I shared some thoughts on 9/11 on a blog at work.
I have re-posted them here.
I am a New Yorker and to think that the Twin Towers were attacked and ultimately destroyed had me asking myself "How can this be?". I mean, I visited that building. I had family that worked or used to work there.
That Tuesday morning was routine for me. I was getting ready for work and watching/listening to the Today show. Then I heard Katie Couric and Matt Lauer jump in with breaking news that an explosion or something happened to the World Trade Center. I stopped gettting ready. My eyes were glued to the TV. While I was watching them try to describe what they were seeing, I saw the other plane hit! "OMG, it's not an accident. This is intentional!" I thought. I called my sister and she tried to contact the relatives still in NYC, the ones who worked downtown. They were OK. (As I type this, I'm getting misty.)
I watched the Towers burn some at home, then headed for the office. It seemed as if 285 was deserted. I heard/saw a plane overhead and got scared. "Was someone going to attack Atlanta, too?" I couldn't help thinking that crazy thought. (Dobbins Air Reserve Base is close by and perhaps they were deploying in response to the attack). I turned on the radio to keep up with the events. While I was driving to work, the first Tower fell. I cried in the car.
When I got to the Atlanta campus, no one was working. Everyone was watching TV. We watched the coverage, and then the second Tower fell. I was incredulous. These buildings that seemed so big and mighty and THE symbol of New York were gone! I couldn't believe that it happened in my lifetime. I still can't.
I kept watching: the Pentagon; the plane lost over Pennsylvania; the hundreds of thousands (it seemed) of dirty, grimy people walking out of the city over the Brooklyn Bridge, many of the women were walking barefoot!
That night when I got home, I was glued to the news. It was a sad, sad day in American history. Personally, I am not happy with the President's response to the attack. Nor am I happy that seven years later we still haven't found the person/person's responsible and brought them to justice.
These days, when I watch pre 9/11 movies or see pre-9/11 photos of NYC, I take the time to appreciate the Towers. To me, they defined my youth. I used them as a landmark as my parents drove around town. And now that they are gone, there's not only the empty space where they used to be in Manhattan, but also an empty space in my heart. Filled with tears and grief for all the people that lost their lives.
NYC, DC, Shanksville, Iraq, Afghanistan.
