11
Sep

CROSSFIT SUFFOLK   ***  Forging Elite Fitness

 

"The Seven"

Seven rounds for time of:
7 Handstand push-ups
135 pound Thruster, 7 reps
7 Knees to elbows
245 pound Deadlift, 7 reps
7 Burpees
7 Kettlebell swings, 2 pood
7 Pull-ups

Scale the weight and number of sets as appropriate!!!!

 

The white dust covering everything is from the pulverized Twin Towers after 9/11.Lisa at Ground Zero 1
Tough lady during a tough time!

Lisa at ground Zero 2 
 I wrote Thoughts On September 11th two years ago today.  I re-posted last year as I did this year.  I'm probably going to re-post it every year because my thoughts for this day have not changed and I don't want the passing of time to cloud my memory.

 

THOUGHTS ON SEPTEMBER 11TH

by George Demetriou

On September 11th my thoughts, like the the thoughts of millions of Americans, are on the attack from seven years ago and on the people who lost their lives.

I think of my brother and sister NYPD officers who were not obligated to enter the Twin Towers, but did so selflessly anyway because of a sense of duty and those who never came out.

I think of Detective Viggiano who was an Academy mate, winner of 3 close range gun fights with drug dealers, but was killed by enemies from afar, murderers who were already in hell by the time Viggiano lost his life.

I think about Sgt. Gillis, a childhood friend of my wife, who was on his way home, off-duty, when the attack occurred.  Rodney went to the Towers anyway.  All that was recovered was some of his equipment.

I think of the horrible images of seeing people jumping from the Towers and the one documentary where you could hear bodies hitting the building or the ground.

I think of standing before the "Pile", awestruck, looking for something that resembled a piece of office furniture,  or anything that would connect the destruction to the fact that people worked here days before and seeing nothing, but smashed steel and concrete, trying to deal with the fact that the "pile" was once the World Trade Center.

I think of my wife, working in NYPD headquarters for her regular shift then walking down to the "Pile" because she had to "find my friends".  She never did.  She was diagnosed with something called RADS (Reactive Airway Dysfunction) shortly after working at Ground Zero. 

I think of the people who paid the ultimate price just for showing up at work on a beautiful September day.

I think of the children who had their mother or father taken from them.

I think of Tommy from my hometown.  We went to the Academy together, but Tommy left the Police Department and went to the Fire Department.  He entered the Towers and like over 300 of his fellow firefighters, never made it out.

I think of the Port Authority Police Officers and the Court Officers, many who came from other locations or from home and paid the ultimate price.

But I also think of the way the people of New York came together to help others.

I think of the groups of people on the West Side Highway who would just stand there for hours cheering us on and thanking us whenever cops went by them.

I think of the response by volunteers from the suburbs, other states and Canada.  They brought food, medical equipment, search equipment, search dogs, but mostly they brought love of their fellow human beings.

I think of volunteers, David Karnes and Jason Thomas, two retired Marine Corps Sgts., who continued to search after night fall and found trapped and injured Port Authority Police Officers.

I think of the response by our military, especially the work done by our Special Operations Command and the work they are still doing.

I think of the fantastic work done by my former co-workers of the NY office of the Joint Terrorist task Force, an awesome collection of NYPD Detectives, State Troopers, FBI Special Agents, Customs Enforcement Agents, Immigration Enforcement Agents, Port Authority Police Detectives, CIA Officers, NSA Officers, US Marshals, Coast Guard Officers and some I'm probably forgetting.  I truly got serve in the company of heroes and am honored to have done so.

I think of Rick Rescorla.  Rescorla was the VP of Security for Morgan Stanley/Dean Witter, the largest tenant of the World Trade Center.  Rescorla served in the Army and fought in the Battle of Ia Drang, Viet Nam in 1965…the battle depicted in the book, We Were Soldiers Once…And Young by General Hal Moore and Joseph Galloway.  Rescorla's photo graces the cover of the book.  Rescorla was proactive as a security official.  He would have the people he was responsible for practice evacuating the building.  Seven years ago today he effectively evacuated nearly three thousand employees of Morgan Stanley/Dean Witter out of the World Trade Center.  He saved the entire company except for himself and some of his staff who stayed behind to make sure they didn't leave anyone "on the field of battle".  The entire time of the evacuation Rescorla kept everyone calm and moving along, while singing and stating, "Today is a day to be proud to be an American" through his bullhorn.

Mostly I think that Rescorla's last words to the employees of Morgan Stanley/Dean Witter are so true today as they were seven years ago.

Twin%20Towers%20Sunrise
 
 
 

 
 

8 Responses

  1. lisa cf suffolk- spartan performance

    thank you george…
    a famous line from a song…
    like a knife that cuts thru a wound -the wound heals but tht scar remains….

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