My opinion is that if you never saw the World Trade Center towers in person then looking at a huge pit in the ground means nothing. Why? Because you are missing the life that made up those two towers.
When they were new the towers were quite sterile but as time past they came into their own and earned their uniqueness. The elevators that zoomed you up the building were cattle cars - open on one side to let you on, open on the other side to let you off. If your company had an entire floor you were in for a long walk around the building if you went the wrong direction!
It was amazing to see the throngs of commuters during the morning and evening rush hours. Everyone exiting the PATH or the subways would go in different directions but at the same time there was a cohesiveness that existed as people moved from spot A to spot B. But heaven help you if you needed to go the opposite direction!
When it was busy, which pretty much takes the hours of 7AM to 7PM the lower concourse was a wild, bustling metropolis. You earned your chops going through there everyday. You could get food, money, clothes, stuff from the drugstore, a birthday card, a strawberry shake, and magazines. You could get your shoes fixed and go try out Body Shop products. A shop for plus sized women and even a kiosk that sold Tupperware. Everything!
When I worked there we were told that every Friday from Memorial Day to Labor Day was business casual. The first Friday we would all chuckle at the guys that should up in raspberry shirts because we knew that bought them in the Banana Republic in the concourse. We think the mannequins ended up naked!
That sugar fix late afternoon? Well Mrs. Fields cookies or a Ben and Jerry’s cone would take care of that. Or that newcomer, Krispy Creme, who nabbed space outside, on street level.
And we all fell in love with Borders, when they took over the corner space vacant by a large bank. You were guaranteed to run into someone from work.
Christmas was crazy, the Gap and J Crew had lines at the cash register even at 8 am in the morning. On Valentine’s Day Godiva always had a line of men out the door – all day long. The workers all used to say in amazement “We never need to leave the building.” But when we did leave we could go up to the plaza and enjoy a free concert or just sit in the sun. And the warm weather always brought the farmer’s market back with their delicious fruit and vegetables.
Of course we’d complain how crowded it got and “Where did all those tourists come from?” But if you ever made it to the concourse at night or even on the weekend it was quite a contrast. Quiet and manageable almost like the towers had a split personality. For the most part life in the towers was the very definition of “hustle and bustle”, “mass of humanity”, and “New York minute”.
You’ll never know how much we would love to have all of that back.
