Text size:

5 years later, father's pain remains

By Radmilla Suleymanova | Special to amNewYork

September 7, 2006

Wilton Sekzer stands beneath the sign honoring his son, Jason, who died at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. (Handout)

Wilton Sekzer glances toward the side of his Woodside apartment building, where the street sign above the passing cars bears his son's name, Jason, in memoriam.

"That sign to me is the true epitome of bittersweet," Sekzer said. "Sometimes I walk over and I feel overwhelmingly proud; other times it's just a reminder of what happened and I feel like climbing up there and ripping it off."

And there are reminders. On the same block, a movie theater is showing the Oliver Stone film depicting the historic day.

"It doesn't fail," the 62-year old retired police officer and Vietnam veteran said. "Whenever I open a paper or switch on the TV, I'm constantly reminded of my son's death."

His son worked on the 105th floor of Tower One as vice president of operations at Cantor Fitzgerald, the financial services firm that lost 658 employees in the attack, Jason among them. He was 31.

On the fifth anniversary, Sekzer will visit the site, something he has done only four times before.

"It's hard to go down there. I know in my heart, no matter what kind of cleanup job they do, if they picked up every micro speck, a part of my son is always there no matter what they do or what they build."

In May 2002, the city called to say they found Jason's remains: a bone fragment 2 inches long and an inch in diameter. The family buried the remains in a cemetery where their own graves are reserved. "For the rest of my life, I'll question whether I wish they found it or not."

Sekzer's eyes are big with anger and betrayal but overlapped with the undying sorrow that has lived in them for the past five years.

"I hate the word 'closure,' there's no such thing as closure when you lose a child," he said. "People don't realize it's impossible. The pain just never stops."

Sekzer has appeared in "Why We Fight," an award-winning documentary that examines America's military power since World War II. Moreover, he is known for getting the Army to put Jason's name on a missile when the war in Iraq started.

"My original intention didn't work out," Sekzer said. "I wanted to drop the bomb on those who deserved it, those who killed my son."

Now he compares the war in Iraq to his experience in Vietnam because he say both were started on a lie.

"What are they going to do if they catch Osama bin Laden alive?" he asked.

"A trial that's three years long and listen to him spout his philosophical bull ---- and then demonstrations. And in the end, he'll get sentenced to death and then get seven years of appeal?"

He pauses and he knows the answer.

Half a decade after the attacks not only on the country and city he served, but on the family, the son and the soul he once had, the answer is still not appeasing to him.

"I'll definitely be in my grave before he is."