FDNY Fearless Firemen

On this 9/11 ten year anniversary, I offer my prayers and condolences to those who lost loved ones that horrible day. May all those souls rest in peace.

I have respect and am so proud of those who offered up their lives to go into the Trade Center and Pentagon and save people, the ones that died that day, the ones that were lucky enough to get out safely, and the ones that continued to work at ground zero on 9/11. They swarmed the World Trade Center area even though they could have been in further danger. My brother was still an active member of the FDNY that day, my family was lucky, my brother came home.

God Bless those on Flight 93 that crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, who somehow averted that flight from crashing into wherever that plane was heading and killing more people.

To those that continued to work at ground zero, in dangerous and unhealthy conditions. The men and women in service to our country before 9/11 and who joined up after 9/11.
Thank you, thank you so much for what you did that day and continue to do today.

This morning I took my niece Bella to church. She's 6 years old. When I picked her up, she and her brothers and dad were horsing around and the TV was on with coverage of the new memorial at the World Trade Center site. They weren't really paying attention but when me and Bella got into the car she said to me, "You know, I don't really know what happened that day, I know there was a fire in buildings but that's all I know." I told her that some bad men crashed big planes into the buildings. She said "and they died too? Well they're stupid, they died too." I told her she was right. She changed the subject quickly, said she wanted to talk about forest fires. So we talked about that for the rest of the ride. She asked what she wanted and that was enough for her. I know she has more questions, but for now, she didn't want to know those answers.

Unfortunately Bella knows a little about death and specifically the death of a firefighter, I think that had something to do with ending the conversation so quickly, she's seen people in her family be very sad about that. On January 23, 2005, Bella and her brothers lost their Uncle Richie, Firefighter Richard T. Sclafani of Ladder Company 103, Brooklyn, NY. Bella was born the previous month and never knew her uncle and her brothers were only 4 and 2. The boys talk about him a lot, but I don't think they remember their uncle. The 3 of them know and remember their uncle through pictures and stories they hear and memorials they have attended.

I didn't know Richie that well. I saw him at a few family functions but he was a quiet guy when I was around him. I couldn't get a sense of the man I met but Richie and I are godparents to our nephew Robert and I do remember him being so happy and proud that he was godfather to this beautiful boy, the first child of his only sibling, JoAnn. He was beaming that day. He spent a lot of his free time with his nephews.

When he died I didn't attend the funeral, although I wanted to. I was watching Bella and her brothers. I knew I was paying my respect to him in a way that was needed and during the time I heard stories from the wonderful fellow firefighters who came to help the family with absolutely everything. I heard stories through his sister. Stories about Richie from people in his past. People who maybe just crossed paths with Richie for a year or less and others who knew him longer. He was funny, kind, brave. He was single and worked holidays so the married men could be with their families. I'm sure he approached every fire he fought with the same feeling, let me go before the guy with a family. He was selfless. He was humble, never boasting of his good deeds. He was at ground zero, lucky that day and then taken so soon after.

My niece and nephews, their children and future generations of their family will be able to learn about Richie, when it will matter to them, as when we are young we take it for granted that our loved ones will be with us forever. They will be able to look up on line and read about Richie, see his picture and read newspaper articles about what happened to him. Maybe someday they will read my blog and see what I learned about their uncle.

And really important to me is that they, my other nieces, nephews, and the future generations of my family will learn a little about the bravest most fearless fireman I was blessed to know.

My father died when I was 7 years old. I don't remember him, hazy stuff, it's more that I know he was with me, the memory is of me, not him. I didn't really see him too often as he was working 2 jobs at the time. When he died I was one of five children and my mom was pregnant with number six. I can't imagine how hard that was for my mom, I only know of some things because my older brothers' remember, they were 11, 12 and 13, and my mom's sister tells me about that time too.

Sometime in late 1967 or early 1968, my mom was introduced to Bo by a mutual friend. Bo had been told that she had a 15 year old son. He asked her if she had any other children and she told him, you name the age, I have the child. They dated after for a short time and then quickly decided to get married. I can't believe the love this man had for my mom, I mean I know she was beautiful, inside and out, and how easy she was to love, but as I grew into an adult, I couldn't believe how crazy he was to do that. Brave, fearless.

The six of us were being raised Catholic, my father's religion. My mom was Protestant and not very religious, my father was. That is one of my hazy memories, going to church with him many times at very young age and his snazzy hat sitting on the pew or his lap.

Bo was Jewish, something I only heard in religion classes learning about Jesus and the Old Testament. But I'll never forget when my mom told me she was marrying Bo, the happiness in her face. I don't remember her being sad prior to that. I think I probably knew but didn't want to face it, those memories are buried deep inside of me, and I believe make up certain parts of my personality.

Some of Bo's family readily accepted us in their lives, but his mom wasn't so happy, she almost through herself off the balcony of her building! Her oldest son marrying a woman with six Catholic kids. That was not common during that time. She came around after a few years. I think she realized how happy Bo was. He was meant to be where he was.

My brothers at the time were in their teens and it was a difficult battle in that way for Bo. They remembered my father, who was a very strict man. During the short period of time between my father dying and my mom remarrying Bo, the boys didn't have that fear of getting in trouble from our dad, my mom was much more easy going. She was one of those moms that said, wait until your father gets home. They abused that freedom, even with some of my uncles looking out for them. Bo made a difference in their lives in a really big way, they grew to love and respect him and became hard-working adults. I don't know how life would have turned out for any of us without Bo, but especially my older brothers.

For me and my younger sisters it was different. Bo is the only father we knew. Especially my youngest sister who called him daddy from her earliest memory. Though my sister Linda and I never called him daddy, we don't refer to him as our step-father, Bo was our father. We just called him Bo from the day we met him. By the time we felt he was our father, I think calling him daddy was a foreign word to us. We do refer to him as daddy when we talk about him. We say, "when daddy did this, or said this". I notice when I talk to my older brothers, I say, "when Bo did this, or said this" and I know they refer to him as their step-father. They don't love or respect Bo any less, it's just they remember our first father and we don't.

When Bo got married to my mom he was working in a busy firehouse, Engine Company 230 in Bedford-Stuyvesant Brooklyn. I remember him coming home and smelling of smoke, looking green or grey and sick from being at a bad fire. Their equipment was nothing like it is today. But my mom got pregnant again, number seven now, "OUR" youngest brother, and made Bo move from Bedford-Stuyvesant to a firehouse in Sheepshead Bay, Engine Company 246, which wasn't as busy, still dangerous, but not like Engine Company 230. My Aunt Margie, Bo's sister, lived a few blocks away from 230 and has 3 daughters close in age to me and my sisters and we spent a lot of time together growing up. Aunt Margie always accepted us and loved Bo tremendously. We would go to the firehouse and get ice cream from a freezer that looked like one in the stores, filled with tons of ice cream pops, for free! We made him slide down the poll dozens of times and played on the fire truck. One time while spending the night at Aunt Margie's apartment, there was a small fire across the street. After the fire was put out, Bo shined the light up to Aunt Margie's terrace, he knew I was delighted.

Bo never called us his step children, he referred to us as his children. In my eyes and in my heart, I never felt that Bo loved my youngest brother more than me and my brothers and sisters, never. He loved my mother and part of my mother was us. That's what he told people from day one, if she had 10 kids or no kids, I would have married her, I loved her.

They had a short but beautiful marriage. My mom passed away first, and she was very sick. Bo kept her at home and took care of her when doctors told him she should be in a hospice. But Bo wouldn't do it, he stayed by her side and took care of her until way past being necessary for her to be in a hospice.

He took care of us after that, he was so sad and missed my mom but he had us, we were his life and we meant the world to him, and he told us, often. I am lucky in another way. My family has always been super loving. I don't end any phone call or visits with my family and most of my friends without saying I love you, it's just what I'm used to. It's how I grew up, with love.

Attending Catholic school I remember asking Bo questions about his religion. I remember asking him if he believed in Jesus and he told me he believed Jesus was a good man, an important man in history, but no, he didn't believe what I was being taught, he was taught something different. I grew up in a home respecting that difference. I never thought he was wrong and I was right, or the opposite of that. I grew up knowing it was just a difference in us, like the color of our hair or eyes and skin, we just are who we are, not wrong or right, just different.

Bo passed away in 1992, he suffered a short time with cancer and died just a few days shy of his 60th birthday. Too young. He left everything he had to his seven children.

We were more than blessed to have Bo in our lives. We were so lucky that he was crazy in love with my mom and married her. He jumped into a life that was beyond anything he was used to in so many ways. He gave up some of his family because they wouldn't accept us. They lost out. They missed seeing how happy he was.

I know sometimes people don't understand why God lets so many bad things happen, me to a lot of times. Some people say that God has a plan, we just don't know what it is. Sometimes I think that maybe God's plan when my father died, leaving my mom pregnant with five kids, in a horrible sad situation was the plan...the plan for Bo to be in our lives, for "OUR" youngest brother to be in our lives and his children, my precious Bella, Robert and Jojo. I can't imagine my life without them.

Bo was fearless, brave and so loving. Before I met him and for a years after, until he worked light duty, due to an injury, he fought many dangerous fires, putting his life on the line as firemen do. I am proud to be the daughter of this man, my father, the fearless fireman.

When Bo married my mom, his fellow firefighters jokingly awarded him the "Fearless Fireman Award". Little did they know how right they were.

I've created many projects designing fake newspaper and magazine covers. I try to get the newspaper covers from on line to get the look of the newspapers from the real dates of the times. Below I used Bo's picture for a birthday card, which I made for another brave fireman in my life, my friend Tommy and the 1968 front page cover of the Daily News. Bo is second to the left in these pictures. I also designed the flyer for Richie's street-naming ceremony pictured above.

Again for those that died ten years ago today, may they rest in peace.