I Remember You, John R. Crowe

Several months ago I agreed to participate in a project a blogger began that I thought was wonderful. His simple wish: to have every single victim of the horrific events of September 11th, 2001 be remembered and honored by one blogger each—to honor the individual’s life and not their murderers.

I signed up and was assigned a name. I dug in right away to find information on this man, John Crowe, and only found the bare bones. I tried with all my Google expertise to find his widow, Pamela, to no avail. I put the project aside for a while. A while became a while longer and before I knew it, the weekend before the fifth anniversary had arrived.

If I allow my memory to go back to that morning even for a second, I am sobbing before I know it. I did not personally lose anyone on that day but felt the loss of innocence and the agonizing pain of trying to wrap my mind around such massive destruction. I can’t do it. It hurts too much because there is no way to understand any of it. It is not understandable.

What we can do, though, is remember not the destruction and the fear and the chaos by itself, but the tiny miracles that occurred that day and in the days after: The pulling together, the stories of courage and strength beyond measure, the strangers rushing to the scene to help. Amidst all the fear there was raw love—that is what I saw as humans all around the world sent prayers. And within all of that—I see 2,996 lives who mattered. They mattered in life and they matter in their deaths. They teach us, if we let them.

Here is my tribute to John, followed by a copy of his profile from The New York Times.

To see the list of participants with links to their tributes, please go here. THANK YOU, D. CHALLENER ROE, for all your hard work!

***

I Remember You

Two thousand nine hundred and ninety-six lives

On a sunny morning gone

Smoke and flames and politics

Obscured you for too long

Today we choose to remember you

Each and every one

A father of two, a husband to one

A friend to all you met

Schoolmates, colleagues, family

None will ever forget

Your kindness, your honest love,

Your humor and your heart

Your fear of heights as you went to work

One hundred and one stories up

And that is how you were

Laughing at the clouds

With feet planted on this earth

Always living life out loud

At fifty-seven, your life cut short

A reminder to us all

To live this life with meaning

Heeding every call

Your death will never have been in vain

As long as people know

That each life can enlighten us

So I remember you, John Crowe.

****

Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on July 28, 2002:

John Crowe made friends the way he played sports: for keeps.
"We were still friends with people he went to grammar school with," said his wife, Pam. "He has friends from his first job that we still see. Clients that are no longer his clients that he still saw for dinner or lunch. He went on golf outings with former clients. His entire life has somehow been intertwined with friendship."
That extended to his relationship with his two sons, now 29 and 26. "They also became his friends," said Mrs. Crowe, a manager at a law firm. "They would golf together and kayak together."
Mr. Crowe, 57, a benefits consultant for Aon Corporation in the World Trade Center who lived in Rutherford, N.J., as such an eager athlete he sometimes pushed his body further than it could go.
"He played softball till he had so many injuries I begged him to quit," his wife said. "He broke a finger, he did something to an ankle, severed a tendon on his 50th birthday playing basketball."
Mr. Crowe did have one fear, though: heights. "You couldn't get him on a ladder," Pam Crowe said. "But he felt perfectly safe on the 101st floor. He'd call once in a while and ask what the weather was like and I'd get annoyed and say, `Look out the window.' He'd say: `I can't see. I'm above the clouds.'"

Comments

[kkt]

Wonderful tribute and a beautiful poem.

Mine is at http://jedisue.blogspot.com

[Elena]

Sara,
I got involved with this because I read about it on your blog! Interestingly, my honoree worked for the same employer as John Crowe! I thought it was an interesting coincidence. I'm really touched by everyone's tributes. It makes me feel better about the blogisphere to know that much good can come out of it when we pull together.

Elena

[Sally]

A beautiful poem. I hope someday someone in Mr. Crowe's family will find this, and know all of us care.

[Joan]

Great tribute. What a great idea this was. I learned so much by participating.

[So Lost]

I am so glad we all did this. Thank you.

[amanda]

beautiful, sarah.

i partook in this tribute as well after reading about it on your blog. i am linking to you because i am so proud of your post.
thinking of you...

amanda

[Heather]

The weekend did sneak up, didn't it? Thank you so much for sharing your tribute.

[Karmyn R]

Another beautiful tribute. Thank you for sharing!

[kerrianne]

Beautiful, Sar. I really like the poem idea.

Mine is up, too.

[Dawn]

That poem made me cry. Your tribute is wonderful.

My tribute can be found at http://retardedrugrat.wordpress.com

[Lala]

good on ya luv.

[sheryl]

Sarah,
This is such a wonderful tribute.

None will ever forget. Amen.

I wanna hold hands today.

[Jenie]

Beautifully done, Sarah. What a lovely poem too.

Above the clouds....that stuck with me...

[Jessica]

Oh, Sarah...this is painfully lovely - thank you.

[Kiki]

This was a wonderful way to remember. This was such a difficult thing for me, but I have learned so much. I am honoring Teresa Martin today.

[Jem]

Thanks for writing about John, it was a lovely poem

[Gopher]

Due to my lack of blogging of late, I missed this fantastic and loving project. This is my second post today that I've found that has been so heartwarming.

You are wonderful Sarah, truly.

[Raggedy]

Wonderful Tribute!
Thank you.
These are sad and hard to read....
I am honored to be a part of this project.
Mine is posted also...

The 2996 link is down. I have a new link on my site to view the participants.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort,
but where he stands at times of challenge
and controversy. ~Martin Luther King, Jr.

Bless you...

[Kate]

Thank you for sharing your rememberance.

Jonathons Closet remembers Robert Levine.

[Shelli]

Very beautiful tribute, Sarah. It gave me goosebumps to read.

[Summer]

Thank you, Sarah for writing this tribute. I only became involved in the project after reading about it on your blog, so thank you for that, too.

[Angeline]

Thank you for your tribute - I remembered Capt Joseph Farrelly at http://tagteam_of_2_jerzydevils.blogspot.com/

[Sandy]

Absolutely beautiful. Thank you for doing this.

[Teena]

What a lovely tribute! Thank you for participating. These people are no longer just a name to us anymore.

Mine's up.

[Meg]

Thanks, Sarah.

The symbols take over so much, and I know they are important, but sometimes it feels like the people are forgotten when I hear talk of it being an 'attack on freedom' and all that... People died, and it was a sad a difficult day. Every one of those people has someone who remembers the scent of the nape of their neck, the comfort of their touch. And that is as big as any larger assault of that day. At least, it is to me. Sorry if I'm soapboxing.

Thanks