I flew in to Dallas on Sept. 10, 2001 to work a week-long college fair circuit. The next morning, I ran to the lobby to grab the continental breakfast and discovered about 30 people all staring at the overhead television. I had arrived immediately after the second plane hit. I returned to my room and watched as reports circulated that there was a third plane near D.C. I called M (who was "just a friend"). When I flew (American) home on Sept. 17th, I flew with somber passengers and a crew wearing ribbions in honor of their fellow crewmembers who had died. People spontaneously clapped when we landed.
Someday I'll try to tell my children and they will attempt to understand the way I do when people talk about where they were when JFK was shot.
7 comments:
Yeah, it's a day I'll never forget. Interesting how this was the day for our generation. Like you said, for our parents it was the day JFK was shot. For our grandparents it was Pearl Harbor.
I remember being in my office and someone got a phone call or something and we all scrambled to get on the Internet to find out what was happening... but the Internet was clogged up. No one had a TV and so in the end we huddled around a coworker's radio to listen. I was able to get through on the land line to my mom and she was telling me what she saw on her TV - about the time the plane hit the Pentagon.
After that day several people in our office had TVs installed.
I remember eating lunch outside of the office and how quiet the sky's were for the next couple days -- not a plane in sight.
Working in a law office and watching Fox & the Hound on the reception room tv until one of our attorneys dashed in and turned it off. Julie was flying that day out of Dulles airport (or thereabouts) and I had no idea where she was. I immediately set out to find out that she was ok. It took me awhile but, of course, she was ok. She was the only one I knew (and loved!) flying that day and I felt enormous relief for her. The law office closed, we all went home and stayed glued to the tv for the rest of the day . . .
At home with my three-month-old baby. I'd just signed onto IM to chat with Darren. He told me that a plane had hit one of the World Trade towers, and I imagined a smaller commuter plane brushing the lightning rod on the top. I wrote, "How grotesque," thinking it was a strange accident.
-- SJ
I was walking down the hall after dropping my students off for special areas and a teacher on my team told me to go to her room. She had a stricken look on her face so I knew something terrible had happened. She had a TV in her room where we watched news coverage for the next 45 minutes. The school was on lockdown and Open House was cancelled for the night. The principal made an announcement at the end of the day that blood donors were needed. All I could tell my fourth graders was that their parents would explain to them what was going on. The next morning I had a very difficult discussion with my students about what had happened. Several were from military families and one little girl was already crying because she knew the attack was going to mean her father was going to war.
It was also so very good to see you, Rachelle, in San Antonio once you were able to fly out of Dallas. It was like seeing family and definitely raised my spirits.
Rich and I woke up to the news. Our radio alarm went off and we heard something about terrorist act. We were groggy and thought it was something in the Middle East. Then we heard New York and World Trade Center.
We spent most of the morning glued to the television. Alexander was almost three and Dominic was just over a year. They had just been baptized the week before. Rich was grounded from flying, as was everyone, so he didn't have to go to work.
I remember turning off the television when Alexander toddled out of his room and asked why those planes crashed. I remember him asking if Daddy's plane would crash.
You know, I didn't have to explain it to the children until this summer. Even with their uncle having gone to war, it wasn't until recently that they asked the whys and hows. It was a hard talk to have with them.
I was in Dallas, too, in my college class. My 8 a.m. prof wouldn't let us out of the room at first, thinking it was just an accident and there was no need to check out the news. (I'm not sure how we knew something was going on...maybe someone got a text?) My next class was in the same building and that prof just wept. We all wept the entire Greek class.
I first heard about it on my way to work at NCHS. It was freaky - I got to work and went straight back home to change my clothes into something more practical. Since we didn't know what was going to happen next, I did not want to be stuck with 120 high schoolers wearing a dress, heels and hose. Dumb, yeah, but my mind was on autopilot and we just didn't know what to expect. I woke up my husband and my son and went back to work.
One of our teachers was a captain in the army and a helicopter pilot. He knew he had to leave RIGHT NOW and took of for Ft. Lewis. We didn't see him for a couple weeks, I think. They were saying (because they didn't know) that West Coast cities could be targeted, too; maybe even Seattle. It was very scary.
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