This week is always an odd one for me.
The Tennessee-Florida game forever fills me with nervous anticipation, and throughout my life, I’ve learned to prepare myself for immense disappointment on the football front the week after.
In my mind, I link things. It’s kind of how I’ve mapped my life. A song on the radio or a game on the television can become sort of a landmark when something important happens. A book I’m reading may forever be linked with a life event. They are pit stops on the Interstate you travel from life to death, or at least they are in my mind.
For instance, I remember the first Stephen King book I ever read and what was happening in my life at the time as a High School senior.
I remember the Ohio State-Miami national championship game was on when I got my first real big job break.
Heck, I even remember that Paula Abdul’s “Cold-Hearted Snake” was on my buddy’s radio when he came to after an awful car crash when he was in the fourth grade.
Until 2001, Tennessee-Florida week was Lincoln County Fair week. That’s the small community where I grew up in Southern Middle Tennessee and the one I live near now. Always as a kid, the euphoria of the Fair was somewhat muted — or was it enhanced? — by the excitement of the Vols-Gators.
Then, the hangover from Fair week and the inevitable loss to Florida merged to produce a terrible week after.
But as an adult, I don’t think of Tennessee-Florida week as Fair Week anymore. Tennessee-Florida week after 2001 is now Sept. 11 week.
It’s sickening to have a week be so exciting and so harrowing all at once, but if you have a soul — and I know most of you do — today is always a tough one to swallow. This morning, I walked out to the road to get my newspaper before getting in my truck to come to work. Taking the plastic wrapper off the roll and flipping the paper open, I realized the centerpiece story was about the six-year anniversary of 9/11. I imagine 99 percent of the papers around the country had a similar piece. But I’d momentarily forgotten.
I immediately put my head down on the bed of my truck to pray. I thanked God for my life despite the struggles we’re going through. I also prayed for the souls of those who were lost and the families who had to endure such great peril. I didn’t know their pain, and I still don’t. I have my own burdens to bear as I’m sure we all do, but that was one we bore as a nation.
On this day, my mind always drifts back to that day. As a college senior at UT, I was sleeping in on Sept. 11, 2001. At the time, I was working two jobs and taking 18 hours to graduate, and that was the Big Week of Tennessee-Florida, so I’d worked late for the newspapers the night before. The radio was on as it always is at night in my house, and that morning, I recall the DJ saying something about a large building in New York — presumably the World Trade Center — being hit with a bomb.
I immediately awoke and hurried down to turn on CNN. Nearly as soon as I flicked on the TV, the second building was hit. My mouth dropped as my mind rushed to grasp the concept of a full-fledged attack.
That whole day was a whirlwind. I remember calling back home to try to find out if my fiancee (now my wife) was OK. She worked in Huntsville, a major defense hub. As you recall that day, we didn’t know who was being targeted, what really was happening and if the world may be ending.
I initially couldn’t get through the phones, but once everything was OK, I skipped class and went back to my apartment. Being a couple of reporters, my roommate and I didn’t get to spend a lot of time together. But that night, we sat up late on the back porch smoking cigarettes and talking about mortality. The Tennessee-Florida game was on our minds but far from the most important.
As we all know, that game was rightfully postponed (along with the vast majority of other games that weekend) and moved to the end of the season. It’s what Tennessee fans always wanted, just not how we wanted it, and the Vols won a classic in Gainesville with Travis Stephens running all over Spurrier’s team. The win was so important, that it (and several million dollars) chased the Ol’ Ball Coach out of the SEC to the NFL. (Yeah, the millions likely was the only reason.) The worst loss of the Fulmer era came next in the ‘01 SEC championship game against LSU.
All those things I remember well, but none as well as that terrible day. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. I hope I don’t.
The scariest thing, I recall, about the whole experience was an airplane with its flickering lights flying over our apartment as we were sitting on the porch that night. We knew there were supposed to be no planes in the air that day, but being that close to Oak Ridge, I’m sure it was military-related. Still, then, who knew? We were calculating whether an atomic bomb strike in Oak Ridge would have fallout all the way to Knoxville. We were bouncing back-and-forth the possibility we may be asked (or told) to fight for our country. We were discussing doing it, regardless. It was scary, scary stuff.
So, looking back on that day, it’s absolutely essential as an American to remember what happened. It’s essential as a Christian to pray for those who were effected. It’s essential as a Patriot to take pride in everything that has been accomplished since. As a Civilian, it’s essential to pine for the troops to be home and for our corner of the world to be safe again.
As a football fan, it’s essential to put our rabidness aside for a day and be Americans rather than Alabamians or Tennesseans or Floridians or Martians. For us on this board, that’s not hard because we’re buddies. But we all know as crazy as we are, there are more important things.
Sept. 11, 2001 taught me that.
Ghost of Neyland
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