed was the friend who had had the office on the 90th floor of Tower 2. The office she envied. The view she didn’t have 73 floors lower. Ed began evacuating his crew as soon as the plane hit the first building. At that point, he had no way of knowing that his building was in for a similar fate, but he worked without hesitation anyway. He got the people in his department to the 78th floor, the first floor beneath him that had an elevator that could express people down to the ground floor in about 30 seconds. Ed refused to get on the elevator himself until all 500 people had been evacuated. The final group to make it to the ground safely stepped off the elevator 12 seconds before the second plane hit. 450 people were still stuck on the 78th floor…the floor that a wing of Plane #2 leveled. 14 of those people survived. Ed was not one of them.

It took my tour guide a long time to realize what angered her the most about what had happened in those very confusing moments on September 11, 2001. She thought she was mad at Ed for not opting for his elevator rescue. What she (and her therapist) finally came to much later was that she was really mad at herself. Her first instinct was to run while Ed’s was to save the lives of others.

Why did she tell us this story? And the stories of the 800 first responders who have since lost their battles to rare cancers because of the toxic rubble they breathed in that day before their oxygen masks were issued? And the stories of the firefighters and police officers that never lived long enough to develop an illness because they were killed in the wreckage? Because when we as a society forget, that’s when history is bound to repeat itself. That’s when we forget the stories like Ed’s that remind us that heroism doesn’t always take the most obvious form. That’s when we stop thinking about how we would handle a similar situation – fight or flight?

So in the end, I did make it to Yankee Stadium twice…and I am glad that I got to see what a billion dollars can buy you in the Bronx. I cheered on the Royals and got to do what I love – watch sports – on my vacation. And when I wasn’t looking, I did somewhat vacate my life long enough to listen to a story that I believe I was meant to hear. Was it God who steered me there? Or Ed? Or that tour guide who once worked in Tower 1’s 17th floor? Or was it me who actually had control of the reigns? I’m not sure, but I’m glad I was “bothered” by that group that came along last Saturday. I’m glad that I finally got the point of a vacation and vacated for whatever reason. I’m glad that this time sports were placed on the back burner instead of my focus as work and play. I’m glad that like that tour guide hoped, Ed’s memory will live on and I will not be a part of a society that forgets the unforgettable.