"Family Tree" by Tom Chapin from his CD, "Family Tree"

On 9/11, I was teaching 4 year olds at, "The Little Red School House" in Greenwich Village, NYC. The third floor windows in my classroom looked down toward the World Trade Center Towers. For years, this view had excited the children who could see the twin towers as they worked each day on their many activities. On September 9, 2001, a brand new group of 4s was in the process of a slow and careful orientation to their new school. We were going to introduce them to the playroof that day. The principal hovered outside my classroom as we met and talked about the playroof. She signal my associate teacher out of the room and told him to take over the meeting - She urgently need to talk to me. She said we shouldn't take the childrent to the playroof because a plane had just hit the World Trade Center and there was too much smoke. Naively, I said, thinking that she meant maybe a little helicopter had grazed the tower, that, no, the children wouldn't see the smoke. She urged me to the roof where, paralysed, I saw the billowing smoke and saw the second plane hit the remaining tower.
I choose this song, because, one, it is a children's song, and two, it is about how we are all a family and related to each other in hundreds of different ways.

Sandy Wolkenberg