Remember Remember the 11th of September

[Snickford]

I was working at a large defense contractor outside Philadelphia at the time. I was very busy, working hard to climb the corporate ladder. My husband called me to tell me a plane hit the world trade center. For a brief moment I thought "That's a shame." but hung up and went on my merry way. Then I heard the second plane hit and I felt my heart sink into the pit of my stomach. We all immediately went to our cafeteria where the large screen TVs were located. As we approached the caf, there were about 100+ people in there watching the screens in complete silence. I've never seen so many people in one place be so completely silent. We all stood there watching in disbelief. The safety and security that we had all grown up with living on American soil had been breached and we were no longer safe. As soon as the second plane hit and it was determined that we had been attacked, our facility went into lockdown. The authorities began closing bridges, grounding aircraft and exhibiting concern over the "missing aircraft". As the scenario continued to unfold, I became more and more concerned with my children. I knew they were safe at school, but really, I thought we were all safe, after all, this was the USA, and we generally don't have terrorist attacks here. I couldn't do or think about anything except getting my kids and taking them home. If there was any type of large scale destruction, I wanted to be home with my kids. So I left work, feeling a bit silly, but didn't really care.

As I drove to their school, I remember it being absolutely gorgeous weather. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. Once I reached their school, I remember feeling stupid for being there to pick my kids up. It was peaceful around the school, no parents all over the place, I was certain I was over-reacting. But, I was already there so I was picking them up and taking them home. After all, I was in a rush to get back to the TV and see if anything else had transpired during my road travel. Were they still closing bridges, did they locate the other plane... I entered the office of the school and walked up to the sign out area and to my surprise, there must have been 10 pages of signatures of parents taking their kids out of school. I suddenly felt far less stupid for picking my kids up and taking them home that morning.

I waited in the office for my kids to come down and felt a sense of relief when I laid eyes on my 5th grader and my 1st grader, together and safe. As we walked out of the building to the car, my daughter, the 5th grader asked what was happening, why everyone was getting picked up, because it wasn't snowing. That made me smile but I was immediately faced with the decision of how to respond to my child’s question without traumatizing her. I put them both in the car in the back seat and informed them that the USA had been attacked and I wanted to be with them safe at home. After a moment of thought and silence on her part, she says, "Oh. Can I have a cookie when I get home?" That too made me smile. Something I perceived to be so devastating, so threatening and so very insecure, and she wants a cookie. Of course, they both got a cookie when they got home.

After the 11th, I remember feeling great compassion, not only for those directly affected by these attacks, but for all Americans. We lost something very valuable that day, our sense of security. Our (perhaps misguided) belief that we wouldn't be attacked on American soil. As I grew up, I watched terrorist attacks on the news, especially in Israel where it seemed to be an everyday occurrence. But I didn't appreciate that feeling of safety until after 9-11, after it was gone.

My story.

[Rjames]

I didn't have television at the time, and I'm not a morning person, so it took a while before I found out what was going on. I went to a doctors appointment around noon eastern time. I heard some people in the lobby discussing airplanes, tall buildings, and thousands dead. I wasn't sure if they were having delusions or if they were discussing a video game. When I went to my doctors office he had the radio on (very unusual). I asked him what was going on, and thats how I found out. Since I didn't have television, and I lived in a rural Colorado town, I never really got effected by the story. I didn't see the planes hit the buildings thousands of times over and over and over on tv, nor did I feel threatened because most Americans have never heard of my town - never mind a middle eastern terrorist. I thought the media attention given the events were total overkill. No one outside the Northeast gave a rip about the three month, six month, or one year anniversary, yet here we are, thirteen months shy of the 10 year anniversary and there's already people bringing it up.

[Yankee Doodle]

I was in a rock band after college that toured in this VW bus and we were somewhere on I-95 when the planes struck. We didn't hear about until we stopped for lunch and I gotta admit, it put a buzzkill on our weekend plans. The entire nation for the next few days was in a stuck in the mud funk. It was easily the strangest thing I'd ever heard. Plus, people started hoarding gasoline because some were convinced other buildings were being targeted. So, we waited on line in South Caroliina for about 30 minutes to fill up our VW bug

[Phil Richards]

I was in college in upstate NY and I remember people waiting on line, stockpiling gas. It was the craziest, world is ending thing I had ever seen. Upstate is kinda sleepy, but it sure woke up that week after the tragedy. I knew people that drove down to the city to see if they could help out or something

[Bingo Pete]

I was in San Diego, near Coronado, when the planes hit and I woke to the news. I was visiting a friend at the naval base and I remember the base being super amped up that day. Sirens were going off and they were in code 'get your butts ready for combat'. Except they didn't know who they'd be fighting. We all thought there would be more attacks, as did most of America over the course of that week

[Luck Be A Lady]

A recent poll of New Yorkers found that 2/3 agree that the Islamic community has the right to put the mosque near the 9/11 site, but an equal amount would disallow it on insensitive grounds and overall decency. Guess it depends just how the pollster asks the question, right?

[David73]

I lost a lot of respect for Mayor Bloomberg for backing the Islamic community on this one

[Marilyn Hickey]

David73, what was he supposed to say? Give into the hate? Of course, everybody is bitter, but Islam is not a violent religion and most everybody understands that

[Jean]

At the same time Marilyn, the Islamic community was clearly being way insensitive and insulting in its request to put the mosque their, almost spitting on the 9/11 memory in many New Yorkers minds, so they should just bow out of the whole request entirely and find another location. That would be the best solution for everybody. Why fuel a fire that doesn't need to be fueled?