WEBVTT

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Hi , I'm nancy writer , I'm a military

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brat , a foreign service officer for us .

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Id and I'm a 9 11 survivor . Where were

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you when the world stops turning Well

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that september day , the conference was

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at the Marriott World Trade Center

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economics Conference . I was actually

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staying at the Marriott World Trade

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Center as well . We were really

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honestly having a fantastic time and

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even talking about what it might be

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like to move there . Greg . He was just

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kind of hanging out by the window ,

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typing on his computer when when it

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happened , did you stand there in shark

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the side of that black smoke rising

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against that blue sky . It was just

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this really

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amazingly loud , reverberating rumble

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and right as we went out the back is

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when the second plane hit , my instinct

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was let's just get away from it . Then

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after the collapse , big

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wave of dust and smoke and everything

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started rolling down . I remember

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having two thoughts in that moment .

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The first thought was , I can't buy yet

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because I haven't lived . And then the

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other thought was if I die right now ,

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none of what I have done has mattered

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to anybody . We had come to an

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intersection covered in just glass . We

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have no shoes in . We're in new york

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city . There was a lady there for some

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reason . She had her friends shoes ,

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she was I guess one of the people on

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the street . I don't know if she was

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one of the people who stopped to kind

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of look up and see what was happening

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or What happened . But she was with her

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friend one minute and the next minute

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she'd been head , she handed me shoes

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and I remember looking at them and

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thinking it was kind of ironic because

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there their high heeled evening shoes

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and I remember just putting the shoes

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on and they could

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and it sounds like such a cliche and

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such a ridiculous thing , but the fact

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that these shoes that this woman gave

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me fit , stay with me

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an enormous sense of Pope . I know

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like I'm gonna make it out of here ,

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I'm gonna make it , it's going to be

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fine . 12 hours had gone by kind of in

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a blur . We saw what had happened and

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we're starting to get an idea of what

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had been happening and they had

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televisions on to airplanes have

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crashed into the World Trade Center in

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an apparent terrorist attack on our

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country . I think the first feelings of

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maybe survivor's guilt started to set

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in at that point . We ended up breaking

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up . I quit my job . I sold pretty much

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everything that I owned . I'm going to

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travel but I'm not going to travel to

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find the perfect place . I'm going to

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travel to find some peace in me and

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figure out what do I want to do with

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the rest of my life . So I worked with

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Wildlife in Africa . It's something

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that touched me profoundly . I thought ,

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wow , I am living my dream , I could

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die right now and I feel like I'm

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living was at the end of my journey , I

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went back to florida and that's when my

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phone writing , we got back together

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and there's not a day that goes by that

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I'm not thankful that I've lived

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another day , even when it's a bad day ,

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it's been 10 years

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And it hasn't been an easy 10 years .

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Obviously , it goes without saying that

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I'm not glad that that happened . But

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after this much time , the journeys

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that I've taken and the growth that

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I've had , I can honestly say I'm glad

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I was there . I'm glad I lived through

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that . I'm glad it was very painful ,

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but I wouldn't be here right now

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doing the things that I'm doing if it

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hadn't been for that

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I was