9/11 story

[crschmidt]

2 years ago today.

8:57am, September 11th, 2001.

PA system:
"As some of you may have heard, there has been an attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. Terrorists have apparently hijacked 2 planes and flown them into the towers.

Please remain calm as we work through this tragic event."

Yeah, it wasn't much.

Before that, a student had come in late to class. "Yeah, Mancow was saying someone attacked the WTC."
Response? Yeah right. Mancow. Sure, believe him and his crazy theories.

Sure. Believe him and his crazy theories.

In econ, I remember sitting, listening to a radio, and hearing "Both towers have fallen." That was when I realized. Before that, it hadn't hit me, I didn't realize what the hell was going on. We had only recently moved into school - we were kicked out of our normal school because of poisinous mold, so we were in another building. In installing mobiles, they had cut the cable line, so we had no TV, we were listening to a radio, and I just remember hearing "The Twin Towers have fallen" and looking around in shock.

In Spanish, the teacher held up a rabbit ears antenna as 60 kids crowded around a static-filled TV set to watch the towers crash to the ground, over and over again.

When I got home, I remember sitting online. For 3 days straight, I would get online, I would watch the numbers, the stories, the video. I used AIM, Usenet to figure out what was going on.

I didn't have a LiveJournal back then.

I remember my brother shunning the news. Pushing everything away. "Why can't they just shut up about it already?" he would cry in disgust. "What's so important about this?"

Everything, Dave. You want to push the world away, you go right ahead, but it's happening, and it's not stopping because you're ignoring it.

Fragmented memories. 5 minutes in econ, looking at kristin jacoby, thinking to myself "Dear God." I remember saying, in a weak humor tone, "We were just talking about how construction booms help the economy."

I remember watching every bit of news I could see. Reading every webpage. Looking at everything.

I had to know.

I had to know.

Comments

[solcita.livejournal.com]

Then, I had to know, too.

My husband was in Egypt, having been deployed only a week. We'd been married for almost exactly six months.

I literally went crazy, I think. I finally pulled myself out of in November, when Rich came home, but... even now, I can feel the old numbness, the cold deadness creeping around me, when I think about it.

I became like your brother, wanting to shut it all out and push it all away, because if it didn't exist it couldn't affect me, right? And why should it affect me, some anonymous little Air Force wife living in North Carolina? I didn't know anyone in the towers, I didn't know anyone who died that day. I felt ashamed for letting it affect me so much. Still do.

Uh... I'm not really sure why I spilled all of that here. Heh. Sorry, Chris. *wry smile*

[freejay.livejournal.com]

I feel like the world has had too many of those "Where were you the day..." moments lately. I'll never forget the shock and horror of Sept. 11, 2001; realizing my father had been schedueled to fly that day-- but not knowing exactly where he was flying out of. Watching the news and seeing those bodies tumble from the tops of the towers.

It's still mind-numbing two years later, as is the way that the world has altered since.

Crazy stuff.

9/11

[kerme0343.livejournal.com]

I hardly even remembered the other day what the date was. Last year it was plastered all over the newspapers and there were candlight vigils and things that made it impossible to forget. I felt pretty dumn remembering the date sometime after dark.

But I still remember that day. I should put that in my journal too...but I don't think I'll ever forget. I heard about the first plane driving the 8 blocks to my school. My first class was American Problems...ironic. I was one of the first to know, I told my teacher as did my friend Dan - he heard on the way too. He turned on the TV and we waited for information. Our principal wandered in and watched with us. I made some offhand comment about terrorists that haunts me to this day. Because not too long afterwards we heard about the other plane.

Everyone passed through the halls from one class to the next waiting for the next bit of information. Some people joked, some people were obviously in shock, and some of us weren't mentally there at all.

Lunch was horrible. I still remember the ashen look on Bill's face and the terror everyone of us felt as he told us that before they reinstated the draft, he could be pulled even at 17 because he was all signed up for the army. Before I could worry about my classmates or my brother, we all had to face the fact that Bill was going to be one of the first to go. Wherever the hell they were going.

I came home and turned on the news...I never do that...but dad came home and we were glued to the TV until the evening. Over and over I watched the video footage.

Over the days following, I found out Batina and Michelle were both in NY during that time...Batina only blocks from WTC. A friend of my friend Matt was killed in the Pentagon.

At the end of our senior year we made a trip to Washington DC and saw them work on the Pentagon...

I can't forget any of it. Every time I watch a movie set in New York I see it.

Where was I when I heard? In my car driving down Pearl St driving past S Argyle st...just about to turn into my high school parking lot...

Every image is etched into my brain...and music videos and tribute music are all over my computer.

So yeah, I babbled too much about this...but I couldn't sum it up shorter than that.