Every year on this date, I take time to reflect on what happened on September 11, 2001.Though it has been 12 years since that tragic day, the images and memories are just a sharp as they were in the days following the attack, and I know they always will be. The events of that day changed so many people’s lives forever, mine included.
I will never be the same girl I was that morning when I woke up to a phone call telling me that the World Trade Centers had been bombed. Details were still sketchy at that point. My brother and I turned on the TV just minutes after the phone call from my boyfriend and we sat there for hours.
We saw the plane hit.
We saw the towers collapse.
We saw people running scared.
We saw the wreckage of the plane crash in Pennsylvania.
We saw the Pentagon with a gaping hole in it.
Those images made me cry. I still cry when I watch footage from that day or think about those memories. Those feelings that I felt that day are still with me and are as poignant now as they were then.
I was pregnant at that time with my daughter, approximately 20 weeks along, and I remember how helpless and hopeless everything seemed. I’ve posted before that at that time I strongly questioned whether or not I had any right to bring a child into such a chaotic world. I thought I was an absolutely horrible person for doing it. I wanted to protect her from the world, to keep her from being touched by evil.
Even though I’m filled with sadness when I think of that day, I’m also filled with pride over how our country pulled together. Instead of shattering us beyond repair, the events of that day showed us how strong our country is…how strong we all are. I am incredibly grateful to all of those who helped during that time. I’m grateful to our military for risking their lives in the years following 9/11.
And to those who lost their lives that day, you’re forever in my thoughts. You’re forever in all our thoughts.
*Photo courtesy of Snickup.
I was in a meeting at work (public school district). I watched the first plane hit in horror. We immediately put our district into lockdown. I don’t live too far from NYC and quite a few people that we grew up with worked in the towers. It took a long time to verify that they were safe and sound – physically. Mentally however, they lost many coworkers, family members and friends. But how many people didn’t perish? Thousands! How many people, for one reason or another, didn’t go to work that day; or were running late? It could have been and should have been so much worse – in NYC, the Pentagon and Pennsylvania. And it was the strongest our nation has ever been – the nation of the people, not necessarily the politicians. A simple trip to the grocery store held bonding moments with strangers.
Athena recently posted..Photo a Day 09/12