Ten years ago today, an event that would change the course of American lives took place. It will be featured significantly in history books as the day the United States lost its innocence. Things we as Americans long took for granted would be gone when two planes plowed into the Twin Towers and forever changed the New York skyline. The loss of lives numbered 2752 while 3000 people survived. But as we know from these last ten years, the United States lost so much more than that.
This post today is in memory of that, all that we lost. It’s also to celebrate all we still have and all we’ve managed to regain, because I do believe we’ve healed and are stronger for all we’ve endured.
On 2001, September 11th, I boarded a plane in New Jersey at the Newark airport. In preparation for my move back to New Jersey from Illinois, I had been in New York interviewing for a job the day before and was on my way back home to sell my house. I had a very early flight and it took off on time around 7:00 am. I was completely oblivious to what was going on anywhere really until our flight was nearing O’Hare and one of the passengers said a small plane flew into one of the Twin Towers. There was shock and concern but we thought the casualty list would be short. We all thought it was a tragic event of a poor pilot losing their way and then losing control of the plane. An accident.
It wasn’t until I was off the plane and walking through the airport to collect my bags when I saw others on my flight gathering around one of the television screens. That is when we all saw the second plane plow directly in the second tower. I remember a chorus of gasps, mine included. It was the most surreal experience. For a several seconds it was hard to process what I was seeing. That’s when the awful truth dawned. This had all been deliberate. The United States was suffering the most deadly terrorist attack in our history.
Everything from that moment on was a blur. I can’t even remember getting my bags, I just remembered the sound of the broadcaster’s voice on the way home when he announced the twin towers had collapsed. That’s about when I did, crying my heart out all the way home. By the time I got home I was a wreck but I had to call my parents and my siblings and let them know I was okay. For the next solid month or so, I was glued to the tv watching every bit of coverage I possibly could and crying many more tears.
I had to fly back to Illinois the following month to close on my house. It was probably the hardest flight I’d ever taken.
What about you? What were you doing when the planes flew into the towers and the third plane crashed in PA? Have the events of 9/11 personally changed your life. If so, how?
Bev, your family must have been freaking out that morning, knowing that you were flying!
Ten years ago, I was driving to work and listening to the radio when a DJ announced that a plane flew into one of the towers. The DJ said there was speculation of an attack. I thought it was just hype and that it was probably a small plane that went out of control. My concerns that morning were related to my job. A few days prior, news had leaked that HP & Compaq were working on a controversial merger. It was a daily item in the news. My colleagues and I were all very nervous. As a single mom, I was really concerned. When I got to work, I found everyone rushing into the War Room with the big screen TV. As we watched the towers fall, everyone in the room covered their mouths. For some reason, that just stuck with me~that it was so unimaginably horrific that no one could speak.
Afterward, my team gathered in a conference room. At that time, no one knew exactly what was happening or who was responsible. We all looked at each other. Our company had been top news for days. Finally, I said, I don’t feel safe, for the first time in my life. And everyone else on the team said the same thing. We were afraid that our work campus might be a target. I got my laptop and left the campus immediately. I worried about my daughter who was at school. I didn’t know what, if anything the teachers had told the kids. I decided to pick her up and take her home. When I got to the school, I found many other parents doing the same thing.
I had to travel to San Francisco for business 6 weeks later. I hadn’t flown in quite a while. When I got to the airport, I freaked out, because there were soldiers with guns everywhere. My boss had warned me, but it’s one thing to hear and quite another to see. My heart goes out to everyone who lost family members and friends on 9/11. Blessings to everyone on this day of remembrance.
I was sitting in class when we were told. Everyone got up and left to find a tv. I got back to my dorm room and watched the second tower get hit. My room ate and I sat with a bunch of other girls all day.
I was very thankful I didn’t have to fly anywhere, and that none of my family was flying either.
A day that everyone remembers and changed many.
I was sitting beside my husband’s hospital bed watching the Today Show as I had done every morning for the previous six weeks. I remember looking out the window of his room at the gorgeous mountains stark against the bright blue September sky and thinking what a gloriously beautiful day it was. Then the first plane hit the tower. At first, like everyone else, I thought it was an accident but we soon learned otherwise. What I remember most after that was the fear and the sadness. Our world was changing before our eyes and there was nothing we could do but watch. My husband of 25 years, a military veteran, my best friend, lover and protector was unconscious on the bed beside me, totally unaware of the events unfolding that day. At the time I wanted to shake him awake and say, “Protect me! Reassure me! Tell me everything will be okay!” Now, I’m grateful that he never knew what happened. Never knew the fear and helplessness I felt that day. In the days that followed, while I held him as he gradually and peacefully left this world, while fighter planes circled our quiet valley patrolling the nuclear plant on the other side of the lake, I found an inner strength that I never knew I possessed. Like our country, I found a resolve to go on, to do my own small part to make this world in which we live a better place, to promote understanding rather than hatred and violence.
Today, my thoughts and prayers are with all people who were impacted by the events of September 11, 2001.
I remember I was in high school and the class I was was speech class. My teacher walk-in and way like the trade centers have been hit. We all were SO afraid.
I am setting here thinking of where I was and i can’t remember. My husband and I were going through some hard times at that time. We had both just lost a job we had of 21 years. Its like my mind has blocked everything during that time.
It was my freshman year of high school and I was waiting for the bus. The guy next to was always plugged in to his walkman and it had a radio. He announced to the rest of us that a plane had plowed into one of the towers. Well, being high schoolers, we just thought it was another one of those every day occurrences. The plane had probably gone awry. After the second tower fell, we knew it had become real.
The bus took us to school and all we did was watch CNN which cycled the videos over and over and over again. At that point, everyone became afraid. They sent us home after first period since no one knew what to do. It was totally surreal.
It’s amazing how this one event changed everything, especially at the airports. I finally felt the impact of this event my senior year of high school. I’d done quite a bit of traveling since the attack, but senior year, I went to Italy on a class trip for spring break. At the Milan airport, there were men in SWAT team-like gear (bullet proof vests, assault rifles, helmets) patrolling the airport and actually boarding a flight bound for Tel Aviv. This event has been burned into my mind.
My thoughts and prayers go out today for all the families affected and for all of our troops overseas.
My 2.5 year old and I were in our upstairs bonus room a little before 9 am and I was getting ready to exercise. I had turned on the tv while I was deciding which DVD I wanted that morning and saw that regular programming was replaced with a news update. A plane had flown into the WTC tower and at that point it was being discussed as a horrible accident. I picked up the phone to call my husband and let him know what was going on since we had just been in NYC and had stayed in the WTC Marriott. As I was talking to him the second plane crashed into the other tower. It was the most shocking thing I had ever seen and I remember saying to my husband, “We are under attack.” The rest of the day was spent with the TV on. I remember not knowing what to do. Should I go get my 5 year old from Kindergarten? How far reaching was this attack going to be? Interestingly, I do believe this is one of the earliest memories my younger daughter has. She says she remembers me watching TV and something about planes.
I was 17 living on base on Germany. Wer had just gotten out of school & a friends and i were on our way for a long awaited shopping trip. I didn’t notice the people rushing about as they got calls about it, I assumed it was just kids & people trying to catch the bus between bases. When my friend calledto tell me her mom had called her, I didn’t know what the world trade center was. I didn’t know where it was. I suppose I assumed it wasn’t a building with People. That even I was sp ashamed of myself because when she first told me I made a joke about how inconvenient it was for us. That thet should have waited an hour or so to give us time to get downtown & start shopping before our parents pulled the plug for security concerns.
when I found out about what it really was and all the deaths I was devastated. i was never afraid, not to fly & not of terrorism, but trying to comprehend the number of dead and the number of people whose lives changed forever because someone thet loved just died was enough to have me in tears often. I was glued to the tv& wanted to experience everything. This changed lives and thet deserved people to care enough to watch.
I never did go buy those boots I wanted. We were on such tight security kids would be 2 hours late to school, people who went off base couldn’t always get back on, &i did not leave that little base for weeks. 9/11 didn’t affect me personally, I didn’t know anyone who died & it didn’t inspire fear or patriotism I didn’t already have. But it did open my eyes to the world beyond what was around me. it taught me not to assume something is huge or minor until I hear the details. I am now someone who wants yo hear & see the truth, even if it’s awful & heartbreaking. The people impacted deserve the truth to be told & for people to be willing to see it, even when it hurts.
I was at home. My husband called me from work and told me to turn on TV. I sat there, stunned, watching events happen. Years ago, we’d spent our honeymoon in NY. Of course we had visited the WTC and taken photos from the observation deck. It still seems surreal. I can’t imagine what your family went through, wondering about your safety that day.
My thoughts are prayers are with all those who lost so much that day, for the many rescue personnel who selflessly responded then, and for the many military men and women who still answer the U.S. call to protect the world against terrorism.
Due to my husband’s work we were living in a muslim country when this particularly heinous attack occured. It was a good friend who happened to be Indonesian who called me to tell me I needed to turn on CNN.
I was off work and at home that day. I hadn’t turned the television on. I was doing some yard work and it was a gorgeous day. I went up the hill to get something out of my car and my neighbor was on her porch on her cordless phone. She asked if I had seen the news. I told her no. She waved me over and we walked inside. About then the second plane hit the towers. She hung up and called her Mom. We continued to watch the coverage on CNN. Her husband, a long distance trucker, called from Texas and told her to get the kids and go to her Mom’s. I stayed with her until her parents arrived. I had televisions on in the bedroom, kitchen and living room. Family members called. Friends from overseas called and they all said the same thing “Are you okay? I am so sorry. Please stay safe.” It was all so surreal. I pray for the families of the victims, the heroes of 9/11 and I pray for the day when all of those things that separate us fade away and leave us in peace.
In our time zone, I think most of it had already happened before we heard about it. I vaguely remember waking up to the news on our clock radio and not really believing it. The rest of the day was spent glued to the t.v.
I was extremely pregnant and remember being especially distressed on behalf on anyone who was giving birth in New York at the time.
I was teaching and had to contain any feelings I had in favor of keeping my students calm on that rather hectic day. Some parents came to get their children and the rest wanted to know why theirs did not. I lived close to NYC and everyone had a story to tell of how it affected their lives. The next year we had the kids were red and white and blue and took a picture of them that made the American flag. I do still have it.
I was home sick from school, I remember turning on the TV , but not really understanding what was going on. Then my grandma called to tell us about it then it hit me. I just teared right up.
Today I watched the memorial from NYC and the tributes at the NFL stadiums. I was teary eyed all day.
Tragic memories from 9/11 hit millions of Americans, and many other family and friends all around the world. My heart still goes out to everyone who had lost someone dear to them on this tragic day, 10 years ago. As an American/Brit. I watch an amazing group of people struggle to work hard in the awful fire, smoke and debris to save as many lives before these buildings completely fell. I was watching the news with a patient of mine. While listening to her heart, she was jotting down notes for an essay about something from the morning news. After hearing her parents gasp, I looked up. Together, our hearts fell as the second plane struck the second tower. Recently, at the Indianapolis State Fair, I watched hundred of Hoosier go to the aide of others that lay under a heavy stage. I’m glad God made us strong, brave and unselfish.
God Bless the families and friends who lost someone dear to them on 9/11. Though they will be sadly missed, they will always be remembered.
I actually had still been in bed until my best friend, a nurse who was at work, called me. I put on the TV and of course was shocked. We live in the suburbs of Pittsburgh and Flight 93 which crashed in Shanksville went right over us. She was totally panicked and wanted me to go and pick our daughters up from high school. I was able to convince her that they were probably safer in the school then adding to the mayhem and trying to pick them up. It’s hard to believe that it’s been 10 years. I’m so glad nothing happened today.
I had slept in that day because I wasn’t feeling well so I slept through alot of it. My Dad called me from work and told me about what was happening. I was quite worried because I live in Pennsylvania and the one plane crashed not that far from where I lived.
It’s interesting reading everyones stories of where they were that day.
I was a freshman in college, and I was in my first drawing class at the time. I distinctly remember that we were drawing a pile of shoes (of all things) when another instructor ran into the classroom and told my professor to turn on the TV because it was very important. Maybe my professor could sense his urgency, but he didn’t ask the other instructor any questions, he just turned on the TV. We watched the second plane hit on the tiny TV in my classroom, and then our professor told us all that we could leave.
I carried my things back to my dorm and sat in one of the lobbies watching the towers fall with a bunch of other kids that I didn’t now. The next few days are a blur to me, but I remember specifically thinking that I would have been called to active duty immediately after that if I had chosen to join the Army Reserves before college. I was planning to, and I ended up not joining so that I could care for my little sister that summer. What a dramatic difference that would have made in my life!
I had slept in that day because it was my birthday and I was so excited that I was going to be going out with all of my friends. I woke up and the first thing I did was call my boyfriend to see what time we were going to be getting together. He then told me that someone had bombed the Pentagon and hit the Twin Towers with planes. I didn’t believe him. I immediately turned on the tv and just watched open-mouthed at all of the devastation. I just couldn’t believe it. I kept thinking that it wasn’t real that how could someone do this! I sat and watched. Then a few hours later I was in line at Burger King and the radio announced that they were closing Disney and I just freaked. It was then that I knew it was all real and I was really scared, I worked there and wasn’t sure if we were next. After that I went home and was just glued to the tv.
I was at work and one of the girls that worked with me had been out on errands and she came in and said that we were being attacked. That was when the plane hit the first tower. Of course we didn’t know until much later just how bad it was and how much worse it could have been. I remember sitting in front of the tv or computer screen for days watching all the coverage.