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Speaker 1: Hey, everybody's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks.

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Speaker 1: And we continue now a part two of our conversation

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Speaker 1: with Alison Crowther right after these brief messages from our

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Speaker 1: general sponsors, and right after Allah rings the bell. All right,

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Speaker 1: so you have this it's an evil day, and you

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Speaker 1: believe that to be true because of your experiences in

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Speaker 1: your life, which those of us listening could choose to

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Speaker 1: hear that or not. But all you got to do is, look,

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Speaker 1: this is a very adorable woman having this conversation, and

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Speaker 1: it's a very real thing. So the plane hits the

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Speaker 1: building and you get a message that he's okay, and

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Speaker 1: then the second plane hits and and the thing falls down,

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Speaker 1: and you are absolutely convinced well S gone yeah, based

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Speaker 1: on the way well grew up, based on what Wells

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Speaker 1: was the human being. His was the phone call to

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Speaker 1: his dad to say I want to be a fireman,

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Speaker 1: his revelation in Spain and Italy that he felt like

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Speaker 1: his life was meant to serve other lives, and all

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Speaker 1: culminated in that two hours. Yea, yes, did tell us

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Speaker 1: about those two hours?

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Speaker 2: Well, they were I mean during the time that the

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Speaker 2: towers had lapsed in what was going on? Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 2: my coworkers drove me home. My Honor was working up

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Speaker 2: in Mount Kissko, which was also in Westchester. Her boyfriend

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Speaker 2: then husband now drove her across. He always kept he

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Speaker 2: kept the car, but he kept a big tractor trailer

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Speaker 2: between going west across the tap and Zee, so Honor

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Speaker 2: wouldn't see the burning of the towers and all. He

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Speaker 2: protected her from that. He was wonderful still is, they're both.

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Speaker 2: I'm so blessed with two wonderful sons in law. Anyway,

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Speaker 2: so I got I was like numb. I didn't eat

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Speaker 2: for days. I mostly walked, I space, I stayed up.

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Speaker 2: I stayed up well into the night. I drank a

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Speaker 2: lot of water. That saved me. I stayed up well

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Speaker 2: into the like two and three o'clock in the morning,

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Speaker 2: because that was the only time you could really get

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Speaker 2: through to hospitals, and I can't.

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Speaker 1: I spent two three days, and you hadn't heard from right.

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Speaker 1: Your worst fears and your premonitions of your intuition that

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Speaker 1: he was gone became very real at this point.

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Speaker 2: Well, here's what happened. Like this, I think the second

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Speaker 2: or third night into my staying up until like the

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Speaker 2: middle of the night, I got up to stretch my legs.

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Speaker 2: My laptop was down in my phone I was working

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Speaker 2: from my office space, which was in the bottom floor.

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Speaker 2: Wells's bedroom was also down there. So I got up

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Speaker 2: and I'm walking around the basement to sort of stretch out,

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Speaker 2: and suddenly I sensed this. All I can describe it

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Speaker 2: is a huge energy space, like an energy like shape

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Speaker 2: like that right right here, right there. And I said, oh, Wells,

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Speaker 2: that's you. If you can do that, I know you're okay.

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Speaker 2: And also I knew he was really gone, so I

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Speaker 2: stopped looking. I knew he was not coming back. But

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Speaker 2: that presence was powerful, and it just it just freed

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Speaker 2: me from trying to keep finding his living body. It

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Speaker 2: never stopped me from looking for what happened to him,

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Speaker 2: because I kept watching everything and reading everything that I

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Speaker 2: could looking for him, which is ultimately how I came

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Speaker 2: across the article in the New York Times and identified him.

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Speaker 1: So eventually some police calm. He's identified by his fingerprons.

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Speaker 1: I can't even imagine what that conversation is for a

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Speaker 1: mother and a father and a family. But even so,

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Speaker 1: your question is what happened between mamam okay and his

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Speaker 1: body being in the rubble. Yeah, and then you found

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Speaker 1: out the most extraordinary thing and how extraordinary your son is.

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Speaker 1: And look, this is an army of normal folks. We

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Speaker 1: highlight stories of normal people who do extraordinary things. So far,

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Speaker 1: we've heard a a human interest story about you and

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Speaker 1: your son and your family, which is heartwarming and gut wrenching.

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Speaker 1: But we're about to get to the meat of just

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Speaker 1: how extraordinary your son is. But explain to us how

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Speaker 1: you found him quote found him, and what you learned,

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Speaker 1: and and tying it back to that faithful Sunday warning

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Speaker 1: where your husband gave him a handkerchief.

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Speaker 2: I will I was, as I said before, I spent

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Speaker 2: a lot of time reading anything I could, watching any programs,

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Speaker 2: trying to catch a glimpse of him. Something kept driving

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Speaker 2: me that if I kept looking, someday i'd find him.

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Speaker 2: Just I wouldn't stop. Now, it's probably just a mother's

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Speaker 2: instinct to do that anyway, but but that was me.

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Speaker 2: So time goes on. We hadn't heard anything or learned

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Speaker 2: anything at all, and my husband was reading he we

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Speaker 2: got the New York Times, and he was reading this

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Speaker 2: section and he saw this headlines fighting to live as

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Speaker 2: the towers died, and he could not. My husband couldn't

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Speaker 2: read anything or see anything. He just was so emotionally

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Speaker 2: damaged that it just he soldiered on. But he couldn't

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Speaker 2: do the searching that I was doing.

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Speaker 1: Your husband best bodies yes, yeah, literally, best.

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Speaker 2: Body yeah yeah. So he said, here, you may want

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Speaker 2: to read this, because he knew I was always looking.

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Speaker 2: So he handed me the paper. I took it into

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Speaker 2: our bedroom and sat sat down on the bed and

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Speaker 2: started reading. And I get to this section. It was

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Speaker 2: for four New York Times reporters that put stories together

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Speaker 2: based on interviews, best on phone messages, last reports of

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Speaker 2: people being seen. And there was a section called nine

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Speaker 2: oh two or nine oh three in the South Tower

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Speaker 2: sky lobby. Well, the sky lobby on the seventy eighth

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Speaker 2: floor was where express elevators would go up from the

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Speaker 2: ground floor lobby to then take people who were in

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Speaker 2: the upper floors. There were another thirty floors to go

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Speaker 2: almost for people. So there was this big second lobby

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Speaker 2: if they called it the sky lobby. And oh, well

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Speaker 2: before that, I should say he was recovered. He was

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Speaker 2: recovered on March nineteenth of oddly I know of two

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Speaker 2: thousand and two, and he was found with Donald Burns,

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Speaker 2: who was instant commander with the FDNY and his men.

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Speaker 2: So when we were informed of that, I said, yes, Wells,

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Speaker 2: you know you went to the top. Good for you,

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Speaker 2: we did, and there the Medical Examiner's office with people

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Speaker 2: were saying, well, he was probably acting like a civilian usher,

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Speaker 2: in other words, holding open the doors so people could

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Speaker 2: run out, and I just knew, no, Wells was not

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Speaker 2: going to do that. Not well, yeah, no, that was

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Speaker 2: not well So they were found with a hearst tool.

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Speaker 2: They all clumped together. They actually were blown up against

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Speaker 2: the side of four World Trade because of the power

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Speaker 2: of the tower coming down and acting like a big

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Speaker 2: bellows and that's that's how they were ultimately found in March.

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Speaker 3: One thing else and two with what they found him.

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Speaker 3: I've always found this remarkable. So there was twenty seven

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Speaker 3: to fifty three Ground Zero victims that day. They recovered

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Speaker 3: sixteen seventy four of the bodies, and only two hundred

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Speaker 3: ninety three were intact, including Wells, And I've always found

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Speaker 3: it remarkable that any of them were intact. If you

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Speaker 3: had this entire building collapse on you the fact that

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Speaker 3: his body was intact is insane.

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Speaker 2: Well he was. He was missing part of his jaw

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Speaker 2: and his right hand, so I know, but there's a biblical.

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Speaker 1: Reputy you could say that.

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Speaker 2: Well, I don't know. I'm sorry.

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Speaker 1: It just it'll apologizes.

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Speaker 2: It's just I just try to be as factual as

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Speaker 2: I can with this. I try to be. I thank

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Speaker 2: my parents and grandparents for that. They so well. Anyway,

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Speaker 2: so back to back to that day. So actually the

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Speaker 2: call from the police officer came on the Friday first,

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Speaker 2: and I was with my daughter who was auditioning for

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Speaker 2: the classical ballet program at Sunny Purchase, which has a

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Speaker 2: very fine classical ballet program. And I was reading from

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Speaker 2: this woman that I mentioned to you about who talks

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Speaker 2: about the universe, and it said you speak your heart

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Speaker 2: to the universe, and the universe can't help but respond.

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Speaker 2: So I closed the book. This page was coming down

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Speaker 2: for lunch, and I said to myself, all right, Universe,

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Speaker 2: here we go. I wasn't sure I believed in it,

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Speaker 2: but I okay, let's try this. So I would somehow

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Speaker 2: like to be reunited with our son, so that so

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Speaker 2: I can because I had all this these premonitions in

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Speaker 2: these spiritual experience experiences along with what Wells did, so

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Speaker 2: that somehow we can bring our stories out into the world.

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Speaker 1: I would imagine many people like you knew their loved

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Speaker 1: ones were lost, but they just wanted to know where

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Speaker 1: and be able to put them to rest.

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Speaker 2: Right, that's right, and.

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Speaker 1: It's that's what you're looking for at this boy.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, just yeah. I mean it was horrible to

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Speaker 2: be to have nothing, really, it was horrible. Anyway, So

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Speaker 2: I closed the book, page, comes down for lunch, and

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Speaker 2: this isn't about ten minutes time, my cell phone rings.

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Speaker 2: It's my friend called my housekeeper calling to say, Alison,

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Speaker 2: the police are at the door, knocking at the door,

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Speaker 2: the police, they'd like to speak with you. And I'm like,

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Speaker 2: oh my god. We had a boxer and a Labrador

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Speaker 2: retriever at the time, and I thought, oh, what have

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Speaker 2: they done?

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Speaker 1: Now?

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Speaker 2: Did they get loose? They were, you know, gallivanting around

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Speaker 2: the neighborhood. What's happened? Oh lord? So I get on

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Speaker 2: and the policeman said, hi, missus Crowther, I'm officers so

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Speaker 2: and so are you driving? I said, no, he's I said,

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Speaker 2: why do I need to sit down or something. I

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Speaker 2: I thought this was going to be really bad. Maybe

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Speaker 2: they attacked somebody. I not my dogs, but hope, you know, Okay,

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Speaker 2: So I sat down and he said, your son's been

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Speaker 2: recovered from ground zero. That was ten minutes after I

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Speaker 2: spoke my heart to the universe to say, you know,

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Speaker 2: so I had to collect myself and because I didn't

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Speaker 2: want my daughter to know at that point, because she

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Speaker 2: had to go back and complete her auditions and dancing,

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Speaker 2: and so I soldiered up and went back and finished up.

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Speaker 2: And she went up to finish her her auditions and

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Speaker 2: a mother, another woman mother there, came over to me

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Speaker 2: and said, are you all right? You look pretty upset,

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Speaker 2: and I said, well, my son's just been recovered from

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Speaker 2: ground zero. And you know, she was pretty shocked to

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Speaker 2: hear that. So after Page comes down afterwards, and my

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Speaker 2: daughters are very bright and also have their sensitivities too,

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Speaker 2: I think. Anyway, so I told Page on the drive back,

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Speaker 2: I said, Page, you know they've recovered your brother and

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Speaker 2: she said, oh wow, And then she said what day

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Speaker 2: did they recover him? I said on Tuesday, And I

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Speaker 2: didn't even think put the date. She said, you know, mom,

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Speaker 2: that's the nineteenth of March, so yeah, they were clued

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Speaker 2: into that. So that was one part of it, but

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Speaker 2: we didn't know the whole story until I was reading

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Speaker 2: the Times then in the end of May. It was

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Speaker 2: a special piece that they'd done for Memorial Day weekend,

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Speaker 2: and I saw this section fighting, you know, fighting to

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Speaker 2: live as the towers died, this section of nine oh

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Speaker 2: three in the South Tower sky lobby. So I knew

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Speaker 2: Wells was in his office that morning, but he'd gotten

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Speaker 2: down below to work with the firefighters. That's where they

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Speaker 2: found him. So we had to have been passing through

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Speaker 2: the sky lobby at about the time the plane hit,

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Speaker 2: and I said to myself, well, if I'm ever going

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Speaker 2: to see anything about Wells, it's going to be in here.

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Speaker 2: So I started reading the section, and sure enough, there

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Speaker 2: were ling Young and Judy Ween, two women that were rescued,

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Speaker 2: referencing this man wearing a red one set of red

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Speaker 2: handkerchief I think the other said a red bandana, and.

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Speaker 1: That I did not know, Oh yeah, did not know

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Speaker 1: his name completely anonymous, right, But this guy, this innocuous guy,

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Speaker 1: and a red bandana saved their loss.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and he had he found a fire extinguisher was

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Speaker 2: putting out small fires, trying to administer aid because some

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Speaker 2: people were still alive but devastatingly injured. I'm not even

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Speaker 2: going to describe some of the injuries. And he found

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Speaker 2: Judy Ling, Judy Ween, no excuse me, Ling Young. First,

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Speaker 2: she was burned over forty percent of her body.

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Speaker 1: She couldn't see because her her glasses were.

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Speaker 2: Filled filled with blood, but she was able to wipe

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Speaker 2: them off, so she's so and so he got her

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Speaker 2: and carried away over his shoulder down to about what

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Speaker 2: they estimate was the sixty eighth floor from the seventy

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Speaker 2: eighth floor, the sixty first floor from the seventy eighth floor,

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Speaker 2: so seventeen stories. Ling said, can I put down this

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Speaker 2: fire extinguisher? And Well said, yes, you'll probably be fine

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Speaker 2: because down there the lights were on, you know, things

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Speaker 2: still looked pretty good, so they were, you know, he said,

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Speaker 2: just keep going. I have to go, and he put

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Speaker 2: the woman down. He said, you have to keep going

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Speaker 2: on your own. I have to go back up and

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Speaker 2: help more people. So he turned and that's when he

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Speaker 2: had the bandana off its face, so Ling actually saw

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Speaker 2: him his full face. So he went back up and

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Speaker 2: that's when he found Judy Wayne and the people she

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Speaker 2: was with, and he directed them to the stairwell and

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Speaker 2: got them going down and apparently went back in to

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Speaker 2: just make sure check on anybody else. And so he eventually,

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Speaker 2: after all of that up and down, he made it

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Speaker 2: all the way down to the ground level. I mean,

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Speaker 2: it was just but he moved fast. He was he

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Speaker 2: was a runner. He moved fast and knew what he

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Speaker 2: was doing. So he called out, you know, there are

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Speaker 2: people you can save, There are people people, there are

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Speaker 2: people you can help. There are people you can't help.

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Speaker 2: Only help those you can help, and get up and

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Speaker 2: stand now and move with me now. So he was

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Speaker 2: it was Ling said it was his voice, the command

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Speaker 2: in his voice that gave her because they were afraid

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Speaker 2: the floors were going to fall out from underneath them.

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Speaker 2: So yeah, so that's how we found out.

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Speaker 1: The thing is, you do none of this, no none,

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Speaker 1: And you read the Times and this woman is just

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Speaker 1: describing this guy with this red bandana. So as you're

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Speaker 1: recounting that story, did you say, oh, that's got to

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Speaker 1: be Oh.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, right away, I said, oh my god, wells I've

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Speaker 2: found you. That's exactly what I said, and I went

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Speaker 2: running into my husband. I said, Jeff, I've found Wells.

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Speaker 2: Look it's he's right here saving people. He's got the

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Speaker 2: red bandana. That's Wells Jeff. And my husband said, don't

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Speaker 2: to say, don't you know don't He kind of poop

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Speaker 2: pooed it. I think he I don't know what was

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Speaker 2: in his mind, but he just maybe maybe it was

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Speaker 2: too much for him to hope for. Maybe that was it.

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Speaker 2: So we didn't want to raise his hopes, but I was.

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Speaker 2: I said, I'm going to track these women down and

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Speaker 2: find out for sure. So the next day I called.

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Speaker 2: I couldn't find any information on finding ling, but I

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Speaker 2: was able to learn in the article that Judy Wayne

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Speaker 2: worked for a ON. So I called AON and they said,

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Speaker 2: oh yes. I said, I don't expect you to give

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Speaker 2: me her phone number, but I think it was my

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Speaker 2: son that saved her. So here's my phone number, and

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Speaker 2: if it is and she wants to call me, could

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Speaker 2: she please call me. So by that afternoon she called

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Speaker 2: me and she said, she said, can you send me

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Speaker 2: some pictures? So I sent her up that picture of

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Speaker 2: Wells with you know, his senior picture, and she said

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Speaker 2: and she moved sent that around, and because they kept

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Speaker 2: the people that survived from the South Tower, they're only

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Speaker 2: of the two hundred people estimated waiting there, they were

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Speaker 2: only eighteen that actually survived down that day. The woman, yes, yeah,

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Speaker 2: the woman that Wells set down. Ling said come on,

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Speaker 2: you have to come. I'm going, and the woman said,

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Speaker 2: I can't. I can't, I'm too tired, I can't move.

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Speaker 2: So she never survived, but the eighteen that did kept

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Speaker 2: like an email group chat going for months, and so

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Speaker 2: Judy sent this out to the group, and Ling's son

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Speaker 2: responded by saying, my mother thinks this might be the man.

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Speaker 2: Can you send us pictures? So I sent her a

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Speaker 2: picture of Wells, and then I sent her another one

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Speaker 2: that was more casual that had been taken in June,

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Speaker 2: where Wells a member of Empire, also a captain. I'm

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Speaker 2: not sure what his title was, but he was in

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Speaker 2: charge of the John D. McCain fireboat that fought the

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Speaker 2: fires at ground zero. Harry Wannamaker had invited Jeff and

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Speaker 2: my son onto there, onto the John D. McCain for

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Speaker 2: some sort of party or something the end of June

303
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Speaker 2: two thousand and one. So Wells said Hey, dad, can

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Speaker 2: you get a picture of Harry and me? And be

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Speaker 2: sure you get the world the World Trade Center towers

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Speaker 2: in the background. So my husband did, and so that's

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Speaker 2: the picture. I cut out the towers so they couldn't

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Speaker 2: she couldn't see that. I didn't want to sway her

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Speaker 2: in any way. And then her son said, well, my

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Speaker 2: mom thinks it's my mom thinks it's him. But here's

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Speaker 2: a couple of questions. And also I hadn't set them

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Speaker 2: sent them more casual picture yet, or if they hadn't,

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Speaker 2: he hadn't shown it to his mother. But he said,

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Speaker 2: was what what color was the handkerchief? I said, well,

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Speaker 2: if it was solid red, that wouldn't be wells. It

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Speaker 2: would have been a bandana with a pattern that would

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Speaker 2: have been wells. He said okay, and he said what

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Speaker 2: kind of what kind of t shirt would he be wearing?

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Speaker 2: Because he was stripped down, and that's like wells, he

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Speaker 2: would have stripped down.

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Speaker 1: I said, well, take office.

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Speaker 2: Right, yeah, he's And it was anyway casual anyhow by them,

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Speaker 2: because that didn't start until a little bit later. The

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Speaker 2: more formal dress. And I said, well, it would be

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Speaker 2: like a crew neck, short sleeve Brooks Brothers type T shirt.

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Speaker 2: It wouldn't have been like a you know, tank top

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Speaker 2: and shed he said, yep, that's okay, that's okay. So

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Speaker 2: so Richard Young was her son that was handling. He

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Speaker 2: is now an EMT from all of this experience. He

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Speaker 2: had now right, he said, I wanted to show my

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Speaker 2: mom the picture and get her immediate response to seeing it.

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Speaker 2: So I took the picture and she was sitting and

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Speaker 2: I turned it and I saw her face. Yes, that

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Speaker 2: was him right away.

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Speaker 1: What was that feeling.

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Speaker 2: I was overjoyed, frankly, because to me, the most horrible thing,

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Speaker 2: and it was cold, and even when we got his

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Speaker 2: body back and had him bury, I felt so cold

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Speaker 2: because I felt like I was still disconnected from him

340
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Speaker 2: in a way. I was so overjoyed he was gone,

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Speaker 2: but at least now we knew he made his choices

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Speaker 2: that day he was. To me, the greatest suffering would

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Speaker 2: have been if he was trapped and couldn't move. That

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Speaker 2: would have been a torture for him in the end.

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Speaker 2: That would have been a complete and I was so

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Speaker 2: worried that that's how it was for him. So when

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Speaker 2: I found out that he was able to do what

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Speaker 2: he did, and that was before we knew the whole story.

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Speaker 2: I just was overjoyed, yell, well, as you went to

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Speaker 2: the top, you went to the insitant commander of the

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Speaker 2: fire department there for the South Tower, to see what

352
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Speaker 2: you could do. I just was so overjoyed that he

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Speaker 2: died with his boots on. Basically, he died a man

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Speaker 2: of action.

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Speaker 1: We'll be right back. Two hundred people in that sky

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Speaker 1: lobby eighteen survived. Twelve of those eighteen two thirds are

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Speaker 1: living today because of your son.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and maybe some of the others too, But they

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Speaker 2: haven't responded. I mean, we never tried to track anybody down.

360
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Speaker 2: They've kind of surfaced, some of the people doing the

361
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Speaker 2: research and to do the ESPN and another film that

362
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Speaker 2: came out interviewed and I've met more people now as

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Speaker 2: a result. I just met for the first time last

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Speaker 2: September another gentleman, Keating Crown, who well saved as well,

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Speaker 2: and I he never reached out or I heard stories

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Speaker 2: about him, and we didn't know for sure whether or not,

367
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Speaker 2: but he came up to me. We were a big dinner

368
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Speaker 2: fundraiser for them, an annual for the nine eleven museum,

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Speaker 2: and he's a big supporter, he and his family, and

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Speaker 2: he found me. He came up to me and he said,

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Speaker 2: he said, it's because of your son. I'm here today

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Speaker 2: and my children are here today. And it's just it

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Speaker 2: was very moving.

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Speaker 1: What what goes through you? What a human being looks

375
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Speaker 1: at you and says, these children exist because of your son.

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Speaker 1: It is sacrificed.

377
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Speaker 2: It's powerful. It's powerful, don't. I don't, it's not. It's

378
00:23:29,920 --> 00:23:34,040
Speaker 2: just a sense of the goodness of Wells. It's really

379
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Speaker 2: all about Wells, and I, of course I'm proud of him,

380
00:23:38,800 --> 00:23:41,879
Speaker 2: but it isn't a source of hubris is like the

381
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Speaker 2: worst thing, and it's not a source of that for me.

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Speaker 2: It's just gratitude that these beautiful people live. And maybe

383
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Speaker 2: some of some people have even said, we were afraid

384
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Speaker 2: to come tell you because we didn't know how you

385
00:23:57,560 --> 00:24:01,040
Speaker 2: would feel, whether you'd be angry with us. I'm angry. No,

386
00:24:01,119 --> 00:24:04,560
Speaker 2: I'm so happy you're alive. It's okay. That was Wells's mission,

387
00:24:04,600 --> 00:24:07,879
Speaker 2: that was his purpose as a firefighters, a trained firefighter,

388
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Speaker 2: that's your purpose to save lives.

389
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Speaker 1: As in an army. Normal folks, we say all the time,

390
00:24:13,280 --> 00:24:16,760
Speaker 1: it's almost redundant and our listeners right now, most of

391
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Speaker 1: them will be like, probably Bill quits saying it, but

392
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Speaker 1: I'm going to anyway, it's my show. I'm allowed to.

393
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Speaker 1: Is the most amazing thing happened when the most of

394
00:24:30,240 --> 00:24:33,480
Speaker 1: the amazing things in the world happened when a person's

395
00:24:33,600 --> 00:24:37,480
Speaker 1: passion and disciplined intersected opportunity.

396
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Speaker 2: Oh absolutely, we are.

397
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Speaker 1: That is you know you My concern is for your

398
00:24:45,840 --> 00:24:47,960
Speaker 1: son is that these two to two and a half

399
00:24:48,000 --> 00:24:53,800
Speaker 1: hours defined his life. But his life was defined long

400
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Speaker 1: before this.

401
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Speaker 2: Yes, it was from a very early age.

402
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Speaker 1: This was just another thing we have. Is you know,

403
00:25:01,160 --> 00:25:05,080
Speaker 1: people talk about football build character. I think that's crap.

404
00:25:05,359 --> 00:25:08,919
Speaker 1: I don't think football builds character. I think football reveals character.

405
00:25:09,640 --> 00:25:12,440
Speaker 1: I think all of the preparation you do in your

406
00:25:12,520 --> 00:25:16,720
Speaker 1: life leading up to tough times tough Oh what doesn't

407
00:25:17,080 --> 00:25:19,840
Speaker 1: you know, what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger,

408
00:25:19,880 --> 00:25:22,640
Speaker 1: And you know tough times build character. I just don't

409
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Speaker 1: believe that. I think all the preparation you do in

410
00:25:26,680 --> 00:25:30,520
Speaker 1: your life for when the tough time hits you, that

411
00:25:30,600 --> 00:25:33,600
Speaker 1: don't build character. You build your character up until that point,

412
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Speaker 1: and when the tough times hit you, that's when it

413
00:25:36,400 --> 00:25:42,560
Speaker 1: has an opportunity to reveal character. And for me, the

414
00:25:42,600 --> 00:25:47,040
Speaker 1: beauty of all of it is, You're split set, his

415
00:25:47,160 --> 00:25:51,879
Speaker 1: whole life building for this moment, and the result of

416
00:25:51,920 --> 00:25:57,000
Speaker 1: his passion, his discipline, and his commitment is life. When

417
00:25:57,119 --> 00:26:03,439
Speaker 1: opportunity met, he saved others. Yeah, that is a normal

418
00:26:03,600 --> 00:26:08,280
Speaker 1: person making an extraordinary difference in the world and they're

419
00:26:08,320 --> 00:26:14,160
Speaker 1: off spread of their Yeah, I get it's dot Hubris

420
00:26:15,000 --> 00:26:19,000
Speaker 1: and I have to I mean, I can only imagine

421
00:26:19,760 --> 00:26:24,399
Speaker 1: both the pride and the humility you feel. But in

422
00:26:24,480 --> 00:26:26,080
Speaker 1: his short life, what a legacy.

423
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Speaker 2: Well, thank you. I'm just so happy for Wells. I

424
00:26:30,720 --> 00:26:33,879
Speaker 2: just was happy for Wells that he was able to

425
00:26:33,920 --> 00:26:39,520
Speaker 2: do what he did in those final hours that because

426
00:26:39,560 --> 00:26:44,679
Speaker 2: I know he was feeling he was feeling focused, and

427
00:26:44,720 --> 00:26:47,080
Speaker 2: he was knowing he was making a difference.

428
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Speaker 1: The fact that he called up and said, this is

429
00:26:51,480 --> 00:26:53,400
Speaker 1: what I want to do with my life. I don't

430
00:26:53,400 --> 00:26:56,440
Speaker 1: want to sit behind this computer and he ended up.

431
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Speaker 1: He didn't die at that computer. He died doing what

432
00:27:00,720 --> 00:27:07,359
Speaker 1: he wanted to do. Yeah. Do you think when he

433
00:27:07,440 --> 00:27:09,919
Speaker 1: went back up that last time he knew the rescue

434
00:27:09,920 --> 00:27:11,159
Speaker 1: atacud uh?

435
00:27:11,280 --> 00:27:15,880
Speaker 2: Probably? Yeah, he had to have known the risk. He's

436
00:27:15,960 --> 00:27:20,080
Speaker 2: a smart guy. But his mission was to save lives.

437
00:27:20,480 --> 00:27:24,520
Speaker 2: And I've even had some young people who were firefighters

438
00:27:24,560 --> 00:27:27,560
Speaker 2: and gone on to be paid firefighters, and you know,

439
00:27:27,680 --> 00:27:31,080
Speaker 2: regular companies say, you know, I don't know if I'd

440
00:27:31,119 --> 00:27:34,040
Speaker 2: be able to do that. But that was not Wells.

441
00:27:34,119 --> 00:27:39,040
Speaker 2: Wells was Wells was just different. I mean, he just

442
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:43,080
Speaker 2: was such a courageous soul and from the time he

443
00:27:43,240 --> 00:27:45,919
Speaker 2: was time he was a little kid, he was always

444
00:27:45,960 --> 00:27:49,600
Speaker 2: leaping from the higher highest places, and you know, just

445
00:27:49,720 --> 00:27:53,360
Speaker 2: had a big heart, and you know, he cared for animals,

446
00:27:53,359 --> 00:27:58,040
Speaker 2: he cared for people. So a friend and why, okay,

447
00:27:58,240 --> 00:28:02,880
Speaker 2: here's my thinking. A friend of mine asked once why

448
00:28:02,880 --> 00:28:09,160
Speaker 2: does evil exist in the world? And I said, I'm

449
00:28:09,160 --> 00:28:12,800
Speaker 2: supposed to answer that. How can I answer that? And

450
00:28:12,840 --> 00:28:16,520
Speaker 2: she said you have to, Okay, So I thought about it,

451
00:28:16,560 --> 00:28:19,000
Speaker 2: and I said, well, I guess evil exists in the

452
00:28:19,000 --> 00:28:21,960
Speaker 2: world because if evil didn't exist, then we'd be all

453
00:28:22,000 --> 00:28:26,640
Speaker 2: here happy, jaunty, jolly, you know, like, what's the purpose

454
00:28:26,680 --> 00:28:29,200
Speaker 2: of that? And so I really fully believe that we're

455
00:28:29,240 --> 00:28:32,080
Speaker 2: here on this earth. I have deep faith in God,

456
00:28:32,240 --> 00:28:36,280
Speaker 2: and I believe in the afterlife and the whatever for

457
00:28:36,359 --> 00:28:37,840
Speaker 2: a life, if there is one.

458
00:28:39,960 --> 00:28:40,400
Speaker 1: But I.

459
00:28:42,360 --> 00:28:45,680
Speaker 2: Think that's our purpose here in this physical form on earth,

460
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:52,000
Speaker 2: to build our souls from wherever we start off, to

461
00:28:52,040 --> 00:28:55,240
Speaker 2: build our character, to build our souls, to look at challenges,

462
00:28:55,240 --> 00:28:59,400
Speaker 2: to look at evil, to see how we respond, and

463
00:28:59,480 --> 00:29:01,600
Speaker 2: in how we respond is how we.

464
00:29:01,880 --> 00:29:11,320
Speaker 1: Build our souls, you know, coming full circle. If somebody

465
00:29:11,320 --> 00:29:14,800
Speaker 1: had come to Wells and said, hey, Wells, think about

466
00:29:14,800 --> 00:29:17,240
Speaker 1: what you're doing right now, because what you do right

467
00:29:17,280 --> 00:29:20,840
Speaker 1: now will define what could be the rest of your life,

468
00:29:21,120 --> 00:29:23,800
Speaker 1: much like the advice Wells gave to his friend in

469
00:29:23,880 --> 00:29:27,840
Speaker 1: high school, and it'll probably still run up the stairs.

470
00:29:28,040 --> 00:29:31,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, and maybe that did go through his mind

471
00:29:31,760 --> 00:29:35,120
Speaker 2: and he would say, did it well, he probably would say,

472
00:29:36,200 --> 00:29:40,520
Speaker 2: I feel guilty forever if I leave anybody behind. I

473
00:29:40,520 --> 00:29:43,560
Speaker 2: think that's probably maybe more what he was thinking.

474
00:29:44,560 --> 00:29:55,520
Speaker 1: So here's the deal. The story of wells life, the

475
00:29:55,560 --> 00:29:59,360
Speaker 1: story of his death, cannot be so proud. It's profound

476
00:29:59,400 --> 00:30:02,960
Speaker 1: that it over shadows the story of his life, which

477
00:30:03,160 --> 00:30:08,280
Speaker 1: was about leadership and about caring for others, and about

478
00:30:08,520 --> 00:30:13,440
Speaker 1: being part of the team and about caring and so

479
00:30:15,160 --> 00:30:21,760
Speaker 1: as as all inspiring as the story of the last

480
00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:27,320
Speaker 1: three hours of your son's life is and is phenomenal,

481
00:30:28,440 --> 00:30:34,720
Speaker 1: as the discovery of that story through Jeff giving him

482
00:30:34,760 --> 00:30:39,320
Speaker 1: a red handkerchief which connected everything to everything, which if

483
00:30:39,320 --> 00:30:42,000
Speaker 1: you don't think there's divinity involved in it, I can't

484
00:30:42,040 --> 00:30:48,640
Speaker 1: talk to you because clearly there is. Now there's a

485
00:30:48,720 --> 00:30:54,880
Speaker 1: curriculum to honor not his death, but his life. Tell

486
00:30:54,920 --> 00:30:55,520
Speaker 1: me about that.

487
00:30:55,840 --> 00:30:59,240
Speaker 2: Well, thank you for asking. Yes, we're very proud of this.

488
00:31:01,360 --> 00:31:03,720
Speaker 2: Formed a charitable trust in two thousand and one when

489
00:31:03,720 --> 00:31:06,320
Speaker 2: this happened, so we because people were giving us money

490
00:31:06,440 --> 00:31:10,120
Speaker 2: like crazy. A fire department gave us like thirteen thousand

491
00:31:10,160 --> 00:31:13,760
Speaker 2: dollars from Maine, made a collection of different houses up

492
00:31:13,760 --> 00:31:15,880
Speaker 2: in Maine sent that. So what are we going to do?

493
00:31:15,960 --> 00:31:19,640
Speaker 2: Let's start. We started this. So ten years into doing

494
00:31:19,680 --> 00:31:22,880
Speaker 2: our charitable work, I'd been also invited to schools and

495
00:31:22,920 --> 00:31:25,160
Speaker 2: speak and we were getting a lot of letters.

496
00:31:25,080 --> 00:31:28,040
Speaker 1: From Stades and all those other times.

497
00:31:28,120 --> 00:31:30,719
Speaker 2: Yeah, things were happening. Well Espen called because that was

498
00:31:30,800 --> 00:31:34,840
Speaker 2: Wells's buddy, Drew Gallagher from Boston College worked for ESPN,

499
00:31:34,920 --> 00:31:38,800
Speaker 2: so this was his brains child, and we're forever thankful.

500
00:31:38,960 --> 00:31:40,920
Speaker 2: He won a sports Immy as a result, which is

501
00:31:41,040 --> 00:31:41,480
Speaker 2: very nice.

502
00:31:41,520 --> 00:31:44,600
Speaker 1: I didn't know that it deserved it. Listen, I sat

503
00:31:44,640 --> 00:31:46,640
Speaker 1: on the airplane, and the guy next to me thought

504
00:31:46,720 --> 00:31:49,000
Speaker 1: I was an idiot because I watched it crying on

505
00:31:49,080 --> 00:31:52,880
Speaker 1: the airplane like a big baby only two days ago.

506
00:31:53,040 --> 00:31:57,160
Speaker 2: Oh dear. Well, anyway, so ten years into this, we

507
00:31:57,200 --> 00:31:58,360
Speaker 2: get a call from.

508
00:31:59,440 --> 00:32:02,760
Speaker 1: By the way, your husband is who made me cry?

509
00:32:03,000 --> 00:32:08,760
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, because related as a father, your father.

510
00:32:09,320 --> 00:32:16,280
Speaker 1: I mean, your husband, the love he has for his son.

511
00:32:19,200 --> 00:32:23,720
Speaker 1: There's no camera, angle or producer or director that can

512
00:32:23,840 --> 00:32:30,520
Speaker 1: make what that was. And I thought about my own

513
00:32:30,640 --> 00:32:37,120
Speaker 1: children and if I had lost one of my own

514
00:32:37,520 --> 00:32:42,680
Speaker 1: in this way, and I crawled inside your husband's heart

515
00:32:42,960 --> 00:32:52,280
Speaker 1: just died a little with him. It's so very real. Yeah,

516
00:32:53,200 --> 00:32:53,680
Speaker 1: I'm sorry.

517
00:32:53,800 --> 00:32:57,680
Speaker 2: Oh no, that's okay. No, it's important to people understand

518
00:32:57,920 --> 00:33:02,920
Speaker 2: the connection that fathers can have with each other. Anyway,

519
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:07,840
Speaker 2: So another friend of our sons, Timothy Epstein, who is

520
00:33:08,200 --> 00:33:11,040
Speaker 2: an attorney in Chicago now, was working as an advisor

521
00:33:11,480 --> 00:33:14,400
Speaker 2: on a special project for the Fetzer Institute, which is

522
00:33:14,440 --> 00:33:17,880
Speaker 2: based in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The purpose of this study was

523
00:33:18,040 --> 00:33:21,760
Speaker 2: how to kind of learn more about how love and

524
00:33:21,800 --> 00:33:24,760
Speaker 2: forgiveness can work in the world. So they had sixteen

525
00:33:24,760 --> 00:33:28,280
Speaker 2: different areas of focus and Tim called and said, would

526
00:33:28,360 --> 00:33:31,160
Speaker 2: you like to. I'm inviting you to make your like

527
00:33:31,320 --> 00:33:33,520
Speaker 2: what would be your next creative step for the trust?

528
00:33:33,920 --> 00:33:36,720
Speaker 2: So I said, I know what we need. We need

529
00:33:36,760 --> 00:33:41,800
Speaker 2: to write some lessons, create some lessons around Wells's story

530
00:33:42,080 --> 00:33:45,080
Speaker 2: because people are teaching about Wells and it would be

531
00:33:45,200 --> 00:33:49,600
Speaker 2: nice to be able to, you know, communicate some specific

532
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:54,280
Speaker 2: lessons and values on character along with this. So I said,

533
00:33:54,280 --> 00:33:56,480
Speaker 2: but I have to call a friend of mine. I

534
00:33:56,520 --> 00:34:00,240
Speaker 2: called Renoi Paolini, who was an educator retired in New

535
00:34:00,360 --> 00:34:03,080
Speaker 2: Jersey who had been invited by the Nine to eleven

536
00:34:03,120 --> 00:34:06,600
Speaker 2: Museum to write lessons and she chose about artifacts. So

537
00:34:06,680 --> 00:34:09,880
Speaker 2: she chose Wells's red bandana to write about, and that's

538
00:34:09,920 --> 00:34:12,920
Speaker 2: how we got to know her. She was just amazing

539
00:34:13,520 --> 00:34:16,760
Speaker 2: and so the FETs we put together proposals of fetsren

540
00:34:17,120 --> 00:34:20,960
Speaker 2: Institute funded us and we created the Red Bandana Project,

541
00:34:21,440 --> 00:34:25,680
Speaker 2: which are lessons on leadership, caring for Others, Team, the

542
00:34:25,719 --> 00:34:30,800
Speaker 2: Power of One, Forgiveness, Bridging Divides, Bridging Divides, Forgiveness, and

543
00:34:30,920 --> 00:34:35,520
Speaker 2: Carpe DM seven different lessons each in five different categories

544
00:34:36,160 --> 00:34:40,000
Speaker 2: elementary school, middle school, high school, sports teams and camps,

545
00:34:40,000 --> 00:34:42,680
Speaker 2: and youth programs. And there was a specialist in each

546
00:34:42,760 --> 00:34:48,240
Speaker 2: area that BRNOI and I pulled together to create these lessons.

547
00:34:48,239 --> 00:34:52,600
Speaker 2: It was such an organic, wonderful time. I was so

548
00:34:53,160 --> 00:34:55,560
Speaker 2: excited about this work and proud of it. And so

549
00:34:56,000 --> 00:34:59,320
Speaker 2: now ten years later, we've had the middle school lessons

550
00:34:59,520 --> 00:35:04,719
Speaker 2: updated and digitized, so they are you can people.

551
00:35:04,440 --> 00:35:06,600
Speaker 1: Where used well in schools.

552
00:35:06,640 --> 00:35:09,239
Speaker 2: They're being used in schools. We're trying to get them

553
00:35:09,320 --> 00:35:12,880
Speaker 2: out more, which is part of our mission now to

554
00:35:12,960 --> 00:35:17,440
Speaker 2: spread the word because teachers that use them are finding

555
00:35:17,440 --> 00:35:20,680
Speaker 2: them to be really excellent. There's a teacher in Scarsdale

556
00:35:20,719 --> 00:35:25,000
Speaker 2: Middle School that has been teaching the forgiveness lesson for years. Now.

557
00:35:25,200 --> 00:35:27,000
Speaker 2: I go and speak to her group. I grew up there,

558
00:35:27,120 --> 00:35:30,120
Speaker 2: so it's going like kind of going home for me

559
00:35:30,200 --> 00:35:32,239
Speaker 2: a bit. My mother was an art teacher there too

560
00:35:32,280 --> 00:35:36,239
Speaker 2: for twenty two years. So and our local YMCA, Rock

561
00:35:36,280 --> 00:35:38,800
Speaker 2: and County YMCA has been teaching the middle school lessons.

562
00:35:38,800 --> 00:35:41,640
Speaker 2: They said they're just great. I am now in the

563
00:35:41,680 --> 00:35:45,799
Speaker 2: process of talking hopefully soon with the CEO of the

564
00:35:45,800 --> 00:35:49,880
Speaker 2: Boys and Girls Club of Los Angeles about hopefully seeing

565
00:35:49,880 --> 00:35:52,880
Speaker 2: how we could work together on using these So. I

566
00:35:52,880 --> 00:35:56,359
Speaker 2: think it's hard for schools because they have so much

567
00:35:56,400 --> 00:36:02,560
Speaker 2: to cover with their usual curriculum. It takes a special

568
00:36:02,560 --> 00:36:07,920
Speaker 2: teacher to engage with extra things. So, but they're now

569
00:36:07,960 --> 00:36:11,799
Speaker 2: available free for downloading on our website, crowdertrust dot org.

570
00:36:12,200 --> 00:36:15,600
Speaker 1: So that's what I was going to say. So, if

571
00:36:15,640 --> 00:36:18,520
Speaker 1: you've got a youth group, or if you're a teacher

572
00:36:18,880 --> 00:36:22,840
Speaker 1: or whatever, you can download this curriculum for free, depending

573
00:36:22,880 --> 00:36:26,919
Speaker 1: on whatever age group it is, and teach these very

574
00:36:27,560 --> 00:36:31,839
Speaker 1: fundamental tendons, all inspired by your son.

575
00:36:32,080 --> 00:36:35,359
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, and other stories too. They you know, they

576
00:36:35,360 --> 00:36:38,600
Speaker 2: do bring in other stories as examples of what regular

577
00:36:38,640 --> 00:36:39,320
Speaker 2: people can.

578
00:36:39,200 --> 00:36:44,479
Speaker 1: Do, for instance, forgiveness. This lesson helps students to find

579
00:36:44,560 --> 00:36:49,040
Speaker 1: forgiveness of both personal societal context while exploring how forgiveness

580
00:36:49,760 --> 00:36:55,080
Speaker 1: can positively impact individuals and communities. I read that, and

581
00:36:55,160 --> 00:37:08,399
Speaker 1: I thought, in our broken, evil, divided, polarized world, how

582
00:37:08,520 --> 00:37:11,719
Speaker 1: far could forgiveness go to solving so much of what

583
00:37:11,840 --> 00:37:12,799
Speaker 1: deels us?

584
00:37:13,200 --> 00:37:14,960
Speaker 2: I think just about everything.

585
00:37:16,160 --> 00:37:22,200
Speaker 1: CARPIDM. This lesson encourages students to analyze quotes on seizing

586
00:37:22,280 --> 00:37:29,040
Speaker 1: the day, identify personal obstacles, explore how wells crowd overcame challenges,

587
00:37:29,719 --> 00:37:34,320
Speaker 1: and create their own philosophy for overcoming obstacles. In other words,

588
00:37:34,520 --> 00:37:38,440
Speaker 1: don't be a victim, go seize the day the power

589
00:37:38,440 --> 00:37:42,200
Speaker 1: of wood. This lesson explores the power of wood property

590
00:37:42,320 --> 00:37:47,960
Speaker 1: students to reflect on its relevance, journal on how compassion

591
00:37:48,160 --> 00:37:52,240
Speaker 1: influenced Wells Crowler, and recognize others who made an impact.

592
00:37:53,040 --> 00:37:58,640
Speaker 1: I can't think of a cooler Your son's legacy is

593
00:37:58,800 --> 00:38:01,400
Speaker 1: such a short time. Are the lives of the people

594
00:38:01,600 --> 00:38:08,440
Speaker 1: saved their offspring. But also now this curriculum of tendants

595
00:38:09,480 --> 00:38:15,200
Speaker 1: of how to lead a more fulfilling and beatingful life.

596
00:38:15,800 --> 00:38:20,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really powerful stuff, and I mean we're truly

597
00:38:20,400 --> 00:38:23,080
Speaker 2: blessed that we have so many people around us. Empower

598
00:38:24,200 --> 00:38:26,799
Speaker 2: an investment company. I don't know if you're familiar with it.

599
00:38:26,920 --> 00:38:29,640
Speaker 2: It's pretty big. They do retirement funds and things based

600
00:38:29,640 --> 00:38:32,640
Speaker 2: out in Colorado, but the CEO is a Boston College

601
00:38:32,680 --> 00:38:37,520
Speaker 2: alum and he is all about Wells. They were very

602
00:38:37,560 --> 00:38:41,120
Speaker 2: generous and financed are updating of the lessons and the

603
00:38:41,160 --> 00:38:45,040
Speaker 2: digitizing of it, and we're still working with them today.

604
00:38:45,560 --> 00:38:48,919
Speaker 2: It is powerful stuff. And when I go to speak

605
00:38:48,960 --> 00:38:51,680
Speaker 2: at school, I travel around the country now speaking at

606
00:38:51,680 --> 00:38:53,800
Speaker 2: schools quite a bit. I'm going to be in Tennessee.

607
00:38:54,000 --> 00:38:55,560
Speaker 1: That's a great state.

608
00:38:55,680 --> 00:39:00,680
Speaker 2: Yes, I know I'm going to be in Knoxville speaking

609
00:39:00,719 --> 00:39:03,840
Speaker 2: at the web School. I'm there school, Yes, I gather

610
00:39:04,040 --> 00:39:08,840
Speaker 2: and the lacrosse coach put me there because he talked

611
00:39:08,880 --> 00:39:12,759
Speaker 2: to a friend of our sons who played with him

612
00:39:12,880 --> 00:39:16,960
Speaker 2: at West Point, and then another friend from Boston College

613
00:39:16,960 --> 00:39:19,800
Speaker 2: that I guess played with him in some sort of tournament. Anyway,

614
00:39:19,960 --> 00:39:23,200
Speaker 2: so I'll be the commencement speaker for their graduating seniors,

615
00:39:23,239 --> 00:39:24,880
Speaker 2: and then the next day I'm going to speak to

616
00:39:24,920 --> 00:39:28,160
Speaker 2: the rest of the school population. When I talked to them,

617
00:39:28,640 --> 00:39:31,640
Speaker 2: I like to say, I like to say, Wells was

618
00:39:31,680 --> 00:39:34,239
Speaker 2: a lot like you. You know, he was a regular kid.

619
00:39:34,600 --> 00:39:38,279
Speaker 2: He was a lot like that, maybe not quite such

620
00:39:38,280 --> 00:39:42,360
Speaker 2: a normal folks. He was a normal kid, had friends,

621
00:39:42,480 --> 00:39:46,200
Speaker 2: got into some mischief, but always was very apologetic for

622
00:39:46,239 --> 00:39:48,799
Speaker 2: any I mean, he only did one really crazy thing.

623
00:39:49,200 --> 00:39:51,840
Speaker 2: But anyway, I like to teach the difference, try to

624
00:39:51,840 --> 00:39:57,080
Speaker 2: help them understand the difference between despotic leadership and enlightened leadership.

625
00:39:57,360 --> 00:39:59,959
Speaker 2: To me, that's very important and what involves in enlighten

626
00:40:00,160 --> 00:40:03,880
Speaker 2: leadership and as these other factors caring for others, the

627
00:40:03,880 --> 00:40:06,880
Speaker 2: power of one, I say to you them, it lies

628
00:40:06,920 --> 00:40:08,840
Speaker 2: within each and every one of you. To make a

629
00:40:08,840 --> 00:40:12,080
Speaker 2: difference in this world. And it can be multiple times

630
00:40:12,080 --> 00:40:15,760
Speaker 2: throughout the day, choosing how you react to a situation

631
00:40:15,920 --> 00:40:18,719
Speaker 2: or how you deal with something. You can either make

632
00:40:18,760 --> 00:40:21,640
Speaker 2: something better or make something worse. You can make someone

633
00:40:21,680 --> 00:40:24,120
Speaker 2: happy or you know, somebody drops their books, stop and

634
00:40:24,160 --> 00:40:25,960
Speaker 2: help them pick them up. Or sit with a kid

635
00:40:25,960 --> 00:40:28,600
Speaker 2: that's sitting by themselves at the lunch table. Get to

636
00:40:28,640 --> 00:40:32,239
Speaker 2: know them, you know. Just do the kind thing, not

637
00:40:32,320 --> 00:40:35,640
Speaker 2: the not the cruel thing, the do the selfless thing,

638
00:40:35,719 --> 00:40:36,680
Speaker 2: not the selfish thing.

639
00:40:36,880 --> 00:40:38,680
Speaker 1: All right, So World War time is somebody what was

640
00:40:38,760 --> 00:40:40,920
Speaker 1: the doubtless load this curricul They go.

641
00:40:41,280 --> 00:40:46,080
Speaker 2: To crowdertrust dot org www dot crowd trust dot org

642
00:40:46,440 --> 00:40:48,920
Speaker 2: and you will see their links to the Red Bandana

643
00:40:48,960 --> 00:40:51,759
Speaker 2: Project and a bunch of history. And I will say

644
00:40:51,760 --> 00:40:53,800
Speaker 2: this one last thing, if.

645
00:40:53,360 --> 00:40:54,680
Speaker 1: You're worrying, the water is up.

646
00:40:55,239 --> 00:40:57,840
Speaker 2: When Wells was working at his office, he carried his

647
00:40:57,920 --> 00:41:00,239
Speaker 2: red bandana with him every He continued to care Harriot

648
00:41:00,320 --> 00:41:05,239
Speaker 2: throughout his life. The weekend before the Sunday before Tuesday,

649
00:41:05,600 --> 00:41:07,560
Speaker 2: we were down in the city having dinner with him.

650
00:41:07,600 --> 00:41:10,400
Speaker 2: We're walking across the street and Wells pulled out of

651
00:41:10,480 --> 00:41:15,520
Speaker 2: his back pocket a red bandana wrapped around his comb.

652
00:41:15,600 --> 00:41:18,319
Speaker 2: I said, Wells, are you still carrying that thing? You're

653
00:41:18,400 --> 00:41:20,680
Speaker 2: working on Wall Street now, I can't believe you're still

654
00:41:20,719 --> 00:41:23,680
Speaker 2: carrying nothing. And he just gave me this like catlike grin.

655
00:41:23,880 --> 00:41:26,120
Speaker 2: You know, he just loved the response. But yes, I

656
00:41:26,239 --> 00:41:29,520
Speaker 2: you know, yes I am. Apparently I learned much later

657
00:41:29,920 --> 00:41:33,120
Speaker 2: through research done by Tom Ornaldy that there was a

658
00:41:33,160 --> 00:41:36,080
Speaker 2: woman at his office. Wells always carried his red bandana,

659
00:41:36,120 --> 00:41:38,880
Speaker 2: put it on his office desk, and she said to

660
00:41:39,000 --> 00:41:41,640
Speaker 2: him one day, Wells, what is it with that red bandana?

661
00:41:42,160 --> 00:41:45,120
Speaker 2: Why are you carrying that red bandana all the time?

662
00:41:45,920 --> 00:41:48,640
Speaker 2: And Wells just smiled her and picked it up and

663
00:41:48,800 --> 00:41:51,040
Speaker 2: held it up and he said, with this red bandana,

664
00:41:51,120 --> 00:41:52,280
Speaker 2: I'm going to change the world.

665
00:41:54,440 --> 00:41:59,680
Speaker 1: Ud believable. Yeah, Eddie did, and he did and.

666
00:41:59,800 --> 00:42:02,319
Speaker 2: He is doing it. And I say to young people,

667
00:42:02,360 --> 00:42:04,719
Speaker 2: I said, don't let anybody take your power away from you.

668
00:42:05,760 --> 00:42:08,719
Speaker 2: Don't do that. Know that you have the power within

669
00:42:08,840 --> 00:42:12,480
Speaker 2: you to make decisions, to make choices no matter what's

670
00:42:12,520 --> 00:42:14,480
Speaker 2: around you. It's how you respond.

671
00:42:16,840 --> 00:42:33,759
Speaker 1: We'll be right back. We're an army. Adorable folks. Tell

672
00:42:33,840 --> 00:42:37,160
Speaker 1: us stories of normal people who do extraordinary things, whether

673
00:42:37,160 --> 00:42:43,000
Speaker 1: their passionate discipline meets an opportunity, and Alison, your son

674
00:42:43,120 --> 00:42:45,960
Speaker 1: taught us that lesson with his life, but more totally,

675
00:42:48,080 --> 00:42:52,480
Speaker 1: he continues to teach us the lesson through this curriculum

676
00:42:53,120 --> 00:42:57,360
Speaker 1: and through you being so willing and so selfless to

677
00:42:57,520 --> 00:43:04,160
Speaker 1: share what has to be so hard to share. But

678
00:43:04,480 --> 00:43:07,080
Speaker 1: I guess in a way that's kind of how wells

679
00:43:07,080 --> 00:43:08,080
Speaker 1: would have done it anyway.

680
00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:15,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, And I think I think also, you know

681
00:43:15,440 --> 00:43:19,640
Speaker 2: that I've shared this before that I have a question

682
00:43:19,800 --> 00:43:22,200
Speaker 2: answer period always when I go to talk to schools,

683
00:43:22,239 --> 00:43:24,840
Speaker 2: and some of the questions are pretty amazing. In the

684
00:43:24,920 --> 00:43:28,040
Speaker 2: last one, I was at the Belmont Hills School up

685
00:43:28,040 --> 00:43:30,239
Speaker 2: in Massachusetts speaking a couple of weeks ago, and this

686
00:43:30,320 --> 00:43:32,640
Speaker 2: young man stoop and said, what what did you learn

687
00:43:33,000 --> 00:43:38,240
Speaker 2: most about yourself with nine to eleven? And that would

688
00:43:38,440 --> 00:43:42,160
Speaker 2: nobody ever asked me that question before? And I said, well,

689
00:43:42,280 --> 00:43:45,080
Speaker 2: you know, there's to myself where there's the family support,

690
00:43:45,120 --> 00:43:47,959
Speaker 2: the friends support, all of that that helped make things good.

691
00:43:48,640 --> 00:43:50,560
Speaker 2: Said But I said to him, I said, what I

692
00:43:50,680 --> 00:43:54,520
Speaker 2: really learned that was new was about the power of

693
00:43:54,560 --> 00:43:58,320
Speaker 2: the spiritual side of what was involved in this. And

694
00:43:58,400 --> 00:44:00,000
Speaker 2: I didn't go into a lot of detail about it.

695
00:44:00,600 --> 00:44:05,319
Speaker 2: But that premonition gave me strength. It opened the door

696
00:44:05,840 --> 00:44:10,000
Speaker 2: to show me that there are and since then other

697
00:44:10,080 --> 00:44:13,279
Speaker 2: things have happened too, but to show me that that

698
00:44:13,480 --> 00:44:19,279
Speaker 2: there are forces that we can't touch. It's faith, it's God,

699
00:44:19,760 --> 00:44:23,360
Speaker 2: it's whatever forces are. There are reasons that things happen

700
00:44:23,440 --> 00:44:26,320
Speaker 2: in life. And it's like a big and I remember

701
00:44:26,400 --> 00:44:28,080
Speaker 2: thinking this in the beginning, it's going to be like

702
00:44:28,120 --> 00:44:31,160
Speaker 2: a big jigsaw puzzle we're putting back together. I'm still

703
00:44:31,239 --> 00:44:34,120
Speaker 2: putting the pieces back together as all this plays out.

704
00:44:34,280 --> 00:44:39,279
Speaker 2: With what we're doing now, it's not the story is

705
00:44:39,360 --> 00:44:42,480
Speaker 2: not over yet. The story is not over yet. There's

706
00:44:42,560 --> 00:44:46,160
Speaker 2: more to come and it's and it's powerful, and that

707
00:44:46,640 --> 00:44:51,000
Speaker 2: has given me huge strength. I remember taking remember soon

708
00:44:51,080 --> 00:44:54,319
Speaker 2: after nine to eleven, and I was in pretty much

709
00:44:54,360 --> 00:44:58,080
Speaker 2: a state of shock for number of days. But the Thursday, Friday,

710
00:44:58,160 --> 00:45:01,880
Speaker 2: Friday morning, I woke up thinking, you know why. I

711
00:45:02,040 --> 00:45:04,440
Speaker 2: thought for a long time, why couldn't I do anything?

712
00:45:04,600 --> 00:45:08,640
Speaker 2: Why couldn't I do something to stop, to help wells,

713
00:45:08,719 --> 00:45:11,280
Speaker 2: to get you know, to tell people to get out whatever.

714
00:45:12,000 --> 00:45:16,239
Speaker 2: And I felt very guilty. I felt guilty that I

715
00:45:16,400 --> 00:45:19,680
Speaker 2: wasn't able to process the premonition I had into being

716
00:45:19,760 --> 00:45:24,080
Speaker 2: able to save the people that didn't make it. And

717
00:45:25,320 --> 00:45:28,879
Speaker 2: then that Friday morning I woke up and then I realized, Oh,

718
00:45:29,200 --> 00:45:31,600
Speaker 2: it was another series of epiphanies I had about this.

719
00:45:32,239 --> 00:45:36,200
Speaker 2: This was the next one. This message was just meant

720
00:45:36,280 --> 00:45:39,560
Speaker 2: for me. It was just meant for me, and what

721
00:45:39,680 --> 00:45:41,160
Speaker 2: am I going to do about it? So I met,

722
00:45:41,800 --> 00:45:44,399
Speaker 2: I called my minister. I said I have to talk

723
00:45:44,440 --> 00:45:46,399
Speaker 2: to you in church and I went and sat. I said,

724
00:45:47,000 --> 00:45:49,000
Speaker 2: out of your office, we have to go into the sanctuary,

725
00:45:49,040 --> 00:45:51,719
Speaker 2: sit before the cross. So I'm you know, I'm telling

726
00:45:51,800 --> 00:45:56,000
Speaker 2: you the honest truths. And he was wonderful. He was

727
00:45:56,280 --> 00:45:59,360
Speaker 2: very enlarged. Thinking man had also been a Vaunteer firefighter.

728
00:46:00,080 --> 00:46:03,480
Speaker 2: He said, I told him what happened and he said,

729
00:46:04,000 --> 00:46:07,600
Speaker 2: he said, you know, he said, you weren't meant to

730
00:46:07,640 --> 00:46:11,640
Speaker 2: stop the freight train, but you're And I said, he said,

731
00:46:11,680 --> 00:46:15,160
Speaker 2: you'll know what to do. And I said, I that's

732
00:46:15,200 --> 00:46:18,160
Speaker 2: the problem. I don't know what to do. And he said,

733
00:46:18,160 --> 00:46:21,160
Speaker 2: don't worry. Your heart will tell you how. And that

734
00:46:21,360 --> 00:46:28,040
Speaker 2: was such powerful counseling. It just gave me strength and faith, faith,

735
00:46:28,880 --> 00:46:31,520
Speaker 2: and every time I prayed to God, please help me,

736
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:34,840
Speaker 2: I feel so low, I feel down to the ground, ground,

737
00:46:34,960 --> 00:46:41,160
Speaker 2: down to the ground. And then within minutes an answer

738
00:46:41,160 --> 00:46:44,279
Speaker 2: would come or a support of something like my sister

739
00:46:44,360 --> 00:46:48,520
Speaker 2: in law calling from Italy from Rome, five o'clock our time,

740
00:46:49,239 --> 00:46:52,000
Speaker 2: and she's calling to say, I don't know what made

741
00:46:52,040 --> 00:46:53,600
Speaker 2: me pick up the phone and call you right now.

742
00:46:53,880 --> 00:46:55,760
Speaker 2: This is after I'd looked at a picture of Wells

743
00:46:56,080 --> 00:46:59,040
Speaker 2: with a little boy holding his Easter eggs so proud,

744
00:46:59,200 --> 00:47:01,759
Speaker 2: big eyes, and I was in tears, like God, why

745
00:47:02,120 --> 00:47:04,600
Speaker 2: did you let anybody take this beautiful child away from me?

746
00:47:05,400 --> 00:47:07,560
Speaker 2: And she called and she said, I don't know what

747
00:47:07,640 --> 00:47:09,279
Speaker 2: it was that made me pick up the phone. Now

748
00:47:09,320 --> 00:47:11,919
Speaker 2: it's midnight in Rome to call you right now, she said,

749
00:47:11,960 --> 00:47:14,239
Speaker 2: but I had to call you and tell you this.

750
00:47:14,640 --> 00:47:17,960
Speaker 2: I met with a religious man and he told me

751
00:47:18,320 --> 00:47:21,160
Speaker 2: that God will miracle. She told him about Wells, and

752
00:47:21,320 --> 00:47:26,840
Speaker 2: he said God will miracle him. And that was before

753
00:47:26,920 --> 00:47:30,000
Speaker 2: Wells was recovered. That was in the Witten like in February,

754
00:47:30,080 --> 00:47:31,799
Speaker 2: before Wells was recovered in March.

755
00:47:34,320 --> 00:47:39,239
Speaker 4: Gives me strength, clearly, it gives you strength to keep

756
00:47:39,320 --> 00:47:43,839
Speaker 4: doing this, Alex, How old the world did you bring

757
00:47:43,920 --> 00:47:44,879
Speaker 4: this person of my life?

758
00:47:44,960 --> 00:47:49,320
Speaker 1: Today? Holy, Holy she's pretty special. Huh oh, thanks to

759
00:47:49,400 --> 00:47:51,879
Speaker 1: you or anybody else that's joined us. Have a quest

760
00:47:51,920 --> 00:47:55,759
Speaker 1: And by the way, Allison and everybody listened, it was

761
00:47:55,880 --> 00:47:59,000
Speaker 1: eighty degrees what to forty degrees and my sinusys have

762
00:47:59,120 --> 00:48:03,520
Speaker 1: gone nuts, heard me snifflin and everything. Well, one time

763
00:48:03,600 --> 00:48:05,480
Speaker 1: it was because I choked up because of the story.

764
00:48:05,560 --> 00:48:07,440
Speaker 1: But the rest of the time it is because of allergies.

765
00:48:07,480 --> 00:48:11,480
Speaker 1: And I apologize putting up a by stiffland Today, you

766
00:48:11,600 --> 00:48:14,200
Speaker 1: have something to ask Alison or anybody out there, have

767
00:48:14,280 --> 00:48:18,440
Speaker 1: any questions or thoughts or just want to say, my gosh,

768
00:48:18,560 --> 00:48:22,160
Speaker 1: what an amazing woman and your son and your family

769
00:48:22,440 --> 00:48:24,040
Speaker 1: and everything else.

770
00:48:24,239 --> 00:48:26,239
Speaker 2: I'm just trying to keep up with Wells. That's shit.

771
00:48:27,200 --> 00:48:28,840
Speaker 2: It's all about keeping up with Wells.

772
00:48:29,000 --> 00:48:30,080
Speaker 1: That's pretty phenomenal.

773
00:48:31,200 --> 00:48:35,120
Speaker 2: You guys, there's a hand, Yes, sir hi, I wanted

774
00:48:35,160 --> 00:48:43,239
Speaker 2: to ask what was Wells's faith life? Like his faith? Well,

775
00:48:43,840 --> 00:48:51,160
Speaker 2: we're Episcopal, raised Episcopal, and he really embraced some of

776
00:48:51,200 --> 00:48:53,520
Speaker 2: the things that surprised me. I mean he missed a

777
00:48:53,560 --> 00:48:57,000
Speaker 2: lot of true, he did get confirmed, but he always

778
00:48:57,040 --> 00:48:59,880
Speaker 2: had ice hockey practices early Sunday mornings, so that kind

779
00:48:59,920 --> 00:49:03,600
Speaker 2: of nipped into church time. But he loved he loved

780
00:49:03,640 --> 00:49:07,280
Speaker 2: being in church when he was there, he he loved

781
00:49:07,480 --> 00:49:12,480
Speaker 2: the Easter series of especially the washing of the feet

782
00:49:12,840 --> 00:49:15,040
Speaker 2: that we would do Thursday nights. He just loved that.

783
00:49:15,320 --> 00:49:18,760
Speaker 1: And so I would take him to that, No surprise,

784
00:49:18,880 --> 00:49:20,239
Speaker 1: that's all about service.

785
00:49:20,080 --> 00:49:23,800
Speaker 2: I guess, you know. Yeah, And and he would go

786
00:49:24,040 --> 00:49:27,400
Speaker 2: to the he would go to the regular you know,

787
00:49:27,560 --> 00:49:31,520
Speaker 2: Christmas in Easter. When he when he went to Boston College,

788
00:49:31,640 --> 00:49:37,399
Speaker 2: which was is a Jesuit university, he really he called

789
00:49:37,480 --> 00:49:39,560
Speaker 2: up one time he says, Mom, I don't want you

790
00:49:39,560 --> 00:49:41,400
Speaker 2: to take this the wrong way, but I'm taking a

791
00:49:41,480 --> 00:49:44,120
Speaker 2: class in religion. I think it was probably required at BC.

792
00:49:44,920 --> 00:49:47,320
Speaker 2: And he said, do you mind. I said, of course not.

793
00:49:47,560 --> 00:49:49,640
Speaker 2: I think that's really important. He said, well, don't worry.

794
00:49:50,160 --> 00:49:51,440
Speaker 2: They're not trying to convert me.

795
00:49:52,560 --> 00:49:55,879
Speaker 1: He were worried about were yeah?

796
00:49:55,960 --> 00:49:58,719
Speaker 2: I said, I said, no, I think that's wonderful that

797
00:49:58,880 --> 00:50:05,279
Speaker 2: you're learning. That's very special. So he had his spiritual

798
00:50:05,400 --> 00:50:11,880
Speaker 2: growth at Boston College was really something. It was really special.

799
00:50:12,480 --> 00:50:15,200
Speaker 3: And Saramato Allison as men and women for others.

800
00:50:15,200 --> 00:50:19,320
Speaker 2: That's right, that's right. And I also really think that

801
00:50:19,440 --> 00:50:21,800
Speaker 2: if if we wasn't gone to any other university or

802
00:50:21,840 --> 00:50:25,200
Speaker 2: college this probably they wouldn't have embraced what Wells did

803
00:50:25,280 --> 00:50:28,000
Speaker 2: the way Boston College has picked up on this. I

804
00:50:28,080 --> 00:50:30,480
Speaker 2: mean that they're every entering student now is given a

805
00:50:30,520 --> 00:50:33,960
Speaker 2: red bandana that they tell the Wells's story at all

806
00:50:34,000 --> 00:50:34,640
Speaker 2: the freshmen.

807
00:50:34,880 --> 00:50:39,520
Speaker 1: They have an annual race that's everybody wears red bandana.

808
00:50:40,520 --> 00:50:43,480
Speaker 2: Yep, the Red Bandana Run. It's the biggest fundraiser for

809
00:50:43,560 --> 00:50:46,560
Speaker 2: our charitable trust. And that was started back in two

810
00:50:46,600 --> 00:50:50,600
Speaker 2: thousand and five. Paige, my younger daughter, was still she

811
00:50:50,800 --> 00:50:54,680
Speaker 2: was a student there. She graduated in six So I

812
00:50:54,760 --> 00:50:57,880
Speaker 2: went up to visit and see that one of the

813
00:50:58,280 --> 00:51:01,160
Speaker 2: large donors at Boston College is was in Wells's class.

814
00:51:01,239 --> 00:51:06,800
Speaker 2: So he donated a million dollars to establish endow the

815
00:51:07,280 --> 00:51:10,760
Speaker 2: Wells Rommy Crowther directorship of the Volunteer and Service Learning Center.

816
00:51:11,840 --> 00:51:13,759
Speaker 2: I know, And so I went up to meet this

817
00:51:13,960 --> 00:51:18,399
Speaker 2: nice Dan Ponsetto, who was the great young fellow who

818
00:51:18,520 --> 00:51:23,239
Speaker 2: also teaches there, who heads it up. He laughs when

819
00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:28,360
Speaker 2: I call him young now, but everybody's young anyway. But

820
00:51:28,640 --> 00:51:33,759
Speaker 2: he's one of Wells's classmates. Two young women decided they

821
00:51:33,800 --> 00:51:36,400
Speaker 2: were going to run the New York City marathon to

822
00:51:37,080 --> 00:51:39,040
Speaker 2: raise money for the trust, and one of the goals

823
00:51:39,400 --> 00:51:43,239
Speaker 2: sold her mother's home baked. She worked in trading, but

824
00:51:43,440 --> 00:51:47,080
Speaker 2: sold her mother's chocolate chip homemade chocolate chip cookies to

825
00:51:47,200 --> 00:51:49,640
Speaker 2: raise money for Wells. To tell me she raised over

826
00:51:49,640 --> 00:51:52,880
Speaker 2: a thousand dollars with those cookies, which I thought was great. Anyway,

827
00:51:52,920 --> 00:51:54,719
Speaker 2: one of the gals introduced off she didn't run, but

828
00:51:54,840 --> 00:51:56,919
Speaker 2: mary All did run. She's still involved with us today.

829
00:51:57,520 --> 00:52:00,279
Speaker 2: And so I went up and so dance, Well what

830
00:52:00,320 --> 00:52:01,759
Speaker 2: can we do for you? I said, you don't have

831
00:52:01,840 --> 00:52:05,600
Speaker 2: to do anything. This is enough. This center is fabulous. No, no, no,

832
00:52:05,719 --> 00:52:08,719
Speaker 2: there's something we can do more, which is always the

833
00:52:08,760 --> 00:52:12,280
Speaker 2: Boston College attitude. By the way, there's never an obstacle,

834
00:52:12,440 --> 00:52:14,800
Speaker 2: only a challenge, and that kind of fit with my

835
00:52:14,960 --> 00:52:20,160
Speaker 2: thinking too. And he said, oh, I said, well, why

836
00:52:20,200 --> 00:52:22,160
Speaker 2: don't we see if we can put together a network

837
00:52:22,239 --> 00:52:24,240
Speaker 2: of people to go run the New York City Marathon,

838
00:52:24,400 --> 00:52:27,600
Speaker 2: which was a ridiculous suggestion, but it was all I

839
00:52:27,640 --> 00:52:30,239
Speaker 2: could come up with because of what Maryell did. And

840
00:52:30,719 --> 00:52:33,239
Speaker 2: he said, he said, well, why don't we just do

841
00:52:33,360 --> 00:52:36,360
Speaker 2: a run here? Okay, And that's how it started, and

842
00:52:36,719 --> 00:52:39,760
Speaker 2: it's just been it's grown from like two hundred three hundred.

843
00:52:40,120 --> 00:52:44,440
Speaker 2: The ESPN documentary came out for the tenth anniversary. Suddenly

844
00:52:44,560 --> 00:52:48,319
Speaker 2: it's up to like thirteen hundred runners in a year

845
00:52:48,400 --> 00:52:52,800
Speaker 2: or so. Again, nothing's a problem, just a challenge, and

846
00:52:53,440 --> 00:52:55,200
Speaker 2: Dan had to talk to the city of Boston to

847
00:52:55,600 --> 00:52:57,440
Speaker 2: work out a few things. But that's how it is,

848
00:52:57,520 --> 00:53:01,920
Speaker 2: and it's almost now almost, you know, always surround sixteen seventeen,

849
00:53:01,960 --> 00:53:03,239
Speaker 2: eighteen hundred runners every year.

850
00:53:03,320 --> 00:53:21,279
Speaker 1: Now we'll be right back. We always talk about how

851
00:53:21,880 --> 00:53:29,040
Speaker 1: in giving, you know, obviously the people that are given

852
00:53:29,200 --> 00:53:34,800
Speaker 1: to are rewarded with whatever is given, but the true

853
00:53:34,880 --> 00:53:38,160
Speaker 1: rewards are from the giver for the given. Yes, that

854
00:53:38,239 --> 00:53:40,560
Speaker 1: you get so much more out of what you put

855
00:53:40,640 --> 00:53:41,000
Speaker 1: into it.

856
00:53:41,200 --> 00:53:42,520
Speaker 2: Better to give than to receive.

857
00:53:43,640 --> 00:53:51,320
Speaker 1: And you know, here we are twenty three now, twenty

858
00:53:51,400 --> 00:53:59,439
Speaker 1: four years, twenty four, yeah later, and you know you're

859
00:53:59,520 --> 00:54:04,920
Speaker 1: very young. Son has a legacy that's enduring and continues,

860
00:54:05,239 --> 00:54:10,080
Speaker 1: and you know, what a gift to the world than you.

861
00:54:11,280 --> 00:54:13,399
Speaker 2: I hope to honor that. That's why I come out

862
00:54:13,520 --> 00:54:17,200
Speaker 2: and talk or do whatever I can. And I so

863
00:54:17,320 --> 00:54:19,719
Speaker 2: appreciate people. I want you to hear his story and

864
00:54:19,800 --> 00:54:23,080
Speaker 2: I hope they embrace it to the kids I talk

865
00:54:23,120 --> 00:54:25,959
Speaker 2: to sometimes, I say, think of Wells as an older brother,

866
00:54:26,760 --> 00:54:30,080
Speaker 2: you know, with an example that he would like to

867
00:54:30,120 --> 00:54:30,640
Speaker 2: share with you.

868
00:54:31,400 --> 00:54:33,200
Speaker 1: I'd like to think of people as well as as

869
00:54:33,280 --> 00:54:35,799
Speaker 1: just one of those normal folks who saw an opportunity

870
00:54:35,840 --> 00:54:38,200
Speaker 1: and filled it. And if we had millions of people

871
00:54:39,040 --> 00:54:44,520
Speaker 1: with that level of idea of service, that that kind

872
00:54:44,560 --> 00:54:49,560
Speaker 1: of bottom up approach to fixing broken things. You don't

873
00:54:49,640 --> 00:54:51,359
Speaker 1: have to give your life for the World Trade Center

874
00:54:51,440 --> 00:54:54,799
Speaker 1: to change lives anywhere else.

875
00:54:59,160 --> 00:55:00,839
Speaker 5: So I know you talk talked a little bit about

876
00:55:01,440 --> 00:55:05,640
Speaker 5: how faith sort of guided your grieving process. But and

877
00:55:05,760 --> 00:55:08,759
Speaker 5: this might get a little personal. Have a family member

878
00:55:08,760 --> 00:55:10,960
Speaker 5: who recently lost her son as well, and she's been

879
00:55:11,040 --> 00:55:13,799
Speaker 5: grieving for years. She hasn't been able to pick herself up.

880
00:55:13,840 --> 00:55:15,719
Speaker 5: And I look at you and I'm like, there's a

881
00:55:15,800 --> 00:55:18,200
Speaker 5: world out there where she can be. She can grow

882
00:55:18,239 --> 00:55:20,640
Speaker 5: from this, she can learn from this. What advice would

883
00:55:20,640 --> 00:55:22,520
Speaker 5: you give to mothers that might have lost their children

884
00:55:22,680 --> 00:55:26,080
Speaker 5: or that are grieving and really unable to see themselves

885
00:55:26,120 --> 00:55:27,160
Speaker 5: in the way that they could be.

886
00:55:28,640 --> 00:55:34,319
Speaker 2: It's you know, everybody's different, is the thing. It's it's

887
00:55:34,440 --> 00:55:36,319
Speaker 2: the worst thing in the world to lose a child.

888
00:55:37,719 --> 00:55:38,640
Speaker 2: No question about it.

889
00:55:38,920 --> 00:55:41,960
Speaker 1: It's unnatural. You're not supposed to your children are not

890
00:55:42,040 --> 00:55:45,000
Speaker 1: supposed to precede you in that right, So it upsets

891
00:55:45,160 --> 00:55:48,120
Speaker 1: the whole natural Yeah, it does.

892
00:55:48,280 --> 00:55:53,080
Speaker 2: Hor it is and I so, you know, people lose

893
00:55:53,160 --> 00:55:57,680
Speaker 2: their children through health, through accidents, through other things that

894
00:55:57,840 --> 00:56:05,400
Speaker 2: go on, and a lot, I think a lot has

895
00:56:05,480 --> 00:56:08,879
Speaker 2: to do with looking at the relationship that you had

896
00:56:09,320 --> 00:56:14,719
Speaker 2: when they were living and embrace that. You can't fix

897
00:56:14,840 --> 00:56:20,160
Speaker 2: the loss, but you just can embrace the good, hopefully,

898
00:56:21,400 --> 00:56:24,680
Speaker 2: and hopefully she had a beautiful relationship with her child.

899
00:56:25,480 --> 00:56:29,320
Speaker 2: That's what she has to embrace the blessing of that.

900
00:56:30,400 --> 00:56:34,080
Speaker 2: And you know, there's there's really nothing and maybe I

901
00:56:34,280 --> 00:56:37,719
Speaker 2: just bury things. My husband wasn't able to deal with

902
00:56:37,840 --> 00:56:45,880
Speaker 2: his loss in a healthy way, but just maybe I

903
00:56:46,000 --> 00:56:51,760
Speaker 2: don't know. Support groups never worked for me. Support groups

904
00:56:51,800 --> 00:56:54,080
Speaker 2: didn't because I was in a different place than the

905
00:56:54,200 --> 00:56:56,840
Speaker 2: other nine to eleven families that were gathering for this,

906
00:56:57,080 --> 00:57:00,719
Speaker 2: and so so that didn't work. That wasn't my role

907
00:57:01,840 --> 00:57:05,839
Speaker 2: how I rolled, so to speak. I just I think,

908
00:57:06,200 --> 00:57:13,160
Speaker 2: just embrace the love that she had and shared with them,

909
00:57:13,239 --> 00:57:18,240
Speaker 2: because I really feel my experience, in several different ways

910
00:57:18,280 --> 00:57:23,480
Speaker 2: has been that they still exist I know this and

911
00:57:24,400 --> 00:57:29,360
Speaker 2: in a different plane that we can't perceive here in

912
00:57:29,480 --> 00:57:34,120
Speaker 2: this physical body, and we're not meant to necessarily not

913
00:57:34,240 --> 00:57:39,200
Speaker 2: meant to, really, I don't think. But but they're there

914
00:57:39,280 --> 00:57:42,439
Speaker 2: with us and I and they watch overs, they watch

915
00:57:42,520 --> 00:57:45,480
Speaker 2: over us all the time. I suppose should I share

916
00:57:45,560 --> 00:57:52,960
Speaker 2: my hard boiled egg story? Okay, I'm supposed to write

917
00:57:52,960 --> 00:57:55,400
Speaker 2: a book now, so you all can read my book

918
00:57:55,640 --> 00:57:59,240
Speaker 2: and learn about the hard Boiled eggs story. I'm gonna

919
00:57:59,760 --> 00:58:02,000
Speaker 2: it's I just started it. It's gonna take a while

920
00:58:02,040 --> 00:58:02,440
Speaker 2: to come out.

921
00:58:02,640 --> 00:58:08,400
Speaker 1: R up. Thank you for coming from New York to

922
00:58:08,480 --> 00:58:09,480
Speaker 1: DC to visit.

923
00:58:09,360 --> 00:58:11,600
Speaker 2: With me, happy to do it. Thank you for inviting me,

924
00:58:12,040 --> 00:58:12,520
Speaker 2: and thank you.

925
00:58:12,760 --> 00:58:15,960
Speaker 1: Thank you for your inspiration. Thank you for your courage,

926
00:58:16,160 --> 00:58:19,320
Speaker 1: thank you for your toughness. Thank you for being well

927
00:58:19,400 --> 00:58:21,520
Speaker 1: to share your story. Thank you for the quick club

928
00:58:21,720 --> 00:58:27,000
Speaker 1: you've put together. But more portly, you're as mom. Thank

929
00:58:27,080 --> 00:58:28,480
Speaker 1: you forgiving the world your son.

930
00:58:29,360 --> 00:58:32,240
Speaker 2: Thank you. It was It was an honor and a

931
00:58:32,320 --> 00:58:36,760
Speaker 2: blessing to have him in our lives. He was just

932
00:58:37,040 --> 00:58:40,000
Speaker 2: that really special person. And my daughters are too, And

933
00:58:40,080 --> 00:58:43,720
Speaker 2: I'm just I'm sad for my daughters that they couldn't

934
00:58:43,800 --> 00:58:47,360
Speaker 2: share their visions of how their adulthood would be with

935
00:58:47,480 --> 00:58:51,000
Speaker 2: their brother and cousins and the families they would build together.

936
00:58:51,560 --> 00:58:54,840
Speaker 2: So but they soldier on and they've found their way

937
00:58:54,920 --> 00:58:57,840
Speaker 2: and have beautiful children now too, So they got some

938
00:58:57,920 --> 00:59:00,680
Speaker 2: of their mom Well, I hope so Honor wrote a

939
00:59:00,720 --> 00:59:03,960
Speaker 2: book for her little children to learn, So that's out

940
00:59:04,000 --> 00:59:04,479
Speaker 2: there also.

941
00:59:05,360 --> 00:59:08,360
Speaker 1: Well, it's an armyandorable folks. I think the world would

942
00:59:08,360 --> 00:59:10,680
Speaker 1: be a better place if we had millions of Welles's

943
00:59:11,240 --> 00:59:15,400
Speaker 1: and hopefully history inspires others obviously not to run into

944
00:59:15,480 --> 00:59:19,600
Speaker 1: falling down, burning buildings, but to understand you don't have

945
00:59:19,720 --> 00:59:21,520
Speaker 1: to be part of a five oh, one C three

946
00:59:21,720 --> 00:59:24,960
Speaker 1: some big gigantic in geo. That the true service and

947
00:59:25,040 --> 00:59:28,240
Speaker 1: true amazing things happen this world from the bottom up

948
00:59:28,760 --> 00:59:31,880
Speaker 1: when an individual sees an opportunity to need and fills

949
00:59:31,920 --> 00:59:35,240
Speaker 1: it with their passion and their discipline. Your son did that.

950
00:59:35,840 --> 00:59:38,160
Speaker 1: We can all do that in so many different ways,

951
00:59:39,720 --> 00:59:41,720
Speaker 1: and that's the power of an army and oral folks.

952
00:59:41,800 --> 00:59:44,200
Speaker 1: So thanks for sharing his story to help continue to

953
00:59:44,240 --> 00:59:47,560
Speaker 1: try to inspire that narrative.

954
00:59:48,160 --> 00:59:51,480
Speaker 2: Well, thank you. It's a beautiful narrative and a missions

955
00:59:52,720 --> 00:59:55,080
Speaker 2: it's really perfect.

956
00:59:55,400 --> 01:00:00,640
Speaker 1: So we appreciate that. Thank you, thank you, and thank

957
01:00:00,760 --> 01:00:04,840
Speaker 1: you for joining us this week. If Wells or Alison

958
01:00:04,880 --> 01:00:07,880
Speaker 1: Crowther has inspired you in general, or better yet, to

959
01:00:08,000 --> 01:00:13,439
Speaker 1: take action by becoming a volunteer firefighter. Hey, Ala, when

960
01:00:13,560 --> 01:00:16,720
Speaker 1: somebody has a fire and they call the fire department

961
01:00:17,200 --> 01:00:20,200
Speaker 1: and the fire department gets a bell and the fire

962
01:00:20,560 --> 01:00:22,880
Speaker 1: department comes, what does it sound like.

963
01:00:25,160 --> 01:00:26,080
Speaker 3: Spulster ring the bell?

964
01:00:27,080 --> 01:00:28,880
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what it sounds like.

965
01:00:29,160 --> 01:00:30,840
Speaker 3: That was really good, Villa, that was a really good

966
01:00:30,920 --> 01:00:33,959
Speaker 3: ring I met you. That was like off the cuff

967
01:00:34,040 --> 01:00:34,600
Speaker 3: coming up with that.

968
01:00:35,280 --> 01:00:38,560
Speaker 1: Okay, man a train, I'm a trained professional. If you

969
01:00:38,640 --> 01:00:41,400
Speaker 1: want to become a volunteer firefighter, which Ala, you think

970
01:00:41,440 --> 01:00:45,200
Speaker 1: that's a good idea, tell them say do it? Okay?

971
01:00:45,280 --> 01:00:48,960
Speaker 1: Good or doing something heroic when the moment demands it,

972
01:00:49,280 --> 01:00:53,440
Speaker 1: or something else entirely. Please let us know, Ala, and

973
01:00:53,560 --> 01:00:56,640
Speaker 1: I really want to hear about it. You can write

974
01:00:56,720 --> 01:01:00,920
Speaker 1: me anytime at Bill at normal folks us, and I

975
01:01:01,120 --> 01:01:05,160
Speaker 1: promise I will respond. If you enjoyed this episode, share

976
01:01:05,160 --> 01:01:08,160
Speaker 1: it with friends on social Islah, did you enjoy this episode?

977
01:01:08,880 --> 01:01:11,640
Speaker 1: Are you going to tell friends about it? Okay? Well,

978
01:01:11,680 --> 01:01:13,160
Speaker 1: if you can do it, they can do it, don't

979
01:01:13,200 --> 01:01:18,280
Speaker 1: you think, say it okay, good, Share it friends and

980
01:01:18,360 --> 01:01:22,280
Speaker 1: on social Subscribe to the podcast, rate and review it.

981
01:01:23,120 --> 01:01:26,480
Speaker 1: Join the army at normalfolks dot us. I just saw

982
01:01:26,600 --> 01:01:30,800
Speaker 1: Alah doing it. Consider becoming a premium member there, any

983
01:01:31,000 --> 01:01:33,479
Speaker 1: and all of these things that will help us grow

984
01:01:33,960 --> 01:01:39,080
Speaker 1: and army in normal folks. What's your name? I'm Ila,

985
01:01:39,560 --> 01:01:42,880
Speaker 1: And until next time, they're not Ila because they do

986
01:01:43,000 --> 01:01:46,880
Speaker 1: what you can. Got a girl, We'll see you next week.