9/11 Commemoration and Voices
Center for Resilience
BY ROBERTA GOULD, PH.D.
This year, September 11 was the 19th
anniversary of 9/11. Voices Center for
Resilience (VOICES), the organiza-tion
that provides long term support of 9/11
victims’ families, survivors and responders,
held its 2020 Remembrance Symposium vir-tually
via Zoom. They honored the 2,977
people who lost their lives on 9/11, the 3,000
responders and survivors who have died as
the result of 9/11 related illnesses, and their
grieving families. Many are still suffering
and have serious medical and mental health
conditions and others have newly developed
heart, lung and cancer problems directly
related to 9/11.
As a volunteer psychologist, I worked at
9/11 with Vilna, a woman with six children
who was administering hearing tests on a
high floor in one of the towers that day. She
ran down the stairs, singed and injured. Very
little of her clothing remained. She was taken
to a nearby hospital where the nurses gave
her pieces of their clothing. She insisted on
going back to her children and walked across
the Brooklyn Bridge, where volunteers were
waiting to drive the victims home. To this day
she is unable to work.
This year marks a change of name for this
organization to Voices Center for Resilience
and their motto is, “Healing families and
communities after tragedies.” The new
name reflects their expanded work to also
help communities and people recover from
tragedies related to violence due to terrorism.
The newest area added is help for the survi-vors
and families of the global pandemic in
the US and abroad. They have also set up a
digital resource center.
Building resilience for all these people who
have been affected by tragedy is the heart
of this excellent organization. They started
with 9/11 in the US and now offer much
needed expertise, love and compassion
worldwide. There is new money available
through the Victim’s Compensation Fund and
other compensation programs. But there is
always a need and the organization recently
launched its 2020 Annual Appeal Campaign.
For more information, visit their website at
voicescenter.org.
Kindness in the Time of the Covid Virus
BY BERNARDINE
ROSENTHAL
In the time of the pandemic,
there was an old woman whose
kitchen wall clock stopped
working. For a while she hopefully
tried new batteries, but the problem
persisted. The clock was well past
its one year warranty at two-and-a-
half years. But beyond that, she
didn’t want to add this clock to
the landfill where it would never
biodegrade. She felt responsible for
creating durable waste that might
end up on a Pacific Island beach far
away. She wanted to fix this clock.
Of course, the woman had sev-eral
appliances with digital clocks,
but she had trouble reading them
when the sun flooded her apart-ment
in the afternoon.
She also had a 200-year-old
grandfather clock that chimed the
hours and kept time, but at its own
speed.
Something had to be done to try
to fix this clock, so she called the
store as a first step. They were open
under the public health guidelines
and so the old lady with her mask
and rubber gloves ventured out.
The sales clerk at the store remind-ed
her that there was just a one year
warranty, but she tried to help by
brushing the works to remove some
invisible dust particles.
The next step was to Google the
problem, and there was a YouTube
video of how to repair a battery
operated wall clock. It sounded
so full of possibilities; maybe she
could learn to fix her clock. After
all, she knew how to change the
plug for a table lamp, maybe it
would be similar.
The man in the video was
patient and unruffled as he
showed the parts and tools that
would be needed. The old lady
already had a set of the teensy tiny
screwdrivers and took that as a
good sign. Twenty minutes into the
video he had taken the clock apart
and the very tiny screws, pieces
of the case and the hands were
spread before him. She realized
then that she would not be able
to fix her clock like that.
There was only one more slim
possibility, and that was to call
customer service for the clock
brand. With all of the problems
companies were having with the
drop in sales, employee safety and
a flailing economy, she would dare
to ask them if they could help her
keep her clock from becoming
garbage.
She followed the automated
instructions on the phone, gave
the age of the clock and asked if
there was any way that she could
fix her clock herself.
That evening when the old lady
was in a state of groggy wakefulness,
watching TV and pretending to read
some saved editorials, the phone
rang. She jumped to belligerent
attention, demanding that the call-er
identify himself. The very polite
response was that it was the clock
company answering her phone
call. Of course she apologized
immediately. As requested, she read
him the identifying numbers on the
back of the clock and held on while
he looked up something.
He was very sorry that he could
not fix the clock, but he had a very
similar new clock that he could
send her at no charge.
Well, she has her new wall clock
and it is lovely having the easy to
read accurate time available and she
has her 200-year-old clock chiming
the hours and doing its best to keep
time. But of course, the problem of
disposal of the old clock was not
solved. She sadly sneaked the clock
into the recyclables bin…maybe
they could do something with it.
But the thing that made the old
lady so very happy was that some-one
out there listened to her clock
story and bothered to respond. It
was a most remarkable kindness in
the time of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Note: This is my true story writ-ten
in the third person because I
feel distanced, and an observer of
my own experience. ~ Bern
October 2020 ¢ NORTH SHORE TOWERS COURIER 9
/voicescenter.org
