Someone asked me today where I was on 9/11 and how had it changed me. I have never written about my experience with 9/11 before today. I guess I was ready to let it go, out from the place where I had tucked it away.
I lived and worked in NYC and was scheduled to attend our monthly sales meeting there that morning, with my former employer. The night before, he cancelled our monthly sales meeting, which he had never done before. He told us to go vote in the primary elections instead, which is what I was attempting to do when the second plane hit. I was listening to the news on my walkman, while waiting to check in with the elderly woman sitting at the desk at my designated voting place, (a public grade school cafeteria.) I got to her desk as the second plane hit and exclaimed, “Oh, my gosh. We’re being attacked by terrorists!” At which point, she thought I was insane, and told me she’d have me removed from the premises if I said anything like that again. “This is an election, and we cannot allow it to be disturbed.” Still listening to the news through one ear of my headphones, I told her, “But we are being attacked by terrorists.” She pointed to the door and told me to “get out.” Who could blame her? I sounded insane. Real insanity greeted me on the streets when I walked out of the grade school. Mayhem. Zombies. No one seemed to be in their bodies.
I couldn’t find a cab and started walking up the west side highway. I hitchhiked my way out of the city that day to my sister’s house in NJ. A crisis can definitely bring out the kindness in strangers. A kind gentleman picked me up and drove an hour out of his way to her home in Kinnelon.
God whispers, then he talks to you, then he blows the whistle! I always swore if I was ever brave enough, I would pack myself up and move to sunny California. 9/11 was a long, loud whistle in my ear. I got brave enough. I accepted a job in breathtakingly beautiful Westlake Village, CA. I had lived in and around NYC my entire life. I bought a PT Cruiser with a stick shift and practiced driving from New York to Los Angeles. I drove for four days and was pretty good by the time I hit L.A., thankfully.
Well, that just poured out of me!
Robin Boudreau (Palmer) fainting in Kevin Kline's arms in THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE
By the way, I got married at 45, to a fellow New Yorker I met out here at our local gym. Our paths
had crossed several times before, without having met each other until that day at the gym. One example: I had starred in Broadway shows for 15 years and my husband had seen me play Linda Ronstadt’s sister in THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE with Kevin Kline. I remember the night he was there because he was sitting directly in front of Jack Nicholson, who happened to be in the audience that night. I had peeked from behind the curtain before the show started, to get a good look at Mr. Nicholson.
Robin Boudreau (Palmer) in THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE with Linda Ronstadt, next to Papa, r. of him.
And the rest, as they say, is history!
Robin B. Palmer
Creator of My Wake Up Call®
Motivational Alarm Clock Messages
http://www.mywakeupcalls.net/
Hear Sample Messages at http://www.mywakeupcalls.net/my-products.php
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