Getting close to the anniversary - where were you on 9/11?

[LisaKinVA]

I was pregnant with my 2nd child, home in Richmond with my 2yo son. My husband was in New Jersey across from the towers. I was watching the news, when I saw the 2nd tower hit... I called my younger brother who works a few miles away from the Pentagon. While I was on the phone with him, the plane that hit the Pentagon flew past his office window.

 

:crying: It's something I will never forget.

[sdWTMer]

I can't believe how close to the surface the grief still is even after seven years.

 

 

I think that we can get just a little glimpse of what all of our civil servants and military people go through when there are tragedies as that one. Just a little glimpse though. :crying: Thank God for all of them!

 

:patriot:

[M&M]

We were getting ready for storytime, I was watching the tv and talking to a friend. We watched in horror the live coverage.

 

We live very close to Manhattan, we have neighbors that commute. It was a hard day as many close to us waited for loved ones to get home. One neighbor did not go to work that day, and his whole staff was lost. One friend saw the first tower fall from his office and ran...it was hours before he was able to contact his wife and let her know he was ok.

 

I will never forget the silence of no planes flying over, no cell phone service and being without power. There are memorials to those lost in the park where I walk, and a large memorial very close to here where you can see the skyline of NYC. It is still strange to not the towers. I am thankful that dh was not called to work in the city that day, as he often worked right across the street from the WTC.

 

We try to focus on ds's birthday and not dwell on what happened, but it is never forgotten.

[TN Mama]

It has been very emotional reading all of your accounts from that day. For me it is hard to believe that it's been 7 years. I remember it all so vividly. My husband was at work and I was home with Bella who was just 6 months old. I was watching my guilty pleasure (7th Heaven) and on a commercial I flipped over to the Today Show just before plane number 2 crashed into the WTC. For a few minutes I was very confused.

 

I tried calling my stepdad who was always traveling. His secretary hesitated and told me that he was in NYC. It wasn't until the next day that I found out he did NOT go to New York and that he was fine.

 

We live about 20 minutes from an airport and it isn't the silence that I remember so much, but when planes started flying again... I'll never forget throwing myself onto my living room floor when I heard a plane go overhead for the first time since that Tuesday morning. People who know me have a hard time picturing that because I'm not one who worries or is easily disturbed. 9/11 was different. I cried for weeks on and off... hearing stories about people who had died, hearing stories from families who hadn't given up hope but hadn't heard from their loved ones... ugh.

 

On the first anniversary there was a big blood drive downtown and I took Bella and lined up to give blood. They gave out ribbons of red, white & blue with the name of someone who had died that day. I still have mine tied around the rearview mirror in my van.

[teamturner]

Crissy, you have a good point about healing. However, we still are engaged in the battle, so to speak, that this act of terrorism initiated. There are a lot of things still unresolved. People still want to harm innocent people here in our country. I'm not sure what the solution to that is but I'm pretty sure it doesn't involve doing nothing. I just think Americans are too happy to slip back into complacency rather than stay involved and engaged. There is still work to be done to secure our country and we the people need to demand of our leaders to do more. Right after 9/11, the country was united and angry that we were attacked. I think we need to remain as united as we can as it relates to terrorism. It's a shame that protecting our country has become a political debate.

[RebeccaC]

We were sleeping. Dh was working a weird shift at American Airlines and was getting home at 4 am or so. Our assistant pastor phoned to make sure that Dh was not flying that day (dh is not a pilot he is part of the ground crew) The phone call woke us up. We then turned on the TV. Hd had to be at work at noon and he went in. He then found out that he knew some of the folks who die very well.

 

I think I posted somewhere else about how AA and the FAA required all personal to be at work and in the lunch rooms. At O'hare there are roughly 3,500 folks who are part of dhs union working shifts around the clock. They have several lunch rooms and folks were basically locked in. Each lunchroom has several monitor that play CNN news. The men and women in the lunchrooms had no way to turn the monitors off or turn down the sound. Nothing flew for a week if memory serves me right and those employees sat there for 8 hours with no work hearing CNN redo what happened. They asked for the set to be turned off, they were not, management was scrambling and extremely fearful about loosing the company and employees were not on their radar, at least at it was that way at Ohare. seems like the 4th or 5th day in the men just torn the sets from the ceilings and walls and defied management to fire them, with the understanding that the union would let the media know about them not turning the sets off. No one got in trouble for it. It really hit those folks hard tho, half the marriages failed that year, there were a lot of bankruptcies because folks lost huge amounts of their income so AA would not go into bankruptcy, and alcohol and drug abuse went through the roof, quite a few of the younger men enlisted in the military, one of dh close friends from work did and he was the first tri amputee in the war but he felt his sacrifice was worth it. Or heard that similar things happened with United employees.

 

I know that airline employees were not first responders but 9/11 hit them hard and rearranged their lives. Jobs and income was lost which in the big picture is not a big thing but close friends and co-workers died and there was a lot of guilt and anger among employees. If dh had not been married with special needs kids I think he would have been one of the guys who enlisted. Each night when they were not flying and just setting in the lunchroom he would come home just seething and could not sleep which made things worse. Or is the type of guy who needs to work hard physically and when he doesn't in normal times he is a ball of nerves, with the stress of 9/11 he was just off the charts. I did what I could to help him but it wasn't much or enough, some things only God can help with. In our lives there is pre 9/11 and post 9/11 it really was a line of demarcation in our lives.

[WagsWife]

We had been stationed in Minot, North Dakota for 4 1/2 years. We were *so happy when we finally got orders to Vandenberg AFB, CA. We got checked into a hotel in town about 1 a.m. on Sept 11th, but because we were all so excited to be in a new place, we all got up fairly early.

 

The girls (5,2 and 1) were watching Nickelodeon. DH and I were getting ready in the hotel bathroom and the toilet would not flush. I called the front desk and remember getting an "odd" response from the lady at the desk...almost like she could not believe I was worried about a toilet. I just brushed it off as being in California. DH started playing around with the girls, when a maid came to fix the bathroom. She kept sticking her head out of the bathroom, looking at my Dh and kids laughing, like we were idiots. I remember thinking we had entered the twilight zone.

 

When she was done with the bathroom, she came out and said "you don't know do you?" Dh and I asked her what she was talking about...and she told us that we were under attack. We threw the kids and our stuff in the car as fast as we could, because DH (being a AF cop) knew they would shut the base down. We got there just in time.

 

The next few days were so surreal. I did not want the kids to see what was on tv, so we kept them busy exploring our new base. On one hand we were happy and relieved to be at this base we had tried so hard to get orders to...but on the other hand we felt like we had no right to be happy about something so trivial. At night, when the girls were in bed, we would watch the news, stunned at what was happening. In someways we felt like our Nation would never be happy again.

 

[chanda7]

I was 5-months-pregnant with my first child and working as a journalist. Once we heard about it, we watched most of the coverage off-and-on TV the entire day. I saw the 2nd plane go through the tower on live TV. I heard about the Pentagon crash on the radio while I was in the car. I watched a lot of the original coverage on Youtube about a month ago and just cried :(

[hmsch4me]

We had spent the weekend in Vancouver, WA for a potential job opportunity and left Portland at 6am. The crashes happened while we were in the air. When we landed at LAX they were evacuating the airport. My husband, former military, shifted into a whole different mode (not knowing if the attacks were over or just beginning). We ran to the rental car station, grabbed an SUV and took off, getting as far from LA as we could - or any major city. Our kids were back at home in Atlanta, GA being watched by my MIL - who was glued to the TV. My kids were in ps at the time, so we called and told her to get them out - didn't know if school would go into lock down. We made it to Atlanta in 24 hours. I'll remember it well. We were all safe, by the grace of God.

[Holly IN]

Yes I remember that day and a few days after that there were no planes overhead. It was really weird not seeing planes in the sky.

 

Holly

[Mommy22alyns]

Sleeping in, as DH and I didn't have to work until that afternoon. His parents were supposed to fly to Bethesda to get FIL's cancer treatment. The phone rang, it was MIL, saying that they wouldn't be flying. DH went to the living room and turned on the TV. I will never forget the words I heard "...impact area around Manhattan..." I bolted out of bed and went and sat, horrified, in front of the television. We watched the second tower fall.

 

We worked in a mall and the place was deserted. Maybe an hour after we got to work, mall security passed a message around that we would close for the rest of the day. We closed up, went and had lunch at KFC, then went home.

 

Just a lot of shock, speechlessness...

[Saille]

I was in the car with my first baby and dh, on the way to a small town in southern Ohio for a final visit before dh accepted the job. We stopped at a fast food restaurant to nurse, and the order monitors had all been tuned to local TV stations instead.

 

We took the job. Dh covered local community reactions for them that day.

 

As we drove home that evening, we passed the a huge caravan of emergency vehicles, black trucks and trailers...the Urban Search and Rescue team from Wright Patterson AFB, headed for NY.

[Alice]

I first heard at Home Depot where I was buying paint. It was when the first plane had just hit and people were still thinking it was a tragic but weird accident. Then I went home and turned on the TV to watch while painting. I was painting the kitchen that whole day and kept the TV on. I just remember being kind of numb and in shock.

 

I don't think it really hit home to me until I called a close friend who works at the Pentagon. I had been holding off calling because I didn't want to tie up their phone lines if he was trying to call his wife. Finally I called hours later and he answered the phone and I started crying. I hadn't realized until that moment just how worried I was.

 

There were several people at our small church in Arlington who work at the Pentagon. Thankfully, they were all ok. There were calls all day long from various people reporting when they had heard from one of the people who worked there.

[Once]

We lived in NY State two hours north of the city. Dh was in Scotland for work and would be gone for 2 more days. I was caring for a friend's dd, taking her to the school bus and walking home. Stopped in at said friends house and found him watching TV. We did not have cable so I watched in horor for a while and in an act of self preservation left for lunch. Dd was only 18 months and oblivious. I cannot remember picking up friend's dd after school....shock I suppose.

 

Dh was grounded in Scotland for another week and the border was closed to Canada (my country of origin). We had almost $25 in our bank account and I was scared. I sat in the dark listening to the radio for hours after dd went to bed. For days, I watched the newspaper spectualate about poisoning the Hudson River and picked up water bottles with my last $25 dollars. Those water bottles were still there when we moved a year later.

 

It is a time I do not ever want to relive but it gives me perspective when I hear about war in other countries.

[dragons in the flower bed]

I was home with my 1yo. XH called before his first class (teaching science in a cottage school) to tell me, "Call your family and say goodbye," (see why he's an XH?). Dad was working in NYC that day. I turned on our TV just before the second plane hit. I remember listening to Dad's cell phone ring over and over while they played the crashes over and over. It was mesmerizing. Eventually Grandma beeped in via call waiting to tell me he was fine.

[Paz]

I was at home and we were having school when dh called and told me to turn on the TV. 9/11 is my birthday and I was upset with dh the night before because he got tickets to a baseball game and was taking one of his clients instead of celebrating with me. I accused him of ruining my birthday. I began seeing things in a less self-centered way at that point. My birthday was forever changed but not by something as insignificant as a baseball game.

[ticklbee]

I was home, just seeing dh off to work when my neighbor came out and told us what was going on.

 

Dh's employers lost someone, my best friend lost someone...it seemed like everyone either lost someone or knew someone who did. Very tragic.

 

My dh used to work at the towers at Windows on the World. I am so thankful that he no longer did!

[TXMomof4]

Crissy, you have a good point about healing. However, we still are engaged in the battle, so to speak, that this act of terrorism initiated. There are a lot of things still unresolved. People still want to harm innocent people here in our country. I'm not sure what the solution to that is but I'm pretty sure it doesn't involve doing nothing. I just think Americans are too happy to slip back into complacency rather than stay involved and engaged. There is still work to be done to secure our country and we the people need to demand of our leaders to do more. Right after 9/11, the country was united and angry that we were attacked. I think we need to remain as united as we can as it relates to terrorism. It's a shame that protecting our country has become a political debate.

 

I agree. It all becomes hypothetical without the reality of that day to remind us. How easy to let ouselves believe that it could never happen again. How much more comforting that is! Unfortunately, that isn't reality. London and Spain are proof that there is still this same evil out there and being vigilant is necessary for our safety.

[TXMomof4]

In our lives there is pre 9/11 and post 9/11 it really was a line of demarcation in our lives.

 

My mom and I were just talking about this a few days ago. My brother had just enlisted in the Army the spring of 2001. It was new and exciting to be a military family. Now, 7 years later, my brother, my husband and my BIL are all military. 9/11 changed the direction of our lives forever. Having that super-successful job and moving up the company ladder isn't nearly as important as making a difference in this world somehow.

[muffinmom]

I was about 6 weeks pregnant with my first child and hoping I wouldn't miscarry like my previous two. I was a freelance editor, so I was at home. My dad called to see if I'd heard. So I turned on the TV just in time to see the second plane hit.

 

I was afraid all the emotion would be hard on my body, but I was able to really cry it all out instead of keeping it in. But it was scary realizing that I was soon going to bring a child into such a world.

[TammyinTN]

We were stationed at Fort Irwin, CA and my MIL called to tell me to turn on the TV..she was on the east coast. We all stood and watched in shock.

[Mrs Mungo]

I was living in Germany. So, I'd already had a normal day with the kids-playing at the park, etc. I was working on some volunteer work when my neighbor knocked on my door and told me to turn on the tv. I turned it on just before the second plane hit the towers. We looked at each other and said "we're at war."

 

I disagree with the notion that protecting our nation has become political. I know some extreme liberals who are against the GWOT but they are few and far between in my experience. I assure you that citizens of our nation *every day* are working to protect our country and that will not end, no matter who ascends to the presidency.

[Elaine]

I was running on the treadmill at the gym. (We were living in NJ at the time) September 11th is my sister's birthday and we were going out to celebrate that evening. I went home, still completely unaware of what had happened, and my phone rang. It was my husband. He wanted to know if I'd heard from my brother who worked in tower 2.

 

I told him no, and then asked him why. He asked if I had the television on. I went to turn it on and began shaking and crying.

 

I spent the next hour frantically trying to reach my brother. When I finally heard his voice I just wept from relief. He had overslept and missed the train.

 

The sadness and grief that I experienced on that day, and the days that followed, remain even now the most profound sadness that I have ever felt. I felt stuck. Paralyzed, unable to move. It felt wrong to laugh. It felt wrong to want to celebrate my sister. It felt wrong to be alive when so many were dead. I could not turn the television off.

 

I will never forget many days later the words spoken by then mayor, Rudy Giuliani. "Go out to dinner. Laugh with your friends. Go shopping. Live your life, it's OK to want to live." I felt as if he were speaking to me. It made me realize that I wasn't alone in what I was feeling.

 

9/11 is still hard for me for a variety of reasons. I lost people that I loved and I lost the security and sense of innocence that I once felt. As time passes it does get easier, but I never cease to be amazed at how quickly I can be transported right to that exact mooment and time and feel all of those feelings again.

[sdWTMer]

I was running on the treadmill at the gym. September 11th is my sister's birthday and we were going out to celebrate that evening. I went home, still completely unaware of what had happened, and my phone rang. It was my husband. He wanted to know if I'd heard from my brother who worked in tower 2.

 

I told him no, and then asked him why. He asked if I had the television on. I went to turn it on and began shaking and crying.

 

I spent the next hour frantically trying to reach my brother. When I finally heard his voice I just wept from relief. He had overslept and missed the train.

 

The sadness and grief that I experienced on that day, and the days that followed, remain even now the most profound sadness that I have ever felt. I felt stuck. Paralyzed, unable to move. It felt wrong to laugh. It felt wrong to want to celebrate my sister. It felt wrong to be alive when so many were dead. I could not turn the television off.

 

I will never forget many days later the words spoken by then mayor, Rudy Giuliani. "Go out to dinner. Laugh with your friends. Go shopping. Live your life, it's OK to want to live." I felt as if he were speaking to me. It made me realize that I wasn't alone in what I was feeling.

 

9/11 is still hard for me for a variety of reasons. I lost people that I loved and I lost the security and sense of innocence that I once felt. As time passes it does get easier, but I never cease to be amazed at how quickly I can be transported right to that exact mooment and time and feel all of those feelings again.

 

Oh Elaine! I'm so sorry.

[Elaine]

Oh Elaine! I'm so sorry.

 

Thanks, Julie. :grouphug:

[Jennifer in MI]

I was running on the treadmill at the gym. (We were living in NJ at the time) September 11th is my sister's birthday and we were going out to celebrate that evening. I went home, still completely unaware of what had happened, and my phone rang. It was my husband. He wanted to know if I'd heard from my brother who worked in tower 2.

 

I told him no, and then asked him why. He asked if I had the television on. I went to turn it on and began shaking and crying.

 

I spent the next hour frantically trying to reach my brother. When I finally heard his voice I just wept from relief. He had overslept and missed the train.

 

The sadness and grief that I experienced on that day, and the days that followed, remain even now the most profound sadness that I have ever felt. I felt stuck. Paralyzed, unable to move. It felt wrong to laugh. It felt wrong to want to celebrate my sister. It felt wrong to be alive when so many were dead. I could not turn the television off.

 

I will never forget many days later the words spoken by then mayor, Rudy Giuliani. "Go out to dinner. Laugh with your friends. Go shopping. Live your life, it's OK to want to live." I felt as if he were speaking to me. It made me realize that I wasn't alone in what I was feeling.

 

9/11 is still hard for me for a variety of reasons. I lost people that I loved and I lost the security and sense of innocence that I once felt. As time passes it does get easier, but I never cease to be amazed at how quickly I can be transported right to that exact mooment and time and feel all of those feelings again.

 

Elaine - I tried to rep you, but I've got to spread it around more. Anyway, just wanted you to have this: :grouphug: This post made me cry!! I've been transported back to those feelings of the exact moment many times this thread.

[MeanestMomInMidwest]

I have logged on and off, trying to read all your memories of that day. I have been crying off and on all day.

My dh is a UAL pilot. He was at the airport (Chicago). I was home with first ds and 8 mos preg w/2nd ds. TV tuned to PBS, but nobody is watching. I'm doing that spurt of housework that we must do when birth is immenent. I remember thinking "It must be telemarketer Tuesday" because the phone is ringing off the hook, but nobody is leaving messages. Finally I decide to answer. Our dear friend (who is also wife to a UAL pilot) asks me, with her typical Southern Charm, "what are you doing?" and then, very conversationally, "Do you know where your husband is?" (Sometimes I don't keep track of his destination cities). When she found out that I knew exactly where he was, AND that he had a nonflying day, she then told me "something bad has happened. Go turn on the news" and hung up because she had more calls to make. I will never forget her kindness in breaking the news to me. No panic. Made sure I knew where dh was. No details.

We had friends stranded throughout the country and a cousin stranded overseas. Such uncertainty about our future. One thing was certain. When dh saw the planes hit (on TV in ops at the airport) he turned to the pilot sitting next to him and said "there goes my career." He was right. One month later...the same week ds #2 was born, he was furloughed. Our whole lifestyle, everything we expected pulled out from under us. Five years later, he was called back to a very different industry. Five years of struggle, lost income, lost status (yes, that matters more than it should), lost friends, all of our savings spent to find him another career & put me through college & live.....We're still paying off debt from that.

And now we live in a world that is so much different......And I have a life that is so much different than I could ever have imagined.

[Mrs Mungo]

Such uncertainty about our future. One thing was certain. When dh saw the planes hit (on TV in ops at the airport) he turned to the pilot sitting next to him and said "there goes my career." He was right.

 

It's strange how you can see in the moment of perfect clarity how your life is forever changed. Like my neighbor and I *knowing* we were at war. Since that moment my husband has been deployed twice. I've held grieving widows in my arms. I've felt my heart stop when a knock or phone call came just a little too early in the morning. I've known someone in our unit was killed and cleaned my house from top to bottom just in case.

 

It's been so many years now that I've known some widows who have remarried, seen babies born of those relationships...it's so strange to think it's been that long.

[MeanestMomInMidwest]

It's strange how you can see in the moment of perfect clarity how your life is forever changed. Like my neighbor and I *knowing* we were at war. Since that moment my husband has been deployed twice. I've held grieving widows in my arms. I've felt my heart stop when a knock or phone call came just a little too early in the morning. I've known someone in our unit was killed and cleaned my house from top to bottom just in case.

 

It's been so many years now that I've known some widows who have remarried, seen babies born of those relationships...it's so strange to think it's been that long.

 

So true....my dh is former military and strongly considered going back in. It was hard for me to be supportive when all I could think was "thank God we got out of the military just in time." In retrospect, I think he may have been happier if that avenue had worked out for him....the support for all things great & small we felt in the military is lacking in our civillian life.

[philda62]

I was home schooling the kids. A dear friend of mine knew we did not watch TV and would be schooling so she called me to tell me to turn on the TV. She has just explained that a plane had flown into one of the Twin Towers. When I turned on the TV I thought I was watching film footage of the first attack but actually watched the second attack happen.

I was getting my 4yo ready for preschool. My husband was working in a highrise building near an airport. I wanted him to come home. But I did not want to scare my children so I needed to make the day as normal as possible. So, I convinced myself that no one was going to attack a little preschool in small town Texas and took him anyway. When I returned the Towers had collapsed and the Pentagon was hit. A dear friend of mine worked in the Pentagon and it was a long day waiting to hear from him. He had not made it into work that day.

It was a long hard day.

Gilda

[Alyce]

When I woke up everyone was talking about it and of course it was all over the news but I could only watch reruns. It would have been nice to have been awake when it first happened. I like to watch peoples reaction to things. And in a way it made me feel less involved.

[Cheryl in NM]

I was driving my step-daughter to school. I almost turned around and took her home. Ds was 4. I heard the 1st tower fall on the radio and saw the second tower fall on the news. I sat in front of Fox News all day trying to reach DH and crying. Dh was hunting and not in cell phone area. After school dss told me how they were not allowed to say anything bad about the terrorists because it might hurt someone's feelings. I pulled her out of school the next day and began our homeschooling journey (it was just the last straw in a long bunch of straws!). Dh finally checked in that night and I told him "forget the deer come home now!". Of course, he's already packed up camp was on his way. We are in central NM, kind of between Los Alamos National Labs and White Sands Missle Range. Roswell, NM is only a few hours away and it has the longest runway in this part of the country. So I saw NM as a viable target and was scared.

 

I remember a country song that came out right away about a woman who receives a phone call from her husband who is on the PA flight and he's telling her that he loves her and the kids and that he's sorry, but he has to fight, then the line goes dead. They never play that song anymore. I think they should. I don't even know the name or artist, but I'm crying just typing this. I get depressed and weepy every September. I still can't imagine what it must be like for families who lost someone.

 

I am forever grateful to our military for keeping the terrorists away from us. I hope something like 9/11 never happens again.

[Elaine]

Elaine - I tried to rep you, but I've got to spread it around more. Anyway, just wanted you to have this: :grouphug: This post made me cry!! I've been transported back to those feelings of the exact moment many times this thread.

 

Thank-you, Jennifer.:grouphug:

[sdWTMer]

I am forever grateful to our military for keeping the terrorists away from us. I hope something like 9/11 never happens again.

 

Amen and AMEN! God Bless our military!

[tibbyl]

We were doing homeschool math. Eldest was few blocks away at local public high school. Husband was working in homeoffice.

 

Since I did not watch *any* TV at that time and only used computer occasionally, some time passed before we were informed by others. Typically we did not answer home phone during certain school hours.

 

We watched the coverage half an hour or so. Discussed the prior WTC parking garage bombing. Contrasted security in European airports with that of U.S. Then it was back to work and school as usual. No one got rest of day off work or school.

 

Since I tended to avoid speculative "news," I waited a week or so before updating myself on the situation.

[Cheryl in NM]

I was sitting on the couch nursing my almost 2 week old dd. My twin boys were 21 months old at the time so they were playing in the family room and my dh was still home with me and our new baby. We had the TV on and actually saw the 2nd plane hit the tower. And we saw the towers collapse. I think we were in shock for a very long time after that. It just didn't seem possible for something like that to happen on US soil.

 

I wish the news media would replay the events that day on TV every anniversary so Americans would remember and mourn our loss each and every 9/11.

 

Dh and I have been saying this for the last 7 years. In today's society it is so easy to forget what is at stake. The terrorists don't want to invade us; they want to kill us. It still gives me goosebumps.

[Krista in LA]

I was watching Good Morning America when the second plane hit the towers. It was almost time to load the kids up for preschool and kindergarten. I could hardly tear myself away from the tv to take them. I was working part time from home at that time, so when I came home, I moved a little 13" tv into my office so I could keep updated on everything while I worked. We live in the flight path of Barksdale Air Force Base so we always have B-52's flying over our house. The sky was quiet - the absence of the B-52's was pretty creepy. At some point in time, I decided I had to get out of the house and away from the tv so I got in the car to run to the store. As I was leaving, I was startled by the sound of a plan flying overhead - it wasn't the usual B-52 or A-10. I heard on the radio later that the President had left FL and came to BAFB. It was AF1 that flew over my house! I initially felt safer because it had to be safe here if the President came here and then I realized that it was no longer safe *because* the President was here. Seeing the soldiers we know as friends and neighbors scrambling to get to work and not knowing what they might be called to do was stressfull for everyone here. When they started flying again, it was kind of weird and reassuring at the same time.

[3lilreds in NC]

I was home with the girls, giving them breakfast I think. Emma was 17.5 months; Abbie was 5.5 months. I remember being out of grapes and MIL calling and telling me Emma could live without grapes, and we needed to stay put.

[Tarheel Heather]

I had just dropped my oldest off at preschool. On our way home the morning radio people were watching it and talking, the first plane had just hit. When I got home turned the T.V. on saw what was happening I got back in the car to go pick up my son.

[dorothy]

That morning a NYC friend called me on my cell. I was in the post office with dd. He said a plane had hit one of the towers, and I replied, "Probably some idiot in a Cessna!" I drove home and turned on the TV to find out more. Then I saw the 2nd plane hit. I kept screaming, "NO, NO, NO!!!!!" I tried calling all of my friends in NYC but couldn't get through. I raced to preschool to pick up my other dd. My DH came home and we just cried in disbelief and pain. The dds played in another room - they were young and we did not want them to see us in such a state. We held it together in front of them but we were emotional wrecks. We lost one friend in the 1st tower. Two friends cancelled September/October weddings. A few weeks later I flew in for business and was in Rockefeller Plaza when the anthrax was found - everyone hauled a** out of there. I still can't get over the skyline. I get a knot everytime I am there.

[sleepy]

I was running on the treadmill at the gym. (We were living in NJ at the time) September 11th is my sister's birthday and we were going out to celebrate that evening. I went home, still completely unaware of what had happened, and my phone rang. It was my husband. He wanted to know if I'd heard from my brother who worked in tower 2.

 

I told him no, and then asked him why. He asked if I had the television on. I went to turn it on and began shaking and crying.

 

I spent the next hour frantically trying to reach my brother. When I finally heard his voice I just wept from relief. He had overslept and missed the train.

 

The sadness and grief that I experienced on that day, and the days that followed, remain even now the most profound sadness that I have ever felt. I felt stuck. Paralyzed, unable to move. It felt wrong to laugh. It felt wrong to want to celebrate my sister. It felt wrong to be alive when so many were dead. I could not turn the television off.

 

I will never forget many days later the words spoken by then mayor, Rudy Giuliani. "Go out to dinner. Laugh with your friends. Go shopping. Live your life, it's OK to want to live." I felt as if he were speaking to me. It made me realize that I wasn't alone in what I was feeling.

 

9/11 is still hard for me for a variety of reasons. I lost people that I loved and I lost the security and sense of innocence that I once felt. As time passes it does get easier, but I never cease to be amazed at how quickly I can be transported right to that exact mooment and time and feel all of those feelings again.

 

Oh, Elaine... I'm so glad your brother overslept. :grouphug:

[5knights3maidens]

That was my first year homeschooling...just had Becca and Tom. My dad called and said that a plane had hit the tower...etc. My 4 boys were in school and I wanted them to come home so badly but the school decided to keep them in until regular dismissal. Oh, a friend was working in the area and he came over to watch the tv. Tom remembers nothing, I guess he was to young but Becca remembers everything.

I want to add that the day before, we were at the Trenton, NJ aquarium with my dad. I believe we would have been in chaos, Thank the Lord we were not.

[Elaine]

Oh, Elaine... I'm so glad your brother overslept. :grouphug:

 

Me, too.

 

You know, in the days after 9/11, our friends had so many stories of people they knew personally who, for one reason or another, were not in the towers at the time they were supposed to be. People oversleeping, taking children to school, personal days, flat tires, going back home for a forgotten item, spilling coffee on their suit and having to change. Of course these things happen all the time but they had a special significance on that fateful day.

[mcconnellboys]

I was homeschooling my older son when my mother called, crying, to tell me something was happening and to turn on the news. I was watching in amazement as the second plane came in and hit the second tower. And then I watched the fall..... Wow. It makes me cry even now to think of it.

 

My husband was in Las Vegas and got stuck for about a week before he could come home.

[sdWTMer]

Of course these things happen all the time but they had a special significance on that fateful day.

 

How right you are on that point Elaine! I wonder how many of those people have survivor's guilt.

[jail warden]

I was pregnant, due any day. Dh was self-employed at the time and came home. We watched the TV with ds and were just amazed and freaked out.

 

I had a meeting with my friends and went there and we were all in shock together.

[newlifemom]

they were so moving that I don't know if I can read all the others. first of my dh was working in NJ at the time(we lived in Long Island). Because he worked for the major traffic company in the city dd#1 and I would always turn on NBC to see the local traffic report to see the back of daddy's head. BTW that is when we first noticed the bald spot;). Anyway I saw the first news report and and then the watched for a while calling family on the west coast and waking them. Couldn't get dh for a while and then my girlfriend called me and asked me to come over. Both our spouses were stuck in NJ as there was no good way to get to Long Island. NYC was shut down. Interestingly, years before I had had a dream that dh and were separated just like that and NYC being bombed. Strange. I personally didn't know anyone who was killed but I do know some who worked in the towers and were tremendously affected. My girlfriend's sister had post traumatic stress over seeing people and parts of people falling from the towers. The whole thing was beyond anything I have ever experienced and I hope to never go through anything like that again. I tell you the truth I am so glad I have moved from Long Island I think I had some hidden anxiety about living there since 9/11. KWIM?

[Pajama Mama]

It was my son's 2nd bday. My mom was driving down that morning for his bday. I had a Barney video on so I didn't know what had happened until my mom arrived. I met her outside and she started asking me if I had any more info. She heard about it on the radio and assumed I knew about it. We turned off Barney and put on the news. We saw the second plane hit live.

 

We were supposed to take the kids out to lunch but we were glued to the TV instead. Besides, we lived close to Dover Air Force Base so we weren't allowed on the roads for most of the day anyway.

 

I was so worried about dh because he was an EMT and his work was looking for people to send up to New York. He volunteered but he didn't go because they started turning people away because they had too many people there.

[Allearia]

I was about six months pregnant with my first son. My husband was unemployed at home. I was driving to work at my temp job that morning, listening to the radio and they were talking about some sort of plane crash. I am in California so this was probably two or three hours after it happened. It took me a while to figure out what had happened and I started shaking and had to pull over. Since I was a temp, I worked in a common room with a kitchen and TV, and when I got to work I started seeing the news footage. I called my husband who hadn't heard what happened yet. The whole next week while at work the TV was going constantly with news footage over and over again.

[Chris in VA]

Both my boys were in school--we had just moved here to NoVA from Dallas 3 weeks before so dh could start his job as the priest at Pohick Church. We live right next door to Ft. Belvoir, just 20 minutes from the Pentagon, and many folks from our church work there.

 

I was watching tv and screwing around, not wanting to do housework, hanging out with the baby. I saw the footage of the 1st plane, then saw the footage of the second plane. I felt a desperate need to go--to get out of the house. I went to the library down the street, of all places. THen I saw the reports about the Pentagon and I think the plane crash in PA. I came home quickly, feeling so panicky, yet oddly calm at the same time! My boys came home from elementary school and I had to tell them that this new place we lived was not safe. (Well, not in so many words, but that's how they took it.)

 

Dh contacted everyone from our congregation who worked at the Pentagon--thankfully, everyone was fine. Someone had almost moved into a newly renovated office that would have been in the wing that was attacked, but hadn't moved her office yet.

 

We had a service the next day or maybe two days later--we had to have it outside because there were so many people.

 

And as far as the planes flying overhead--we heard planes taking off from Ft. Belvoir, which freaked us out, because we knew it was military, and we just didn't know why they were flying.

 

And a year later, my kids had to deal with the crazy sniper-dudes--their school was locked everyday, they couldn't go outside, buses parked sideways to protect the kids going into the building, shades were drawn all the time--it was traumatizing. We are still dealing with the trauma of moving here in therapy.

 

I wish you all health and peace on Sept. 11.