Excerpt from my latest book talking about my September 11, 2001 experience.

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Chapter 3

My Place in this World

College Graduation December 16, 2000

Auburn University at Montgomery

I was FINALLY graduating! Everyone else was sitting up right, smiling, and waiting for the program to begin. Several hundred people were graduating this day with any number of degrees. Family members were piling in the stands taking pictures, whistling and yelling at the graduates, waiting for their child or friend to walk across that stage and receive a degree they had spent years earning. I had already seen my mom and family sitting in one spot and my dad and his wife sitting near the front corner of the stage so they could get a good picture of me. I was sweating like there was about to be a mishap. I was thinking about all that could go wrong. “What if they didn’t call my name? What if they said my name wrong? What if I fall? What if there was a mistake with my classes and they pull me out of the line?” I was bouncing, rocking, and fidgeting like I had drank two pots of coffee. I wasn’t going to believe it until I had my degree and was out that door NEVER to return.

We finally got through the speeches and well wishes of the various presenters. I couldn’t tell you what they said or who they were at this point. We all lined up wrapped around the gym in the hallway, row by row calling the names of each graduate and then waiting for the cheers of their friends and family to die down enough to call the next person. It took forever. My name was finally called “Daniel Matthew Marrow,” Marrow? My name isn’t Marrow, it’s Morrow, like tomorrow. I didn’t care though. I got my degree and returned to my seat. The night before we had had a big graduation party with a hundred or so friends and family from the church. They had brought me gifts and they did speeches telling me what a special young man I was and how proud they all were of me. What kind of man would I be? At the time I felt invincible, like I was the smartest man on the planet. What rude awakenings were in my near future.

My first corporate job took me all the way…..to the front of the ten acres where I had grown up. That’s right, I, with my new Accredited Business Degree from Auburn University, was going to teach my mom and grandmother how to do business the right way! I was so arrogant.

~I was so arrogant~

I regurgitated all these things I had learned in school but found that change doesn’t come easy. I found that the classroom isn’t a real business with living breathing people, employees, and contractors. My father had been giving me the “real world” speech for a decade already and I was ready to prove everyone wrong. I set about the task at hand and found tons of things my family’s business were doing wrong. I, in my naivete, proceeded to do an analysis on every invoice they had produced in the last year and then at the end of my analysis, I would report to my mom and grandmother the findings and they would change and do the things I told them to do. Seemed pretty cut and dry to me. This is where you need improvement. Change.

MEMO:

To Whom it May Concern:

This is to inform you that you have been doing your business incorrectly for 25 years. Do as I say and you may yet survive. Make the following changes immediately!

Best Regards,

Matthew Morrow

Manager - Business Innovator Extraordinaire

I finished my analysis about two weeks later and went line by line down the things I felt they needed to change immediately if they wanted to be successful. Keep in mind they had run a successful business for twenty-five years at this point so they were obviously doing some things right. We had our meeting and they were excited to hear about my findings. That excitement lasted about two seconds.  As soon as I started talking you could see their faces turn to anger/concern, their arms folded and their brows knit, and the kicker, the jaws locked. You don’t know this but the women in my family, when they get that look, and that jaw locks, it’s done. You have turned the corner and there is no retreat at this point. I was so arrogant, I didn’t care. I didn’t change my tone or sugar coat my criticism. To say the least, it didn’t go well. I was throwing out facts and figures and college jargon and they were full of emotions for their business they had grown from baking cakes to being a nationally recognized event planning company. Feelings were hurt and things were said that couldn’t be taken back.

Was I right? Well... you can win and lose at the same time. That’s what I had just done. It didn’t matter that I was technically correct on several points, it mattered that I had done a horrible job communicating my thoughts to them. I had not seasoned my speech or taken into consideration all they had done right. It was weeks before our relationships were better. This wasn’t the first or last time my mouth got me in trouble. After nearly a year we/I realized that there wasn’t going to be as much change as I thought there should be. It’s hard to change when you have been doing something successfully for 25 years and some kid tells you to change.

I sought out men at church that I respected, as I did whenever I had a big life question. It didn’t take me long though to realize that almost without exception each man I asked life advice from about what my purpose and career should be all answered me with their chosen vocation. I spoke to multiple men in the Air Force and Army who said,  “Son you need direction and the military will give you that direction. I think you should consider joining xyz military.” Small business owners said I should start my own business, salesmen said I should sell, educators said I should get my masters, and on and on like that. There was only one man who said, “I don’t know, what do you want to do?” My friend and Elder Charles Elliott had gone to school and become a horticulturist. (He loved plants.) When he graduated he started a sod farm and nursery which he later sold to the Harwell family. He wanted to continue working and so the Harwells gladly hired him to continue doing what he loved doing. He told me after selling to the Harwells his wife told him he needed to go get a job. So he did. He told me proudly he had been unemployed only one day since he was 15 years old.

I had come to Mr. Charles for years for advice. He knew I was ADHD and could be annoyingly hyper, but he also knew my family, my work ethic, and my heart. He asked me what I wanted to do. I said, “I don’t know, that’s why I’m here asking you what I should do.” He asked me a few questions and I told him what the other men I had asked for advice had told me. He said that he felt since I had owned my lawn service and enjoyed working for myself, but didn’t want to be a car salesman with my outgoing personality I should go and speak to one of our deacons at church that was a Financial Advisor. I called and made an appointment not really knowing what this man did. He went on to tell me he had made a comfortable life for himself and he never had to do the hard sales. Because of him people would be able to retire comfortable, save money on taxes, pay for college, and take care of spouses incase someone passed away. I was really impressed by him. He was smart and thoughtful and it didn’t take long to realize this is what I wanted to be. I would become a Financial Advisor with SunAmerica Securities, a daughter company of AIG.

I informed my mom and grandmother that I could no longer work for the catering company and that I was going to study and get licensed to sell Insurance and Securities and to help people with their retirement plans. My mother beamed with excitement. “MY SON IS GOING TO BE A STOCKBROKER!” She told everyone she met with the joy that only a mother can exude. The reality of it was that I had no clue what I was about to get myself into.

The men at the office gave me an advance on rent allowing me to work in the office each day to study for my licenses. I purchased a computer and started assembling my office. First up was the State of Alabama Insurance Licenses for Health and Life Insurance. This would allow me to sell Long term care, cancer, disability, life, and was needed in part to sell annuities. I hardly even studied like I had done in much of my schooling. Just pay attention in class and use some common sense and you pass, which I did with ease.

Two things happened here that are noteworthy. One is my already intact ego was growing by leaps and bounds. I told everyone I was a Stockbroker in a growingly condescending way.  Even my family wasn’t immune to me mentioning how I was the “Only one in the family with a degree” and I distinctly remember a conversation where I arrogantly said, “If everyone in the family managed money as well as I did the family wouldn’t have any debt!” I was walking around in new suits my mom and grandmother had bought and I had just purchased a flashy red sports car. It was all about ME! My naturally outgoing personality ate up the attention I was getting.

The second thing was trying to rely on God for direction. You might think that these two things can’t go together, but I have found many Godly people who carried sins with them. There are no perfect people only perfect intentions. It’s really hard to determine what God wants you to do with your life. I had prayed about it and asked every friend and mentor what they thought I should do. The only thing I was missing was a big booming voice to come through a cloud or burning bush to tell me what to do. With that in mind I thought, “Maybe I can go in the Bible and see what God told people whom he had a verbal conversation with.” First person I thought of was Moses.

Exodus 3 (NIV)

Moses and the Burning Bush

3 Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. 3 So Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.”

4 When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!”

And Moses said, “Here I am.”

5 “Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” 6 Then he said, “I am the God of your father,[a] the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.

7 The Lord said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. 8 So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey—the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. 9 And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. 10 So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.”

Long story short, God showed up and said “GO!” After Moses does what God says and the people are released from Pharaoh they wander in the desert for forty years and he never enters the Promise Land. I insert this to say, sometimes when people are praying, including me, they pray for what they want. I know I do all the time. Me, me, me! I want! Please give me! Please bless me! Please heal me! How often do we purposefully spend time in prayer just praising who God is and all he does, not asking for anything? Something to think about for sure. I was praying for God to make me a Stockbroker. I would soon find out that is not what he had in mind for me.

~My next test~

My next test was a 6 hour exam certification called the Series 7. This license would allow me to sell just about any Security you can imagine. Stocks, bonds, mutual funds, IRAs, ROTHs, Annuities, Money Markets, and College Funds. I scheduled my next class with a training company out of Atlanta. They did a week long prep class that would help you prepare to take the Series 7 test.

Here’s a side note on some more arrogance. Many, in fact most people in the financial world in banks and Insurance offices if they were Securities licensed only had their Series 6, while I was getting my Series 7. So, Nana nana boo boo! I can feel the words dripping with arrogance as I type them. I remember how invincible I felt and what a braggart I was. Incorrigible! I’m so thankful people tolerated me back then.

I headed out to Atlanta which is just a few hours from my home in Montgomery, Al. It’s a familiar drive as my father is from College Park, which is about 20 minutes from downtown. I drove up to see my grandparents first and visited with them. They were proud of me and happy that I was happy. I left from there up I-85 in the overwhelming sixteen lane traffic and went up to the high class part of Atlanta called Buckhead. Where valets drive your car ten feet from the door for tips and all meals are ala carte.  I found my way to family friends of my mother, who were allowing me to stay in their home for the week while they were on vacation in the mountains. I was all setup. I didn’t want to get lost in the morning so I went on and found the training facility and mapped out my route. Now it was time for a great dinner and relaxing till tomorrow. I can’t remember where I ate for dinner but I’m sure it was fabulous. Everything is wonderful in Buckhead. When traveling, I try to make sure to experience new places. Who wants to eat at a chain place you can have anytime?

Monday morning came and I got to the training facility forty five minutes early. I was excited to get the day started. I couldn’t wait to be done. I stayed pretty impatient for most of my youth. Training began and I really liked our teacher. He was mid-thirties and from New Jersey. He had olive skin and dark black hair with a smokers deep voice like he had been yelling and smoking since he was four. He had spent his twenties working for firms on the stock exchange floor and had lots of crazy stories about people burning out by age twenty-eight. All and all the day was amazing and was over before I knew it. I made my way to yet another fabulous eatery and gorged myself with another gluttonous feast.

Day 2- September 11, 2001

Just like I had done on Monday morning I made my way to the training facility. Not quite as early as I had stayed up too late watching some mind dulling show on cable TV. We started class as I finished off my pop tart and Dr Pepper. I had not yet discovered the joys of coffee at this point. Class went on and we heard more wild stories and I remember the teacher having each of us introduce ourselves and tell a little bit of why we were there. Most people were captive agents, only going to work for a company that was paying for them to be there and would be selling only their company’s products. I was one of the few who was going to be an independent agent and be licensed to sell through multiple companies. It was around 10:30am and we took a short break. The teacher, from New Jersey, had multiple voice mails. This was before Facebook and texting so most of us had our phones off during class. Our teacher returned from his voicemails in a panic and told us all to go home, class was over.

“THE TOWERS ARE HIT….THE TOWERS….ONE OF THEM JUST FELL….THE TWIN TOWERS IN NEW YORK, OH MY GOD! I HAD FRIENDS IN THAT BUILDING!!”

We didn’t really know what was going on but we grabbed our stuff and all went our separate ways. It was chaotic and jumbled information on the radio on the way back to my friends house. Every few minutes they were learning new information. Was it just one plane? Now there are two planes, NO three planes. The whole country was shut down. They were advising everyone to get out of major cities. The interstate was a parking lot. I’ve never seen so many cars as millions of people tried to leave downtown Atlanta at one time. It was so eerie. I remember looking at people on the sides of the streets hugging and crying. People crying in their cars with fear on their faces.  I had a dozen voice mails from my mom, dad, grandmother, sister, and a few friends checking on me. My phone was dying as I tried returning all the calls. If you remember they just kept playing it over and over and over...and ...over… and OVER again. We must have felt the impact of that video a thousand times. I, like the rest of the country, sat in horror as we saw another plane crash into the second tower, a third plane crash into the Pentagon, and a fourth plane that had gone down in a field.

We prayed….. I didn’t know what to pray…..I remember calling my dad and as we talked I was overcome with tears as I realized what this could mean. Does this mean we will go to war? Will they reinstate the draft? Will I go to fight a foreign war like my dad had done in his youth with Vietnam? (I was still young enough to be drafted.) My father assured me that wouldn’t happen, but I think he was just reassuring me. Who could know such a thing?

Stop Reading… Say a prayer with me…

I’ve had to take a moment from writing. These memories are so vivid. I think if you lived through this you remember all the uncertainty. Where’s God? How could this happen? That starving sinking feeling in your gut when stress and worry grab hold of you. It’s the absolute opposite of the loving warm embrace of peace, love, forgiveness. It feels like death and fear. You could see it on everyone's faces and hear it in their voices. I will say that as a Christian I hope our conversations were filled with hope. I know in speaking with my mom and dad and other close family and friends we were all on the same page. We knew that God was still on his throne and that because of his Grace we would see each other in Heaven if the worst happened. We still didn’t know what was going to happen. It was only noon. I wasn’t hungry though. I didn’t know if I wanted to cry or throw up. My mom and I had just been to New York a few months before and I had stood on the top of one of the towers. Did this change everything?

I would love to tell you I had some great revelation from God. That I have some insight from that day. After fifteen years of experience looking back I can certainly tell you I have learned a few things, however in that storm, in that moment, I felt all but lost.

Can you imagine that some people have this terrible, sinking, desperate, kick in the gut feeling every day of their lives. Everything is a struggle from the moment they wake up. They don’t have family or friends, people at church to talk to, no one knows how lost they feel. When you feel this sinking in your soul you can be standing in a room with a hundred people, sitting at dinner with your family, out with your best friends, or even in bed with your love and still feel empty. We, as saved believers, can say that God is the only one who can fill those voids, but I think it’d be a lie to say we as believers have never felt these emotions. It’s just life. God told Adam and Eve in the Garden, “Because you have done this cursed will be the ground all the days of your life.”  

After about three hours of being glued to the television watching the cataclysms unfold I couldn’t watch it anymore. Watching those brave first responders, police, and firefighters walking towards the danger and at the same time seeing the ash covered, coughing, crying, and sometimes bleeding victims walking the opposite direction was heartbreaking. I remember all the people hanging outside the broken windows on the upper floors of the second tower. I remember watching people jump to their deaths rather than being burned alive. All these years later I don’t know if they jumped out of sadness and desperation or if they prayed and asked God to catch them. What an awful situation. Do you get burned to death? One of the worst pains in the world or do you jump? I pray none of you reading this ever have to make that decision. I know people say ugly things about the people that jumped, but as I have gotten older and faced more and more of life, I don’t judge people’s actions like I used to. I remember feeling terrible when the first tower fell, but when that second tower fell and we knew all those first responders, firemen, policemen, and medics were headed up those stairs….I just started crying. Not the type of crying you do when you have a breakup or hurt your big toe. It was the kind of crying that starts and doesn’t stop. Your eyes just keep producing tears as mine did from being overwhelmed. Every time they zoomed in on a jumper or someone falling to their death, or heard another report of possible planes unaccounted for...It was maddening. There was one person they followed from high up and when he hit the ground I turned the television off. I had to get out, but there was no where to go.

Downtown Atlanta, Ga 3:20pm

I decided to take a drive and that drive ended up being one of the most Twilight Zone type moments I have ever had. Atlanta has five million people in the greater Atlanta Metropolitan area. Yet, as I drove on the interstate that weaves through the center of downtown sixteen lanes wide, there wasn’t another car in sight. I got off on Peachtree Street and drove through the center of downtown and didn’t see a moving car or a single person. In a world filled with billions of people, in a town with five million people, on September 11, 2001, I was the only human in sight. Everyone including the police had been told to leave all of the major cities with skyscrapers. The next target might be a large metropolitan area where they could kill a lot of people or a military base. Back home in Montgomery, Alabama we have two Air Force bases, the War College, and the Officer training school, so it was extremely unsettling to say the least.

In times like these there were many good things that actually came out of them. People heard the word of God. Church attendance was surging. People were looking for answers. Prayers were being said. Families reconnected. People forgave each other. Communities became tighter. We weren’t black or white, or Latino or Chinese, We were Americans. Brothers and sisters of all races, nationalities, ages, economic backgrounds and we were united against any terrorist that came knocking on our doors. Isn’t it sad that it took something so terrible to remind us of the things that were truly important?

It didn’t take us long to get back to our lives. People slipped back into their old habits. Church attendance and prayer meetings diminished. Just like the children of Israel we are an arrogant and stiff necked people with a short memory. I’m so thankful we have a Heavenly Father who pursues us daily.

~I know sometimes it can feel like punishment but it’s pursuit~

I can’t think of a better verse to end this section with than 2 Chronicles 7:14.

14 If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

Day 3

It was now Wednesday morning, September 12, 2011, and I was on the way to class. Over half of the people didn’t show and we were told they would reschedule the class in a few weeks. I went back and packed my stuff to head home. It was a longer than normal drive. Life seemed to be going in slow motion. Lots of introspection.

Was I still going to be a financial advisor?

Would I be drafted?

Would we be hit with another attack today?

Will a nuke go off and wipe out all the big cities?

In the days to follow, the country would have a huge scar that would occur in the financial markets. The whole country stopped. People pulled money out of the markets and put it into savings. ATM’s were emptied. People were stocking supplies and water. People were scared. The stock market immediately felt the hit as many stocks took nosedives.  Businesses that had been in business for over a 100 years were closing. It showed how many businesses weren’t prepared for a hit. In the late 1990s everyone seemed to make money no matter what they invested in. Corporate functions stopped, car sales stopped, buying stopped, holiday travel all but stopped. Our engine of a country that had been the most profitable capitalist society in all of human history had been brought to its knees with a handful of men and four jet airplanes. Here I was, twenty three years old, trying to get licensed to sell securities and help people with their retirements and yet 40% of Financial Advisors were getting out of the business. AIG, Merrill Lynch, and many other companies all but died overnight. Mom and pop stores like my mother and grandmother’s catering company all but stopped.

We were used to having Alabama Power and other large companies throw Christmas, Holiday, and retirement parties. December had traditionally been our busiest month of the year really starting the week after Thanksgiving. Upwards of 15 catered events per day, sometimes even on Sunday. Our calendar was always full so much so we hated having to turn business down. Phone calls started pouring in canceling weddings, Christmas parties, and retirement parties. That December we had only two Christmas parties out of hundreds to not cancel. One was a little group of older ladies who had been having their event there at the Banquet room for twenty five years and the other was our own church’s Happy Heart meal for the older members which Nanny did at her cost. Talk about a test of faith.

Coupled with the cancellations, and businesses grinding to a halt came the credit crunch. Any of you that have ever owned a business knows that the profit margins can be so low sometimes you don’t have a lot of reserves which is where credit comes in. Many small businesses have a line of credit with a local bank or a credit card or five to take care of payroll, taxes, bills, and inventory. This has been a common practice for thousands of years. It all stopped! Letters started coming in the mail saying things like the following:

“Dear Mr. Jones,

We want to thank you for your years of business with our company. Due to recent changes in our credit lending practices we have reevaluated your current line of credit, Account # 123456789, and determined that we need to readjust the terms of our agreement. Please see page two for the new Terms. (OR We have determined to close your account and we require your balance of $5000 due immediately)”

This was a death note to many businesses that might as well have read, “You are now out of business!”

CLOSED OUT OF BUSINESS!!

We thank you for your patronage!

So with no business and no available credit to run their businesses many people desperate to continue surviving cannibalized their savings, insurance and retirement plans. This is nearly as worse case scenario as it gets. Since the stock market was plummeting, people's retirement accounts were at all time lows and when they cashed them out not only had they essentially bought at the height of the market and were now selling at the lowest part of the market, but early withdrawal penalties from retirement accounts took upwards of 40% in taxes and penalties. So imagine you had been saving all these years, and your $200,000 retirement plan was now only worth $80,000, then when you cashed it out you were only left with $50,000. All these actions lead people to do the next worse thing which is put it somewhere “safe.” It’s called hoarding cash and it happens whenever the market has a downturn. People stuck their already taxed, fined, and devalued retirement money into savings accounts earning less than half of 1%.

I was twenty-three and once I was licensed,  I was supposed to sell people these retirement products people are now ditching. You can bet that I had some long confusing prayers to the Lord trying to figure out what my purpose was. I wanted the Lord to show up in a loud booming voice or a dream or a burning bush and tell me what the heck He wanted me to be doing. I never heard a voice. I never saw a burning bush. Life continued on and I, like many of you, took it a day at a time.

Looking back on it all now I remember I never missed a meal and the Lord was with me the entire time.

Matthew 28:20

“And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”