September 11 and the rest of us...

We all have a story or some very distinct memories around the tragic events of 9/11. Thirteen years ago, I was at our Vail apartment, having breakfast, when I first heard the news about the attack. I remember thinking immediately “the result of the unresolved Israeli-Palestinian crisis...” I immediately called my wife in Park City, we both try to get in touch with our daughter, who at the time was in college near New York, but couldn't get through...

In 2002, as our kids were no longer living with us, we decided to “downsize” and sold our Park City home. The new owners, a Mormon family from California weren't fond of all that snow and three year later re-sold the residence to Mrs Schlag, a 9/11 widow. who moved to Park City with her three children. The five of them had visited our resort during a ski vacation before the terrorists attack. This is something we didn't know until a few weeks ago.

It's when I discovered that one of the children, Garrett, had made a movie about his struggle with the loss of his dad, Steven Schlag. As coincidence would have it, the Schlag family came from Franklin Lakes, New Jersey, just where Lange ski boots were headquartered when I still worked for the company. I watched the very moving clip and the opening section looked very familiar to me; it was filmed just inside our old garage...