9-11

[Miranda]

I was scrolling the post in this section, and didn't see this up... the anniversary of 9-11.

It's funny the things you remember. It was DD's first day of pre-school. I had just dropped my baby off away from my care and safety for the very first time. Little did I know that my worries of safety were much less than others in the world at that moment.

Today I drove by DD's elm school and fire trucks were there. It was not a standard drill. In the end, no real actual fire, but a mechanical malfunction. The school could not deem themselves safe without proper working equipment, and officially evacuated. The principal sent home a letter to the effect of that, and noted the anniversary of 9-11. I think for some, it might have caused some concern of repeat terrorism without an explanation (& how rumors spread).

The world can be a crazy place. Never forget to hug the ones you love. Peace to all those gone, and those left behind who loved them.

[ASammy1]

I got married on Sept 11, 2000-one year before the attacks...

I'm divorced now, but interesting how things happen.

[teigyr]

Seems like a long time ago.

That morning I was at home and my mother called. I was half asleep and let it go to the answering machine. She said "call before you go to work, there was a crash and all the airports are closed". I thought "huh?" I turned on the news.

I worked at LAX at the time. The next day (I believe) we had a potluck for the United and American ground people. There were National Guard people we had to go through to get to work (lots of BIG guns). A lot of our planes were grounded for a bit. We had heard LAX was to be a target and I lived right near a fairly big refinery near the airport. Us non-uniform type people started wearing our uniforms (I'm not in uniform but have uniforms from when I wore them) to respect the other airlines and to be able to go through security more easily.

I know there are so many stories out there. A co-workers mother was supposed to be on one of the flights but she missed it.

If any good has come of it all, it has made us more aware of what's going on around us. As an airline person, we look around when we travel on vacation and I know the other passengers do too. It's not good to be paranoid but it is good to work together. The US has been buffered for a long time and this is, unfortunately, an introduction to a lot of peoples reality.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

All morning I have been thinking about this, not really wanting to post.
I grew up in Manhattan. My mother was watching it from her apt window a just few dozen blocks away as the towers fell. I was living here 2 hours north of the city. We were on the phone in a state of shock when she told me one tower was just "gone".
I didn't have a tv (haven't watched tv in 10 years now). Listening to the reports on the radio describing what was going on was not enough. It was the only time in the past 10 years that I felt compelled to see tv news. I went to a friends' house who was out of town, and I watched those news images for hours the next day, alone and in tears.
New York City changed forever that day, you can still feel it. Now, people look at each other more, there is a bond, a strength, a human connection that was not as palpable before.
This morning i have shed tears off and on, remembering that day. There are no words really.

[Aggie_Ama]

I had a News Writing class at 8:00 that morning, we were busy listening to a lecture from the professor (a woman I can see her face but don't remember her name) when it happened and the class was in the basement of an old building, very isolated. I respected the teachers in college so much I would not even leave my cell phone on vibrate, I didn't know about the phone calls from my mom and then fiance. Texting was very uncommon in 2001, not even sure my phone could do it!

I went upstairs to my next class, Women in Media, this building was a very small one for the A&M Campus and often there wouldn't be a lot of people in the halls. We sat down and our teacher turned on CNN, that is how I learned what had happened. We spent the next 1.5 hours discussing the news coverage and alternately just soaking in the enormity of it all. I remember a vry numb feeling and not even realizing class was supposed to end, I was late to the next class. Parts of our campus went on high security alert because of research they do (nuclear, biohazard type stuff)

I had to work that evening at Lowe's, I remember no one was shopping and the few that were just had this look of "what next?" I also remember lines at the gas station that night.

[andtckrtoo]

We had just moved into our current house and had not had cable run yet, so we had no tv (there was no cable from the street so we had to have it dug in). I was on the internet before work - it was 6AM. I remember reading about the first airplane crash and thought, "Wow! How tragic!" Then the second one hit. Oh my. The moment of truth was shocking. I ran upstairs to my still sleeping DH and woke him up. We immediately turned on the radio. A few minutes later DH's brother called. He lives in Washington, DC and works for the government. He was in a state of panic. DH managed to calm him down, but he was very shakey himself.

I worked for an internet company and we had offices in NY right in downtown Manhattan. They had a view of the WT Towers from their lobby window. They sent photos, and for some reason that made it more real. When the towers collapsed, we all sat in stunned silence.

9/11 made me go into search and rescue as I wanted so badly to help in some way.

On September 23rd, 2001, DH and I climbed Mt. Whitney. At the top was a plaque commemorating the victims of 9/11 that someone had carried up the mountain. There was also a flag that was held down by rocks. It was breath taking experience in many ways. Here's a photo of DH at the top of Whitney with the flag and plaque (unfortunately exposures at 14, 500 feet leave a bit to be desired):

[sundial]

Christine, I got goosebumps just reading your post.

I remember that day well. I was doing a load of laundry and cleaning the house when my husband called from work. "You better turn on the t.v.--there's some strange stuff happening!" It was so unusual for him to tell me that because he neverlistens to the news. I promptly turned on CNN and watched as the second plane flew into the tower. As the news anchors sat stunned, I tried to grasp what had just happened. I called my dad. We were glued to the t.v. for the rest of the morning. I went out and bought a flag and mounted it on the front porch. I tried to find the largest flag. We were at war.

[milkbone]

9/11 is a day that will always be remembered and close to my heart.

I was a Marine stationed on Camp Lejeune at the time, was out in our maintenance bay working on a Howitzer at the time, another Marine came out and told me I needed to come into the shop, that a plane had hit the WTC...I got upset at him for wasting my time when I had this gun to fix(I thought he was playing a joke), he insisted I come back to the shop...I did, I walked in saw my whole platoon in groups around several different radios in the shop, all on the same station.

At that time was when the Pentagon got hit, and we were all jaw dropped, angry, sad, and just in a state of shock. We were all held at work until about 9 or 10 that night, I didn't see anything on tv until I made it home, then the next morning we came in with all of our gear, being told be ready to go...

I have since served as a firefighter and now am a paramedic...I feel a close bond with all those who serve the public and remember the 343 daily.

Hopefully we will never have to suffer such a tragedy as a nation again.

[Tuckervill]

I remember it was a beautiful day at my house, too, 1500 miles away. I had extra kids at my house for a couple of days. They and my son were all still asleep. I grabbed a basket of clothes out of the bathroom and walked through my bedroom, where the TV was on. I glanced at it and saw "breaking news" on the screen and then saw the second plane hit. I stopped dead in my tracks. I picked up the remote and checked the other channels--certain it was a movie or something. I don't remember what I did with the laundry basket. I remember Peter Jennings crying.

After I watched a while, and the Pentagon was hit and the other plane went down, I called my husband and asked him to come home from work. He said he wouldn't. I was very mad about that.

The extra kids' parents called and were trying to decide whether to come home, but they ultimately decided to stay where they were. I spent the rest of the day online with others similarly situated, having moved a TV into my office so I could keep up with what was going on. I was so thankful for those extra kids, because I was able to keep them all busy doing stuff and entertaining MY kid while I kept one eye on the TV, and tried to understand. I remember feeling very lonely.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I held my breath all day and the next, waiting for something else to happen.

I happen to be traveling right now, and taking that son to NYC on Saturday to watch the Yankees play in Yankee Stadium before they tear it down. I asked him months ago what one thing he wanted to see in the city if he only had a few hours in the morning. He said he would see Ground Zero. So I guess we're going to Ground Zero on Saturday morning, despite me telling him about dozens of other things there are to see in NYC.

This morning, when we decided to leave a campground and get a hotel, he was glad that he would probably get to see the documentary on the History channel that uses the recollections of people who took videos and photographs that day. That's what was on when I first saw this thread.

He was almost 7, on this day, 7 years ago.

Karen

[maillotpois]

We went for a bike ride. We're in the flight path for planes to SFO (they are still pretty high overhead by the time they cross over us, but there's regular traffic.) There were no planes in the sky that day. It was eerie.

[divingbiker]

I was at a meeting on the top floor of the National Press Club, a block from the White House. Someone came in and closed the blinds, and it wasn't long before the meeting ended and we all stood around wondering what to do.

Finally, I told two other women at the meeting that we were going to walk to my house, 7 miles away. After walking about 3/4 mile, we caught a cab. One of the women (who works for the National Security Agency and really wanted to get to work) lived north of me, so we took her home. The other was in town from Houston, so she stayed with me for four days until she could get a flight home.

About 7pm on September 11, we drove to her hotel south of National Airport to get her belongings and check her out of the hotel. We went right by the Pentagon, and the smoke and smell of burning flesh was something I'll never forget.

Several Cantor Fitzgerald employees that my branch worked with died that day. We think about them often.

One of the reasons I ride my bike to work now is so I have a quick way out of town if something like this, heaven forbid, ever happens again.

[crazycanuck]

We were living in Auckland at the time. I remember waking up, turning on the internet to read the BBC & saw the reports.. I thought..eh?? No freakin way..OH!

I woke Ian up & he said " nah".. I said " Ya"

I was confused when I went to work that day & heard some of the comments from my overseas students. (I was teaching english at the time)

[redrhodie]

I lived 20 blocks from WTC. You could see ithe North Tower from my building. That day, BF and I were away on vacation. My kitties were home alone, being taken care of by a neighbor.

My neighbor's friends lived at Battery Park City, and weren't allowed into their home because of the all of downtown below Canal St was closed, so we let them stay in our apartment while we were gone. It was the time you opened your doors to strangers, no questions asked. The need to do ANYTHING to help was foremost in everyone's mind. That's the one good thing that I remember from this, we all came together in a way that made you proud to be a New Yorker.

Sadness shrouded the city. The hardest thing for me to see was the funeral progressions for the firefighters, which seemed to happen every day for months, always with the firetruck decorated in purple and black, with bagpipes playing the mournful songs.

The missing person fliers were everywhere, on every surface they could be taped, smiling beautiful faces, which slowly washed away until the pictures were ghostly streaks of abstract color. I wanted those gone so much. It was hard to look at them knowing there was no hope these people were alive, knowing how much they were being missed. It just hurt to see them. I felt like I had been rubbed raw by the grief which permeated everything.

I left the city the following year. It was time to find a new place without the history this one held for me.

[Aggie_Ama]

When I was still at A&M I was assigned to write news articles for class on various speeches given on campus. I got to sit in on a speech from our Corps leader, Lt. John Van Alystyne, he described being in the Pentagon that day. It was the two year anniversary (or around) when I listened to him speak and yet the stoic career military man had trouble keeping his emotions at bay. It was powerful, horrifying and emotional to hear him speak of it. The vivid details of the feeling of the flames around the corner, the description of the burning flesh smell and the screams of the injured was the stuff of nightmares to listen to and hard to stomach. I remember crying for much of his speech while taking notes.

I remember thinking I wasn't worthy of telling his story in my assignment and wanting to do it justice. It ended up being one of my best grades in the class and one of the pieces I was extremely proud of for writing.

Growing up my parents talked about where they were when Kennedy was killed or where they were when Charles Whitman opened fire on the UT campus. When the Challenger disaster occured it left an impact on me I still remember even though I was a pre-schooler that day but it doesn't evoke the emotion the photos of those towers can. At first when I watched the news in class I didn't realize it would be my "I remember where I was when...." moment but I can remember the sun sparkling through the oaks of campus, where I was sitting in Reed McDonald, sitting in my first apartment and being late to work because I was watching the news.

[mimitabby]

we were in Italy. Stopped into a hotel to use their bathroom.
When I came out of the bathroom, some men came up to us.
"Siete Americani?"(are you americans?) they led us to the TV in the lobby. I thought it was a horror movie. Of course, it was all in Italian. one tower was still up.. We watched as the second one collapsed! we drove back to my cousin's house with the car radio on, trying to hear the english behind the italian, and being fairly clueless, as it is very hard to understand newscasters speaking another language, they talk SO FAST. At my cousin's house, there was the same news reel, this time with 6 people talking in Italian. It sure brought us down to earth fast. It changed the tone of our vacation, we realized at that point that we REALLY didn't want to come back home.

we were so blown away by it all that we left our rental car unlocked in the town plaza and ended up with it getting towed away because someone tried to break into it and no one could re-lock the door without a key... what a mess.