Photographed at Sherwood Island State Park's Living 9/11 Memorial, Ashley Gilligan Pastor was 17 when her father, Ron Gilligan, who worked at Cantor Fitzgerald brokerage firm, died in the World Trade Center attacks on 9/11. (Mark Mirko / Hartford Courant / September 8, 2014)By SUSAN CAMPBELL, Special to The Courant
This is a story about grief and loss and love. But it's mostly a story about love.
Two years after her father, Ronald Gilligan of Norwalk, was killed in the 9/11 attacks when she was 17, Ashley Gilligan began training to be a firefighter. She pushed her 5-foot-4, 120-pound frame through grueling training that sometimes made her question her own sanity.
She was the daughter of a financier who worked at the storied Cantor Fitzgerald. What was she doing sweating out her weight wearing heavy turnout gear in a burning building?
But she pressed on. "It was more of a physical challenge than a memorial to my father," she said. She also trained to be an EMT, and only an ankle and shoulder injury stopped her emergency services career.
She met Greg Pastor when both were tending bar a couple of years ago. He was a banker by day, but had taken a bartending job in the evenings. They were friends for six months before they both confessed they wanted to try dating. They had their first date at Top of the Hub in Boston. They shared a plate of fresh-baked cookies and talked about places they'd visited, and places they'd like to visit together.
A year to the day, Greg handed Ashley his cellphone. On it was a picture of a boxed engagement ring resting on her father's engraved name at the National September 11 Memorial & Museum.
"I asked your father for permission," Greg said. He'd gone to New York to visit the memorial and brought back the photo.
"That went a long way with me," Ashley said. Greg knew how important her father was to her, and the influence he had.
They began planning their wedding, without the beloved father of the bride, but then the couple had an inspiration. They reached out to the office of Rudy Giuliani, who as New York's mayor had provided such support to the 9/11 families, who'd crystallized the nation's grief when he said the loss of life from that day would be more than any of us could ultimately bear.
Giuliani said yes to officiating, and on March 7, the wedding party was in New York City, where the former mayor performed a beautiful ceremony, Ashley said. It included all manner of memories of Ron Gilligan that you wouldn't have noticed, if you didn't know where to look. His favorite polar bears topped the wedding cake, where blue piping matched the blue at the memorial. The groom wore a 9/11 memorial tie. Stitched inside her dress, the bride wore a small heart cut from the blue-and-white striped shirt her father wore to work on Sept. 10, 2001.
And then, after a small reception at the Ritz-Carlton in Battery Park, the bride and groom went alone to the memorial, where a staff member thoughtfully waited for them. On this important day, a day for family and hopes and the future, they wanted to pay their respects. Ronald Gilligan's remains were never found. The memorial is his final resting place.
There was no wedding photographer, and no crowd. It was quiet. It was intimate. It was perfect.
Life goes on. It doesn't go on like you thought it would, but it does go on.
Ashley, now 30, has finished nursing school. She's studying for her board exam. She hopes to be working as a nurse within the next few months. She and Greg live in Fairfield, where they are slowly renovating a house to reflect their style. The living room includes a small table filled with mementos of her father.
She sometimes has to gently remind people that there is no closure, and no answers. A building explodes, the bodies are buried, and everyone asks why when there is no answer. There never will be, and so, says Ashley, attention must turn to learning to live your life without that loved one physically there. You go from why me to a sense of gratefulness that you had your father in the first place, this great man who taught you about dignity and respect and giving back.
And you greet each anniversary with a sense of celebration because you are not marking the loss of this life, but the celebration of what came before the tragic death. You forget about closure. You concentrate on love