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In 2001 my father, Joseph J Pycior Jr, was working at the Naval Command Center in the Pentagon, a supposed last and final stop during his 21 year career in the Navy. He had finished his coursework for a degree and was looking forward to moving back to New Jersey, where he and my mother grew up, to be a history teacher. He had done a lot during his time in the service with multiple deployments on ships across the globe and at several points up and down the east coast.
After high school he initially attended The Citadel, but ended up leaving to enlist in the Navy. He became the go-to guy wherever he went and had a varied career across the Navy. He had a thirst for knowledge that was fulfilled in his work, but also by taking our family to museums, historic sites to learn about the events that shaped the United States, and Civil War battlefields. He was active with our church, knowing just the place to get a mooring line that could be used for a massive tug-of-war game at our church picnic the weekend before 9/11.
I was eight years old on September 11th, 2001.
We had just started our homeschool year and got to sleep in later than most other kids in our neighborhood. My brother woke me up earlier than expected and told me that the world trade center was on fire. We turned on the news coverage of it burning and knew that we weren’t going to have a regular school day. As we watched we saw the second plane hit and realized, like millions of people did that day, that this was on purpose. My dad spoke with my mom’s family on 9/11 when just the first tower had been hit and told them to look out their windows at the NYC skyline. My parents grew up across the river from New York City.
That was the last contact anyone outside of the Pentagon had with him.
The Naval Command Center had recently moved locations within the Pentagon, so recently that we had to forgo looking at houses the weekend before so my father could assist with some last minute transition work. My brother and I remembered where the old office was, having gone in during take your children to work day in prior years, but didn’t quite remember where the new office was.
Things fell apart when we heard that the Pentagon had been hit as well. We tried calling and reaching out to my father but were not able to reach him. We held out hope that he was injured and in a coma at a nearby hospital, but that was not the case. He had been killed instantaneously when Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon.
It took almost two weeks to get confirmation that he was gone.
We held a funeral at St. Joseph’s, the prior parish of Father Mychal Judge, the FDNY chaplain also killed that day, whom my father and uncle were altar servers for decades prior. My father was buried in a veterans cemetery in New Jersey. He has the unusual distinction of also being buried in Arlington National Cemetery with the other people killed in the Pentagon that day.
After the funeral, we had to move from military housing and start over as a family of three. Although 9/11 was an international event with so many people impacted, I felt very isolated. Although we moved to within an hour of New York City, the town we moved to did not have any other kids who were impacted by 9/11. Starting life over in a new town, in school, and with extracurriculars was a challenge for all of us. We also didn’t have the support of the military community and neighbors like we had prior to his death, other people who “got it”.
I first went to Comfort Zone Camp, back when New Jersey camps were specific to 9/11 families.
I was able to meet other kids who had experienced something similar to me. Reflecting back, I cannot imagine what the initial volunteers went through with going to a camp specific to 9/11. I honestly don’t remember much from my early years at camp, I grew into a “too cool for school” preteen and my brother and I stopped attending. It wasn’t until several years later when I ran into Katie (Lalama) Pereira at a 5k fundraiser at the beach for a different non-profit that I came back to camp. Going back to camp felt like I never left at all. I was able to reconnect with old friends, make new friends, and was surprised that volunteers still remembered me.
Bracelets that we had made in honor of my father were still being worn years after my brother and I had attended camp.
The volunteers truly cared.
My return to camp was during a point in my life where I desperately needed some direction and felt that reconnecting with a positive and impactful program would be a way to help guide my future. I was at the cusp of adulthood and wanted to do something that was beneficial. I attended my first camp as a volunteer and was matched with an 8 year old boy who had also lost his father. There were several other big buddies in the group who had lost parents and were matched with younger versions of themselves.
By the end of my first camp back I knew that I had to keep coming back.
I have now been volunteering for Comfort Zone Camp for 15 years and look forward to my weekends in the bubble of camp. My life is much different than it was when I first began volunteering and reflecting back on the differences has shown me how much I’ve changed. I had more than a table of CZC friends at my wedding and have been able to share camp with my wife. My daughter, who is 4 now, has even developed an understanding of what Comfort Zone Camp is and why I continue to go back. In her words: “To help kids that are sad, like you were when pop-pop died” she never got to meet her pop-pop.
I keep going back to camp because I recognize the impact that camp has on kids and teens, I am able to connect with a part of my past that is very important to me, and I am able to offer some of my lessons learned about grief and life in general to the next generation. Campers can see the best qualities in adults at camp and that is helpful in finding and nurturing those qualities within themselves.
Camp is just as helpful for volunteers as it is for campers.
I get to go back to a place that has helped mold me into the man I am today. Getting to see men be open and expressive with their emotions, supporting each other, and being honest were all things that have stuck with me. I have now gotten to see former campers become big buddies and give back in their own way too. Having a weekend off of my phone and focused 100% on connecting with other people is restorative and freeing. Even if there was not a grief component, I think that my time at CZC would be beneficial, the grief component and emotional vulnerability that I can express truly shape my outlook on myself and the world around me. Volunteering at camp has also made me a better father, and helped my work as a school social worker. Understanding grief, and to a wider extent childhood trauma, has informed my practice with students.
I also have been very clear to be as involved as I can be with my daughter, as I know that sometimes the early childhood memories are all that kids get with loved ones.
If I have learned a few major lessons from CZC, and from my work as a social worker, it is that kids need to feel seen and heard. They need a place where they can be themselves and where that is good enough for those around them. They need to be able to talk about school, family, emotions, growth, and especially the challenges that are faced when growing up. A place where a big buddy can share a piece of wisdom, an older camper or junior counselor can offer support, and where they know that they are not alone with their peers.
I’ve learned over the last 25 years that loss impacts everyone differently, but loss is what ultimately unites us as people.
Regardless of how death is viewed, how we mourn, how our culture and upbringing impact our views on grief, we will all experience loss. Knowing that there is a space for children impacted by loss makes that fact just a little bit more digestible, especially when I know that those children can continue to come back into adulthood and support the next generation of campers.
I can’t wait for my next weekend at camp.
