MORGANTOWN — There’s a mostly paraphrased quote out there attributed to Robert Frost that goes something like this: “Poetry makes you remember what you didn’t know you knew.”
It definitely went like that for Tyler Evans on a somewhat cloudy Friday afternoon on the campus of WVU.
Evans tapped into emotions he didn’t know he had.
That was when the freshman music education major from Sturgeon, Pa., crisply brought his trumpet at the ready, so he could play “Taps” for the fallen of Sept. 11.
Twenty-four notes.
Each with an aching elegy of loss.
And all for the victims taken away that Tuesday morning 20 years ago that began with a sky that couldn’t have been bluer.
Nearly 3,000 people died after a group of hijackers seized control of four jet airliners that morning.
Two of those planes crashed into the twin towers of New York’s World Trade Center.
Another took out part of The Pentagon.
The fourth, believed to be possibly bound for the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., slammed into a Pennsylvania field after passengers fought back and stormed the cockpit.
Twenty-four notes.
The poignant bugle call was performed to launch the annual 24-hour vigil kept by the university’s Army and Air Force ROTC students out of honor and respect for the victims and heroes.
Military students in fatigues stood at parade rest for the wreath-laying down from WVU’s downtown library complex.
A handful of others dropped by on their way to class.
Some of them were too young to remember what happened that day.
Others like Evans, who is 18, weren’t even born yet.
Except, Evans uses music to make his mind-bridges and cognitive imprints.
“Playing ‘Taps’ made it complete,” he said.
“I had the history, but now I’ve got the connection.”
There was something else.
“This is the first time I ever played at a military event. This is a moment.”
Moments were precisely on the mind of WVU President Gordon Gee, who was also part of the program.
He honored the WVU alumni who died in the attacks, and the countless other university ROTC grads who served in the military since that day, fighting the war on terrorism.
And he praised the ROTC students there Friday for their obligations of service to follow.
Twenty years this day, he was on the campus of Vanderbilt University.
His professional calling had taken him to the school in Nashville, Tenn., where he was in his second year as chancellor.
No boot-scooting occurred that day on the campus in the city known for its country music. It was more like a minor-key blues. It was “Taps.”
“A lot of our kids were from the Northeast,” he said. “They were worried.”
For several days after the attacks, Gee slept in his office and spent other nights in residence halls.
“Just so I could be a presence,” he said. “I wanted to be there. I needed to be there.”
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