MONROE COUNTY, Pa. — For almost two decades, Cpl. Matt Nero has been a police officer with Pocono Mountain Regional Police Department, working a lot of the time with K-9s.
But Cpl. Nero wasn't always in law enforcement; he used to work for the American Stock Exchange.
"The goal was I was going to be a broker, so I was studying for my Series 7 (exam), and I was going to be a New York Stock Exchange broker and go from there, I was playing semi-pro football, so I was living the life then."
It was a life he had planned out himself, but that changed on 9/11.
"If you remember, the second one was even lower, and that flew right over our building and the impact, I remember, knocked me to the ground, blew out the windows of where we were trading, and I made a decision I didn't want to be there," Cpl. Nero said. "They locked down the building, and I pushed security out of the way and grabbed one of my buddies, and I said, 'Let's go.'"
The sounds and smells of fire and burnt ash still live with him to this day, a day so horrible that no one could have ever imagined. He remembers the heroes who inspired him to change his career to help others.
"I just remember running down to the ferry and seeing law enforcement and firemen running towards those buildings, and what I could see, I knew what I had to do, and immediately it was like fast forward. I think it was three months, I moved back to Pennsylvania where I'm from, and threw myself in the police academy, and here I am."
On the anniversary of September 11, many of us try to remember and reflect, but for Cpl. Nero, that's every day he goes to work.
"When I put this body armor on, there's a piece of me every morning that goes for them, for the people who lost their lives that day. Because that's who I am, and I've seen a lot in this job, in this career, stuff that you'd lose sleep over," Nero said. "But I think part of that was 9/11 told me what I'm made of, and I can deal with stuff."
Cpl. Nero says he still has the boots he wore that fateful day, never worn again, still covered in soot and ash. They sit in his closet at home as a reminder that no matter how many years have passed, so many lives were changed that day, including his.