Heart Scene: My First Day of Cardiac Rehab with Shanksville on My Mind

The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are there, not to keep us out, but to show us how badly we want things. The brick walls are there to stop people who don’t want it badly enough.
-Randy Pausch

My first day of Cardiac Rehab started with registration and a reunion with a family favorite Mary Ann McGrath. We were both at the Saxon Pavilion and our paths crossed somewhere between booth 3 and 6. As always, Mary Ann had a beautiful smile and a face that lights up the room with positive energy.

After our brief conversation and a picture I finished my preliminaries and then it was down to the business of strengthening my mending heart

Jenny Falzone and Michelle Merkel literally took me by the hand to show me the ropes. Their kindness and professionalism helped me through the first day. They made it interesting and much less tedious than I thought it would be. While they measured vitals at every exercise device, they explained what was happening inside my body, how my heart was reacting and why it was important that I do what I was doing.

They were cautious and encouraging. They wanted this to be a positive experience. From the first blood pressure reading to the meditation exercise at the end, it was just that, a most enjoyable day in the fitness center.

Both women were part of my rehab team in the hospital, and both have a special talent. They have been helping heart patients for years and it shows.

I must confess, however, that my attention was divided. As I worked on the treadmill and the exercise machines, my mind wandered to the experiences of the weekend that just ended. While my body was exercising in Kingston PA, my mind was recalling vivid images of our annual visit and screening in Shanksville, PA, 248 miles away.

Located in one of the most rural and most beautiful sections of the keystone state, Shanksville has become like a second home to Kitch and me. We visit there whenever we can to reconnect with friends and acquaintances, and we do everything we can to see to it that the forty Angels of Freedom are not forgotten.

For the past six years we have taken students, relatives, neighbors, friends, and friends of friends to the site of the temporary memorial of the Heroes of Flight 93.

Once there we listen to Janie Kiehl, a Flight 93 Ambassador and dear friend tell the story of United 93. Val McClatchey another good friend, explains the history of her famous photograph, The End of Serenity. Chuck and Jayne Wagner, Flight 93 Ambassadors, are usually on hand to help us and their daughter, Leigh Snyder provides our guests with her book, Patriots of Peace.

At the Lutheran church hall we come together in a community dinner compliments of Janie Kiehl and her family. This year Val McClatchey shared a priceless piece of history with our guests. She played a DVD of the amateur video recorded in Berlin, PA, of the aftermath of the end of United 93 and the now famous plume of black smoke that looked like a mushroom cloud.

For Val McClatchey it was a moment of vindication. It gave lie to the conspiracy theorists. For those of us in the room, it was a chilling moment of discovery and verification of what Val’s picture had recorded for millions of people around the world. We were watching moving images of The End of Serenity. We were experiencing an historically significant event.

After the meal people stood to talk about their reactions to the site and all they had seen during the day. It is an emotional moment. It is a beautiful moment. For me, it is a sacred moment and one of the most important opportunities of the day. The room takes on a hushed silence, and people of good will struggle to find the words to express their feelings.

This year our special guests, the members of the Brighter Light Choral Ensemble, lit up the room with beautiful thoughts of transformation and discovery. Berwick, PA, the home of Brighter Light is a place that is most famous for High School Football and a potato chip company named Wise. On this day, at this time, it was best known for the honesty and sincerity of 12 people who came to visit the site and sing songs of belief, peace and joy at a concert.

Their comments were heart-warming and very instructive. They spoke to the beauty and poignancy of the site. These are people with a history. These are people of wisdom, courage and strength. These are people who know adversity, pain and suffering. These are people who knew that the events of the day eclipsed their beautiful music. They were part of a mosaic that enabled them to sing Amazing Grace not in words and notes on a page, but in actions of silence and reverence for a very sacred place.

The members of Brighter Light made an impression on everyone they met not because of anything they did but because of who they are and how they behaved.

Across the room, members of the delegation from Misericordia University spoke their minds about the day. One by one students, staff and parents of the students stood to give witness to what was in their hearts. It was a touching display of learning and growth. It was a collage of verbal images of life, learning, intuition and perspective.

Many of these people had visited the sight in September 06 with us, and they were anxiously awaiting the screening that would present their visit in an episode of our Changed Forever series entitled Shanksville, PA: A Place of Hope and Heroes.

When they spoke you could see the anticipation in their eyes. One of the last to speak was Joe Pipitone’s mother. An elementary school principal by profession, her comparison of the Angels of Freedom to the patriots during the revolutionary war era touched a nerve. When she finished talking our group responded with spontaneous applause.

This part of the community dinner is many things to those who attend.

Doug MacMillan, Todd Beamer’s best friend and founder of the Todd M. Beamer Foundation calls it an Aha Moment.

Bill Gaydos, our resident poet, calls it his transformational moment.

Christine Fraser, the sister of Colleen Fraser one of the passengers on United 93, called it a healing moment.

For Kitch and me it is an affirming moment, a teaching moment, and a beautiful moment that summarizes everything we hope the visit will be.

We end the dinner with two minutes of silent prayer so that everyone can speak to their God in their own way.

After that, the room empties and our band of brothers and sisters quietly makes its way across the parking lot to The United Methodist Church where Dan Bolthouse and his son, Colin, have everything ready for the screening.

This is a time of nervous energy and anxiety for us. Although we have done it many times in many different locations, we are never quite sure what to expect.

Kitch and I watch the film hoping it will work, hoping that it will touch the people in the audience, hoping that it will be well received by those who had loved ones on the plane, hoping that it will accurately portray the feelings of those who trusted us with their stories.

Then it happens. The documentary ends. The room is filled with light and there is a respectful silence and then sustained applause. As I make my way to the front of the room my mending heart beats harder and faster as the adrenalin of relief consumes every part of my body. Looking at the audience assembled in front of me, I am frozen in place. I struggle to find the right words and then two words move spontaneously from my mind and my heart.

Thank You.

My eyes search the crowd for Kitch. When they find her they focus on the broad smile of satisfaction on her face.

Her eyes speak nine words to me: “I told you it was one of your best.”

This silent transition enable me to regain composure and I begin reading a letter I wrote to the President of the United States on September 11, 2007. It is short and to the point. It recommends that the Presidential Medal of Freedom be awarded posthumously to the 40 Angels of Freedom at a White House ceremony before the president leaves office. Joe Haberski a former student in one of my first classes planted this idea in my mind during a conversation over lunch.

My eyes lock onto Christine Fraser’s eyes. They are beaming with appreciation. Before the evening ends she will be in possession of a copy of this letter.

Doug Macmillan walks from the back of the room to a place where everyone can see his six foot five inch frame. He shares an emotional story of his moment of change during the annual September 11 remembrance ceremony at the site.

When Doug finishes, Bill Gaydos walks to the front of the church to present a gift to The Garden of Life in Windsor Park, and to tell the audience how his poetry came to be. At one point he cannot find the words to express his gratitude and he endears himself to everyone with the admission that what he is feeling cannot be expressed in words.

Bill is followed by Chuck Wagner a very big man who helped build the temporary memorial, and who helps people understand what happened there as a Flight 93 Ambassador. Clutching a framed copy of what he describes as the best picture he has ever taken of the site, he extends his hand and gives it to Kitch and me with these words: “ It is my best because it is the only one with a rainbow covering the site.” It was a priceless moment.

For the next few minutes, Kitch and I join forces to distribute gifts to those who made the weekend possible. Someone once called it Christmas in September. We call it affirmation.

Then the Brighter Light Choral Ensemble walked to the choir loft. Standing under a stained glass window darkened by the night as it shrouded this historic church, their leader, Steve Kanouse, thoughtfully and respectfully introduces each selection making references to the day and the events the music would reinforce.

As I recorded this scene, I looked through the viewfinder of my camera and I could see the sense of fulfillment and purpose etched on the faces of the men and women of Brighter Light.

Their magical voices resonated with everyone in the church. It was a perfect venue for them. Their sound brought peace, comfort and healing to the audience.

The last song they sang had particular meaning for me. Entitled The Music In My Life, it literally carried me through my surgery and recovery. They know this and they sing it with a special verve and definition.

It is difficult to operate a camera with tears of joy streaming down one’s cheeks.

Randy Pausch is right. The brick walls are there to show us how badly we want things and how tirelessly we will work for them.

For twelve months I have been dreaming, hoping and planning for this weekend. One quarter of this time I was facing the greatest medical challenge of my life. Dreaming about this moment gave me a sense of purpose and the will to go on.

Prior to and after my open-heart surgery, I thought about this day and all that it meant to Kitch and me. We wanted this day to happen. We wanted it to be special for everyone who attended. We wanted it to touch hearts and transform souls. We wanted it to be a legacy moment for everyone in our group especially the group from Misericordi University.

It was all that and more.

Dr. Michael Harostock and his team of miracle workers tore down the brick wall of heart disease.

The brick wall of anxiety and depression was leveled by the music, trust and belief of the members of Brighter Light.

The brick wall of obstacles inherent in documentary production was moved aside by the participation of four students, two staff members, a poet and a friend.

The brick wall of recovery was reduced to sand by a marvelous caregiver named Kitch and a dream that the dreamer would not let fade away.

The brick wall of isolation and fear was diminished by the loyalty, encouragement, prayer and positive actions of dear friends many of whom were in the church on that special September evening.

This was our finest moment in Shanksville. Now we must make the most of our cardiac rehabilitation so that we can do it again come September 2008.

Randy Pausch is so right: “the Brick Walls are always there for a reason. They stop people who don’t want it badly enough.”

This year our Shanksville weekend began with an enthusiastic and loving embrace from a child named Adam. It ended with smiles and waves from the Brighter Light Choral Ensemble as they made their way to the exit of the Holiday Inn parking lot in Somerset, PA.

Everything in between was best described by people who shared their reactions with these words: Transformational, Touching, Thought Provoking, Impressive, Overwhelming, Amazing, Affirming, Beautiful, Sacred, Hallowing, Hopeful, Genuine, Soul Searching and Powerful.

It was one of the best weekends in Shanksville we have ever had. it was a weekend that almost did not happen.

Thank you Janie Kiehl and family.

Thank you Chuck and Jayne Wagner.

Thank you Dan Bolthouse.

Thank you Brighter Light.

Thank you Dana, Jessy, Joe, Laurel,
Donna, Annmarie, Doug and Bill.

Thank you Vera Berkert.

Thank you dear friends. You know who you are. You have been there from the beginning.

Thank you Kitch.