9/11/01 Bad as it gets.

I was handbilling a plant named Dopaco in Bakersfield California at around 7am as a union organizer. (They made McDonalds, Burger King, Taco Bell cups and utensils. One of my In Plant Committee organizers named "Big Mac" drove up in his bright yellow truck and told me and my sidekick Dan Marino that the United States was under attack. Everything was pretty sketchy on the radio. After we handbilled we had a union organizing meeting with the workers at a nearby coffee shop. Everyone was stunned. We talked about what was happening and of course the whole coffee shop was abuzzed. I went back to my hotel and people were panicking about what to do. Rumors were that Los Angeles was going to be hit at anytime because of planes still unaccounted for. It was an anxious day and I was along ways from home. That afternoon the people from Dopaco were getting off work and were meeting with me in a pizza parlor. They had all just heard rumors and such while at work. Their faces when they came in the pizza parlor was of shock in seeing the surreal images on the big screen. It made for a somber meeting. We ended up losing this organizing drive. I felt we should (the union) have left for a bit and let things work out after the twin towers fell. The union just was not all that important to them in relations to what had happened to us as a nation.