9/11 Display at the Newseum in Washington, DC
Where were you the morning of 9.11.01?
We had just finished breakfast and were starting our math lessons when the phone rang. It was an guy who use to work with my husband. He said,
“Stop whatever you are doing and turn on the television.”
I asked him why and what channel and he said it didn’t matter I just needed to turn it on. Then he hung up.
My children, seven, five and one, watched with me as the World Trade center buildings burned and then fell. I was in shock.
We lived on one of the largest Navy bases in the world. I was afraid.
I locked all the doors and we sat and watched. I couldn’t turn it off.
I don’t know whether it was the right thing to let my kids watch all the devastation that day, but they did.
Later that day they closed the base. You couldn’t enter or leave.
My husband called his work and volunteered to help, wherever he was needed.
I thought about our unborn child. He would be born into a different world. He would never know life before 9.11.
Where were you on 9.11.01?
Jen says
Getting ready for work. Turned on the radio to listen to music like I always did and it was all about a plain hitting one of the towers in NYC. I then went and turned on the tv and could not believe my eyes at what was happening. I called my mom right away and told her and she couldn’t believe it either.
When I finally made it into work, we were all in shock. My boss (I was an accountant at a small CPA’s office) told us all to go home and come back in a couple of days. I went that night to church, like so many others, to pray for those families who had lost someone, to pray for our coutry and our president, and for all that would now change for all of us. Such a terrible time in our nations history, but something we should never forget!
Serenity says
I was getting ready for work when my mom called. I turned on the TV just as the first building fell and I sat there and cried. We were living in Colorado Springs and there were rumors that President Bush was coming or was already in Cheyenne Mountain. Later I took my four month old son to my moms house so I could go to work. Once I was there (I worked for the state in child protection) all I could think about was that the world was coming to an end and I was working instead of being with my baby. Everything in Colorado Springs shut down that day (I guess we were a possible target?). 9/11 was what prompted me to quit my job as a social worker and become a full time mom.
Rhonda says
Living n the South, I had just began my day when my Dad called telling me to turn on the TV that a plane had hit the WTC. We sat watching together as the second tower was struck. At this point, I had a very dark, lonely feeling come over me.
As the day went on, it only got worse as the Pentagon had been hit as well. Then they start announcing about flight 93. I knew our Nation was in a great deal of trouble and I was so scared home alone. I wanted my husband, my dad, mom or someone close to me. I just wanted my loved ones to be near, for the fear of what was to come.
Today and everyday, my heart is with the people that didn’t survive the attacks of 9/11. With the families that lost loved ones expecting them to come home that evening. With the NYC Firefighters, Police and other First Responders that lost brotherhood family and forever have to relive what they saw the days to follow. May God Bless You and Our Great Nation!!!
Mrs Happy Homemaker says
I had just put my then 3 month old baby & 19 month old down for a nap, and was getting some housework done with the tv one. When the story broke, I stood still right infront of the television watching in shock & disbelief at the horror that was displayed in front of me.
Kathryn H. says
I was at home. My husband was at work. He called me at home and told me to turn on the TV. I asked what channel, he said it would matter. I did and sat there in our bedroom and was dismayed. I continued to talk to him on the phone while watching coverage. I watched as the building came down. The TV stayed on for days after 9/11. I eventually got tired of watching all the coverage. and turned the TV off. Ever since then, the TV remains off most days. I like the quiet better now.
Erika (Rik) says
I just wrote in my blog about this very topic yesterday: http://cordialchaos.blogspot.com/2011/09/remembering-9-11where-were-you.html
NancyP says
I was at home with my daughter and daycare kids; we’d just returned home from taking my son to school, and the daycare boys were playing while I organized some stuff in the kitchen. My mother-in-law called (I find it interesting that so many mothers-in-law called people!) to tell me to turn on the TV. The way she described it, I thought a private plane had hit the WTC, but I turned on the TV and stayed on the line and we wound up watching the second airplane hit together. I was just horrified, and all I could think of was that we were at war. I got off the phone and turned off the TV, which was hard to do, but necessary so that the young children in my care didn’t watch it. Then my husband called to tell me he was okay, which seemed strange – I thought he was at work, but it turned out he was supposed to have been en route to a meeting in the Navy spaces at the Pentagon, which was where airplane #3 that I didn’t know about yet had hit, killing 184 people. The base where he worked had run out of government vehicles, so he never did go to DC…he was still trying to find a way to get to his meeting when the airplane hit the Pentagon. He went to collect our son from school (a difficult task, as he was one of the first parents to arrive there; fortunately, as he was arguing with the principal about why he needed to take our son home RIGHT NOW – duh – a bunch of other parents streamed in and the principal realized that she would have to give in). I called the daycare parents and then just waited until they came to get their young sons. It was a mind-numbing experience. I think I fell apart when our son came home and didn’t say much, just started drawing the Twin Towers and the planes… but with fighter jets from our Air Force in the picture to shoot the bad guys down. How awful it must have been to be so young – he was 9 – and to have to process such terrible, terrible news. We learned a day or two later that three of my husband’s colleagues were killed in the Pentagon, and my uncle, who was a commodities broker, lost 50+ colleagues and friends in the World Trade Center attacks. I remember the eerie, awful silence over the next few days…we live near an airport and jet noise is part of our daily routine. Except it wasn’t, and that was so very, very sad. When the airlines started flying again I stood outside and prayed for the pilots and flight crews. What courage they must have had, to get into an airplane every day, never knowing if terrorists were walking down the jetway toward their aircraft! We take air travel for granted, but it takes a heck of a lot of nerve to believe you can fly a plane and land it safely, every single time, and to be held responsible for hundreds of other lives at the same time.
We went to a Bar Mitzvah on September 15 and the Bar Mitzvah (young man coming of age) gave the most amazing speech about his studies, September 11 and bravery. I cried and cried. Afterward, at the party, all the teens and kids received goodie boxes that included squirtguns, and they ran all over the place squirting each other and just having fun. I felt grateful that they could set aside sorrow and celebrate a joyous occasion in such a carefree way.
Crissy says
I was making peach scones for myself and my 18 month old. My husband, an Army Specialist, was sleeping after working the night shift. My mother in law called and told me to turn on the tv. I quickly woke my husband up and we watched the news footage together. We lived on an Army post outside of DC and I was terrified we were going to be hit next due to the nature of the operations on post. In the days and weeks that followed, the sense of community that developed was amazing…neighbors reaching out to neighbors, churches reaching out to the community, individuals reaching each other.
tuxgirl says
I was just starting my senior year of high school. I remember all of us being in complete shock, and every class it was either discussed, or we were watching the tv footage. They had a tv up in the cafeteria. Around lunchtime, my best friend and I just spent the hour walking the track, talking and crying as we tried to make sense of it all.
I knew from the moment I heard about the first plane that it had to be intentional. I remember on the way to school, hearing about the first plane, and looking at my mom and saying “that wasn’t an accident.” A few moments later, the news reported the second plane had hit another building.
A while back, it came up in a discussion when some of the younger girls (12-14 year olds) at my church congregation were around, and I was utterly shocked to realize that none of them remembered that day. I still remember a month later I was flying out for a weekend at a college that was recruiting me, and I was terrified of getting on the plane.
Ali says
I doubt that I will ever forget where I was and what I was doing when the planes hit the towers of the trade center. I was grocery shopping with my husband and our two boys who were 2 and 9 months at the time. I was standing in the middle of the pasta isle when suddenly the music from a radio station that was playing in the store stopped and was interrupted by news broadcasts of the attacks. When we checked out and went home, the news coverage was on every station of our television, including PBS, and Nickolodeon. I was putting my groceries away when the towers fell…standing staring at the TV screen with my refrigerator door wide open.
MarshaMarshaMarsha says
I was home when a friend called and told us to turn on the TV. I was SO thankful that David was home that day! Many of his friends were stranded out of the country for over a week. We watched, horrified, as the second airplane hit the other tower. And when they collapsed? I was in shock… I had NO IDEA that could even happen.
We live near the airport and were so used to the sight of airplanes lined up like stars on the flight path towards the runway… It was eerie to not see a single plane in the sky.
I called my sister in New York, she worked the night shift so she was home sleeping at the time… She was scared, wondering what would happen next.
I had always wondered about the adults that could tell you exactly what they were doing when JFK was shot… And now I know. Some things change the course of a nation and you NEVER forget.
Juanita says
I was getting ready to bring my mother to the airport for her flight home. I’m in Canada, and it’s 90 minutes to get to the airport. The news was on when I walked into the house where my mom was, and we didn’t know whether to go or not. We did end up driving in and the airport was only letting planes land not take off. Even a week later, when my mom finally got a flight home, the security lineup started at the front door of the airport and snaked all the way around the terminal.
Jennifer says
I was at home with my 2 kids at the time 3yrs and 3 months I was standing swaying with my baby that was screaming non stop for about an hour + and my husband called and said turn on the news quick. So I did. He wanted to know if what he herd was true so I stayed on the phone with him and told him what happned as the time passed. We were in awww. I was scared then mad and couldnt wait till we took care of those guys who did this to us! What a scary day that was. But God lets us go though these trials for us all to learn something. I Learned that we can not take for granted that we are a free country. We need to do what we can to protect that.
abba12 says
I’m in Australia, and I believe the first plane hit around 11pm our time. I was asleep, but mum and dad had seen the second plane hit live, and it sounds like they barely slept that night. The next morning I walked out to hear the TV on, a strange sound in itself as the TV was NEVER on in the morning, and the first image I saw was the first plane hitting. I was 10 at the time, and just at that awkward age where I was old enough to understand what was going on but too young to think rationally about our own safety. When I got to school, as I was attending a public school at the time, it was all anyone could talk about all day. I believe the teachers explained to us what had happened and the magnitude of it all. All I can remember is that, for the first time ever, everyone in the entire school was talking about the same thing. That in itself felt surreal.
Kari says
I was 19 years, starting my second year in college. I had overslept and everyone else in my house was already gone. I took a shower and then turned on the TV for company as I got ready to make it to campus in time for my second class. I was blow drying my hair when they showed the pictures of the world trade center on fire. I watched as the second plane flew into WTC 1. I ran to the TV and threw a video tape into the VCR (Remember those!?!?!) I knew this was going to be big. I remember calling my mom and her leaving work to come home and watch with me…to say the least I didn’t go to school that day or work that night. I stayed up for hours watching the coverage…I just couldn’t turn it off. I remember asking why they hated us so much. I didn’t even know who they were. Why did they hate us badly enough to kill innocent people? I grew up a lot that day. I cried a lot, I prayed a lot, I learned to love my country more than I ever thought I could. And in a way I was kind of glad I didn’t end up going to NYC after graduation to try to make it in the theater world…I don’t know if I could have handled witnessing all this in person. I will never forget that day, and I don’t ever want to. Thank you to your husband for his service to our country and you and your children also, you get overlooked so often in all of this..the silent heroes behind the scenes!
danielle says
i was a sophomore in high school. our school had just been built so we didn’t have the tvs hooked up yet. I walked into my English class room after lunch and at the point the teachers had been hush because they didn’t want to cause panic. We live in Norwalk Ohio so not very close to the attack but i remember my teacher telling us (about 11;30 am) that the world trade center was crashed into “what the heck is the world trade center” i thought. She quickly said that that our nation had been attacked and it had been determined that it was an act of terrorism. Then we listened, stunned while the radio kept repeating what had happened. I got dropped off to my mom school after school ( she teaches kindergarten at one of the elementary) and I quickly turned on the television because the kids had all gone by then. I couldn’t wrap my brain around it. Something that I didn’t know about that morning when i woke up was now burned into my mind as i watched recap after recap of that mornings events. I also remember looking up at the sky for the week following and finding it so insane that there was not a plane in the sky. And everyone in the nation came together and actually meant it when they said “God bless America” It brought the nation to their knees!
Sunnie says
I served for 8 years in the Army Reserves, and I was in AIT in class. Our dril sargeant came in and took us out of class back to the barracks. Both platoons got together and we sat in between two big building outside for a long while. 9-11 was and will always be so sad.
Wilson Family Adventures says
I had just gone to sleep at 4am (I was celebrating getting my first FT job in CO since moving there that April) which is 6am ET. My best friend called me just after the first plane hit, but before the 2nd one. With only a few hours sleep, I stayed up the rest of the day, glued ot the TV.
SPKarenO says
We were anticipating my husbands birthday on the 12th, and we woke that morning like most other work days, to the sound of our radio. But the voices sounded different. There wasn’t any music playing, just quiet voices. And then I heard one of them say, “A plane has crashed into one of the world trade tower buildings” and then that one little word that changed America, “Terrorism”. We were still laying in bed trying to figure out what was going on when I looked at my husband and said, “Oh my goodness. We’re going to go to war. America is going to war.” Pretty quickly there after we had the tv on and we watched in horror as the second plane crashed. We were on the phone calling family to make sure none of us were going into work in downtown LA, as they were beginning to report there may be other attacks in other major cities. And then the buildings fell. The images from that day, still horrify me. God Bless America.
Carol says
I was teaching third grade in Central Florida. Another third grade teacher and I had just picked our students up from P.E. and had taken them into the main building to use the restrooms before returning to our classroom when the custodian came up to us and told us we needed to go up to the office. I asked why, but he wouldn’t say. The other teacher told me to go and she would watch the kids. I walked into the office and they had the tv on – I couldn’t believe it. The principal told us NOT to tell the kids – we were to teach and treat the day as if it were any other day. We were to let the kids parents tell the students.
I went back down the hallway trying to figure out what to do – I did manage to tell the other teacher and we did get through the day without telling the students, but they knew – because all the teachers were quiet or we would try to sneak off to the office to the tv any chance we could, or huddle together in the hallways anytime we left our classrooms.
It was a difficult day for all of us and one that I will never forget. The next year we had a curriculum to teach about that day, but I think on that horribe day the principal was so upset that she just didn’t know how to explain what had happened to a school full of elementary school students so she chose not to tell them anything. How can you explain what had happened when you don’t understand yourself?
Anne-Marie says
I had just dropped my 3 yr old son off in St. Augustine, FL, at his developmental preschool and was heading South on US-1 toward home with his 2yr old brother. I was listening to a Jacksonville news talk station in the car. The news guy brought a report of a “small plane” crashing into the World Trade Center. My initial thoughts were probably similar to the news guy’s…”a freak flying accident”. Before I reached home he reported that another plane had flown into the 2nd tower. The news guy was still “unsure” about what was going on. I new upon the report of the 2nd place that the USA was under attack.
When I got home, I told my husband what had happened (I don’t recall whether he knew then or not) and then I called the school to see if I needed to come pick my son up. They were aware of the attack, were watching it on a tv there after being told about it, but that for now school had not been canceled.
At noon I picked up my son…I’m sure there was banter at the small school, but I don’t recall.
What I do recall is that Rush Limbaugh was on vacation & another man from San Diego was filling in on his show & different people filled in until Rush returned. That was the day I became an internet new junkie! We didn’t have tv, so we only saw what was available online. And we listened to talk radio incessantly.
We had a wedding to attend in IN on the 15th (I was singing). Even after the FAA ungrounded the planes, our flight to Midway had been canceled. We made a decision at 10pm on the 13th to drive straight thru to IN (about 21 hrs). Going thru Atlanta that evening, the sky was black & quiet. But on the return trip on Monday night, the sky was full of planes. It was surreal. The other thing that sticks out in my mind where the countless “God Bless America” signs everywhere!!! As bad as 9/11 was, it breathed a breath of revival in us. That revival dwindled over time and many in our country have forgotten or simply ignore what happened. The unthinkable has happened as children were taught to “tolerate” the attackers and even blame America. Our enemies have been sugar-coated, promoted, propped-up and protected by insanity running rampant in our government & elsewhere. I don’t what happened to our renewed unity as Americans, but I sure wish it would come back.
Rhonda says
I so have to agree with you! I think the attacks of 9/11 should be added into the history books just as Pearl Harbor are taught. This is a life changing event that touched every life in America if not the World in some way. Our Nation as we knew it was for ever changed on 9/11. Our lives were changed on that very dark day. Not a single day passes that 9/11 doesn’t enter into my mind now. I live with the thoughts of terrorist stricking again, when and where!
Caroline Cordle says
Heather! I have never heard a first hand story of what happened! God had his hand upon you! Desperate to hear the rest of your story!
Sheila says
I was a kindergarten assistant at the time and we (my teacher, our class, and myself) had just walked back to the main building after chapel. A previous parent of ours (who was a stewardess and her husband a pilot -neither were in the air that day) came into the foyer of the school telling us what had happened. The days following were eerily quiet, especially on the playground with no planes flying.
Katie says
I was at work and there was a gal who had came in to get her meds and was complaining that she couldn’t get on her flight because of a plane going into the tower. Walmart turned on the news to their tvs and we saw the 2nd plane hit. I had just moved away from home to start college, and couldn’t get ahold of my mom. It was a rough few days
http://sailorsprincess07.blogspot.com/2011/09/911-10-years.html
Robin in New Jersey says
I was in my bedroom, praying for a friend’s husband(she had asked a few ladies from church to pray for him) and praying for our school day like I do everyday. My oldest daughter, who was 18 at the time, burst into my room and told me to come quick, “A plane has hit the World Trade Center.” I told her it had to be an accident. We watched in horror as the next plane hit and the buildings fell. Later in the morning, as people from church called each other to make sure everyone was OK, and make sure my husband wasn’t on a plane that day(he used to fly a lot), I would find out that the lady whose husband I had prayed for, was on the 101st floor. He was never heard from. We had a memorial service for him a week later. It was a very sad day, as he left behind two young children.
Heather says
I was working in my building, exactly one block from the south tower. I took the train into the WTC every day and walked to my building from there. When the first plane hit, the building shook. We were evacuated and ran the 35 flights of stairs to the street. Once outside, my coworkers and I talked about ways to get home. Eventually, we had devised a plan but as we were about to make our attempt, the south tower began to fall… Only one block from us. We all ran, and I led us into a stairwell to avoid the debris. The pressure of the building falling – as well as the sound – made you think a plane was about to land on you. As soon as we made it into the stairwell, the dust cloud hit. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face and there was no air to breathe. It was like inhaling hot, chunky powder mixed with cat litter, and it hurt. My coworkers and I started saying our goodbyes to each other when we just couldn’t breathe anymore, when suddenly the air began to get thinner and you realized the oxygen was coming back. We made it into a back entrance to 40 Wall St and spent a few hours in a vault in the basement, hacking up gone of mud from our mouths and noses, while covered in a thick layer of itchy, burning ash. We looked like grey snowmen. Eventually we were led outside to leave walking over the Brooklyn bridge. My group got separated in the debris cloud and my friend who lived right over the bridge was no longer with us. My only idea was to lead the small group of people I had with me to her apt, and even though is only been there twice and couldn’t remember the address, I found it WW if I’d been there q million times. When we got there, she was there with w small group of her own…. The story continues but my baby is trashing the place so I must run. I am grateful for every single dqy….
Tabitha (Growing Up Homeschooled) says
WOW, Heather. I hope you come back and finish your story.
Mayra says
I was woking in Puerto Rico and everything stopped when we heard the news. We watched a portable tv set and did not understand why all the smoke. It was because the towers fell. Who could thought it! I lived in NY the last two years and watching Ground Zero is something we will always remember.
Misti says
I had dropped my then boyfriend (now husband) off at a Philadelphia airport. I went to work and straight into a meeting, so it wasn’t until after the meeting that I knew anything about it. At that time they were not sure where the planes had originated from. So I sat right next to a phone and everytime it rang I jumped 3 feet. Of course our friends and his family kept calling me to see where he was at. It was so hard to keep telling them I did not know. At one point I was no longer able to call out because the phone lines were so busy in the northeast. I worked retail and was working with a customer and they knew I was waiting on a call. The phone rang and I was going to let another salesman pick it up. They insisted I stop and answer it, so I did and heard the most amazing sound. My boyfriend had made it safely to Atlanta. I started crying and they walked away to give me a moment to speak with him. But I remember feeling so numb and shocked and realizing this was must have been how they felt after Pearl Harbor. Our world was forever changed that long ago day in Hawaii and altered even further by the events of 9/11. I continue to pray for our soldiers, their families, and the families that were affected that day. May God bless us all!
Deven says
It was my senior year of college, and I was an office assistant in one of the dorms. My husband IMed me and told me there was some sort of serious plane crash, so I went over to the dorm’s TV lounge to turn on the news. After I started watching, I sat there for a few hours. Students drifted in and out. No one spoke because we were all so transfixed. I saw the second plane hit live. The college (a Christian one) held a prayer service asap after it was obvious that these were attacks and not accidents.
One of my roommates from the previous year was unable to get married as scheduled because her wedding was the following Saturday, and her fiance was unable to fly into the US.
Christie says
I was at home with my brand new son (firstborn), recovering from a C-section, and slept through the whole thing (we lived in TX, so it was a little earlier in the morning there.) My husband kept calling home trying to reach me, but it took several tries before I woke up enough to hear the phone, then I spent the rest of the morning watching the news reports and looking at my son, crying, thinking what kind of world would he live in? Later on, I met my husband and a few of his coworkers for lunch. I remember everyone just feeling like we all wanted to be together. My sister in law’s family was living in Washington, DC (Capitol Hill area) and her husband was at work in the Smithsonian- we spent most of the day trying to contact them and make sure they were all OK; thankfully, they were. My husband’s company is based on Long Island, so several of his colleagues suffered losses of family and friends. 10 years later, and the very last thing we covered in history last year was 9/11. I know my son knows all about what happened, but I’m pretty sure he’ll never fully understand just how different the world is compared to the way things were for the first 3 weeks of his life.
Carrie says
I was also pregnant and happened to be in clinicals for nursing school that morning. I remember every patients room had the story on their tv. I went home and stood in our first unborn child’s room and cried thinking “what have I done bringing an innocent child into this nasty world?” I was afraid and all I knew to do was pray.
Jenny says
I had just sat down with my 5 year old and 3 year old to do our first day of school. My husband called from work and told me to turn on the tv, a plane had crashed into the world trade center. I was mildly irritated at the interruption. He insisted. I went to the tv and was horrified. After watching about 10 minutes with my children I decided we needed a bit of normal on such dark day. We prayed for the people in the towers and the first responders then did a bit of reading. After 30 minutes I couldn’t wait any longer. I put on a movie for the kids and went to our other tv. I was shocked to see another plane had hit the other tower. My husband and I talked on the phone as we both watched. I called my mom. She had a NYC firefighter friend who was there. We later found out he was one of those who didn’t make it out. That night our family went to church. Our whole congregation knelt at the altar and prayed. It was a long time before my husband and I went to sleep that night. We held each other and knew our world was forever changed.
Clare says
I wrote about this on my blog last year. I was a college student living in Colorado. It was important to me to write it down- it is my little piece of history for my kids. I think it is so vital to keep these memories alive and not gloss over that day. It really pulled us together as Americans, and if it continues to do that, it was not completely in vain. http://clarescontemplations.blogspot.com/2010/09/i-wont-forget.html
Corrie says
I was at work and someone in the office was talking about a plane hitting the first building. So I immediately jumped onto Yahoo. Yahoo was so busy that it was going down intermittently from the server load. There were so many rumors swirling around the office about planes hitting other targets (besides the ones they hit) that our boss let us go home. I turned on the radio during my drive home and watched it on TV for most of the rest of the day.
My husband and I went to a University of MI football game the following weekend, and I remember being scared that a terrorist would be at the game. There was a lot of fear following that day, but there was also a lot of unity too.
Caroline Cordle says
I was on the way to an ante-natal appointment, for my first child, when I heard about it on the radio. By the time I got to my friend’s house, they were collapsing. She had Sky, so we could watch it live. We are in the UK, so it was the afternoon here. I remember feeling totally shocked, and we couldn’t stop watching it – we were transfixed by the whole event. So sad – never forget the people jumping – how horrific the inside conditions must have been that it was better to jump. 🙁
Jennifer says
I was an office manager at a small manufacturing company. I was listening to talk radio when the announcer said that there were reports that a small plane had hit the world trade center. I tried to get on line (dial up), but it seemed that everyone in the world was trying as well. I listened throughout the day as the radio hosts told was was happening. It wasn’t until I went to lunch and went to my mom’s office where there was a tv, that I got to see the images. I didn’t want to do anything that day except sit in front of the tv and watch what was going on. But I had swim lessons to teach that evening so I had to keep going. I don’t know if I can watch all of the specials and coverages as it still turns my stomach to watch.
Philothea says
At work, doing the weekly payroll. My 3 yo son was with me. A friend of my boss called us about the first plane. We turned on a tiny portable b&w tv my boss used for tailgating at football games. It had a tiny screen, and we turned it on just as the second plane hit. I called my dh who was working about 90 minutes away in a rural part of New York. Then I called my Mom who was a hour from Manhattan. I had family in the vicinity. I had to finish payroll before I could leave or the men wouldn’t get their checks that week. I went home around 10:30 and spent the rest of the day crying and watching the Fox News Channel. My family and friends were all okay, but they all lost friends and colleagues. I watched those towers go up. I still cry when I think of it.
Brandy says
It was the day after my daughters 5th bday. She had a tummy ache from the cake the night before, so I let her stay home from school. She watched it with me. I was 7 months pregnant with my 2nd child. My husband was a Sgt in the military. We lived just off the base at this time. He had left very early to do a field op for a week about an hour from the base. When I woke I had logged onto the internet to a baby/pregnancy forum that I was a part of. Everyone was talking about it. I didn’t really understand. So I turned the television on to see the 1st tower burning. It was on every channel. The news reporters were replaying the details that they knew up until that point. Most still hoping it was a freak accident. My daughter woke as I was watching. She asked me what was going on and I had no idea what to tell her. “A plane accidently hit that building”… I’m not sure I believed that. Then we watched live, as many people did, the 2nd plane crash into the 2nd tower. To hear the usually calm and controlled news casters flip out and not even know what to say.. was so surreal. I immediately called my husbands cell phone. Of course it was turned off, they were on a field op. His parents called me next. I think every military family had the same fear at that point. Especially being at a very large base on the East Coast. Then there was the unknown of what this meant for our military spouses… little did we know what was to come. My husband finally called about 2pm that day. They had been aware and monitoring the situation since it happened. They had not been allowed to make any phone calls until this point. The field op was off, but he didn’t know if he was coming home. No one knew. It was a very scary time for our family, even though we were not directly affected by those planes. We were fortunate enough not to lose anyone that day, but have lost many friends since then in deployments that would have never happened if it were not for this day.
FishMama says
Definitely one of the defining moments of our generation. We lived in a remote area of the country with our own well. And even there I didn’t feel “safe.”