By November 2002, I was working full-time at Robin Hood and interacting daily with organizations serving low-income victims of September 11th — my entire days at work were devoted to the consequences of that horrific day. Aside from work, I went to class two nights each week. I did homework…

While mourning the loss of my father who died on 9/11, I began working at an organization helping others who were also impacted by the attacks on the World Trade Center. Robin Hood had moved offices a second time and by the time I started in mid-November 2001, the staff…

As much as I have been looking forward to 2021 and putting 2020 in the rearview mirror, I have also been dreading this year — and not because I thought the first week would have been so terrible. 2021 will bring the twentieth anniversary of my father’s death at the…

Find beauty. Be generous. In January of 2015, I received a call at home from a stranger who asked for me by name. He said he had a photograph of a helmet of an FDNY chief from the twelfth battalion (where my father was not only one of four chiefs…

He ran into burning buildings by day. But on his days off, he created. Whenever I heard the chainsaw buzzing in the backyard, I knew my dad was sculpting. Yup, sculpting. He spent many of his days off crafting animal sculptures out of large chunks of wood. When he saw…

When life feels grim and like all hope is lost, look around and use the tools available. ** This essay will make more sense if read in the context of my other essays about losing my father on 9/11. If you are interested, please read in reverse chronological order. ** …

Trying to live up to the ideal modeled by my father has never been easy. In, fact it’s hard. Trying to live up to the ideal modeled by my father has never been easy. So many times, I would have preferred to put on blinders and ignore what was going…

On a crisp, quiet day in late October 1985, my father was in the backyard of our house in Piermont, a suburb of New York City, when he heard gun shots. He walked to the end of the driveway to investigate and heard a man yelling, “He’s got a gun…

I didn’t have to look for far to find a hero. I was eight when I realized not all adults were quite like my dad. Someone asked me once what it was like growing up as a fireman’s daughter. Only upon hearing that question did I begin to realize there…