Like the phoenix, Mark Grillo rises from the ashes of 9/11

Firefighter, with new wife and daughter, has kept his promise of ten years ago to live life to the fullest Goshen — A deep scar near Mark Grillo’s left elbow, and another scar barely visible through his hair, are all that remain of the physical injuries he sustained on that fateful day 10 years ago. The collapse of Tower Two of the World Trade Center blew Mark Grillo, a Goshen volunteer firefighter and EMT, across the street. He felt a gash his arm, and when he touched the side of his head, it was just a flap. A detective who checked on him was sure his ear had been blown off. He then saw the flap of skin and ushered him into an ambulance. Grillo told The Chronicle on the first anniversary of 9/11 that he could not hear a train without recalling the collapse and the nightmares that followed. He vowed to no longer put off anything in life that he had wanted to do, knowing that life was so uncertain. Grillo, now 33, has made good on those promises. He'd always wanted to kayak, so he bought a couple of kayaks and regularly takes them down the Delaware River. He'd always wanted a Harley-Davidson; two years ago he bought one and took a month to tour the country. He went skydiving at a ranch upstate. He travels as much as he can, going on one or two cruises a year to different places. His next cruise may be to Italy, if it ever stops being “ridiculously expensive to get there.” But the two happiest changes in his life since 9/11 are his marriage three years ago and the birth of their first baby, Arianna Noel. “She is a saint,” says Grillo of his wife, a bank manager whom he met after 9/11. Though the baby still keeps them up at night, Grillo is very happy. Grillo admits he is much less patient with people since 9/11, which he attributes to post traumatic stress disorder. “The nightmares stopped about a year after it happened, but certain sounds and smells will bring it all back as if it was yesterday,” he said. He chose not to go for counseling, but found that confiding in a friend and biking buddy and other guys at the firehouse helped. He said he will not be going to this year’s memorial service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. This year, it's family time “This is going to be the first anniversary of 9/11 that I am going to purposely stay home with my family,” he said. In past years, he attended services at Ground Zero with his fire department. But he dreads the political hoopla surrounding the tenth anniversary commemoration. “It’s time," he said about his decision to stay away. "Besides,” he added, “this year the people who it happened to won’t even be able to get close.” He envisions lots of politicians and dignitaries who “weren’t even involved and who know nothing about what it was like” to be there, and who will show up only to be photographed. He envisions President Obama there with all of his bodyguards. He said he prefers to go either in the winter or spring, during a quiet time that will allow him to reflect properly on the lives lost. He looks forward to the opening of the 9/11 memorial and museum, but plans to visit after the opening rush. Grillo has undergone other changes over the years. He smiled and said he's become a fan of country music, which he thought would never happen. Having grown up listening to hard rock and heavy metal, he'd always considered country music to be “twangy-whiny.” But when through a friend he was introduced to country music, he came to appreciate the words of the songs, and the patriotism of the stations that played them. Whenever he wears his NYFD tee-shirt in his travels outside the New York area, people will get very serious and ask him questions, expressing a reverence for his experience. Sometimes they tear up. It's made him realize that people outside of New York, “country people," still feel pain from 9/11 and a patriotism and sensitivity that people in his own area seem to have forgotten. New Yorkers are more wrapped up in conspiracy theories and politics, he said. Every morning, he says the Pledge of Allegiance. He's noticed that teenagers, who were too young to know what was going on ten years ago, ask him questions now that 9/11 is in the news again. He tries to explain — but when they ask for graphic details, like people falling from the sky, he stops short. He doesn't want to talk about that. Everyone who died was somebody’s son, daughter, husband, wife, sister or brother. To him, they were not just falling bodies. One strange thing happens a lot, he's noticed. When he looks at the time, or pumps gas, or checks the mileage on his car, he inevitably sees the number 343 — the number of firefighters who died that day. “My mind is in tune to that number," he said.