I was driving to work when the news came over the radio. When
I got to work I went into the back room to turn on the TV. I
watched all the coverage in horror. I couldn't get home fast
enought to continue watching. I do however have a question
that haunts me to this day. Remember last year when Barack Obama, John and Cindy McCain walked down to ground zero?
Where was Michelle Obama? Why did she not accompany her husband
on this very important day? This drives me nuts!!!!Did she not
care? I don't know, but that was one reason he didn't get my
vote.

Books in hand I walked into an economics class. There was the normal hustle and bustle as everyone rushed into the room. A girl burst into tears and fled into the hall. I heard murmurs of "...plane crash...New York...". The instructor ordered all into their seats and we were informed the day would proceed as normal. I went home, turned on the TV to relax, and felt only confusion and disbeleif. It was impossible.

I was on my way to my first class in grade school actually, bending down to reach into my locker when I first heard the news. When one of our teachers turned on the news for us to briefly watch the coverage, I remember it seeming so surreal. It's unsettling to think of that feeling to this day.

Edited by Jasmine Dillon (09/11/2009 11:13 AM)
Edit reason: irrelevant

It was still summer break for me. My college quarter hadn't started yet and my family was getting ready to leave for work but I was home until 2pm. I turned on the tv and was surprised to see CNN live on the tv since we only got Canadian TV reception.

That afternoon I left for work and my little world of Port Angeles looked different. I couldn't put my finger on it until I realized. There are no planes... no jet trails in the sky.... with the exception of the birds at the very empty golf course I worked at was silent.

I was talking to my daughter on the phone. She was working a few blocks away from the Towers and they had no power, no news, nothing but rubble and smoke and sirens, and she was calling me in California because she knew I was working at home and could turn on the TV and tell her what the heck had happened.


I remember too how long it took her to walk out of NYC, some to walk across the bridges that are never full of pedestrians .... my daughter and hundreds of thousands more to walk the long way to the piers, hoping to catch a ferry across to New Jersey. New York Waterway had 24 boats running, and then Circle Line and World Yacht added their boats. The ferries moved several hundred thousand out.

I am going to a candle-lit memorial tonight, and it's one of several around the county. It happens every 9/11.

I was sitting in one of my morning English classes (7:40am was the earliest class), waiting to start reading our books (which were Harry Potter & the Sorcerers Stone-I was a senior), when our teacher came in and said that she'd just got off the phone with her hubby and he told her to turn on the tv because a plane had just hit tower 1.

Our teacher turned on the tv, and withing minutes of it being on, I looked up from my drawing we had to do for the book/class, just in time to see the second plane fly into tower 2. Our whole school was in shock. I felt like I should be doing something, but there was no way for me to get from ND to NYC. I wish I could have done something to help, but I know that remembering what happened that day and having a moment of silence on the date is what I can do.

Funny, I was thinking today as I listened to NPR on my way to work that I remember few exact dates or moments from the past but I will always remember 9/11.

I was still doing family medicine residency and I was seeing patients in clinic. The nurses had the radio playing and I happenned to be standing in the nurses station finishing a chart when the news pierced through my concentration. I couldn't believe it and I had the nurses turn the radio up. We were all in shock.

Of course we had to continue on with our day but I continued to feel panic. We lived in Houston and my residency is surrounded by refineries. At that point no one knew whether or not the nation was under attack and Houston with its refineries is considered be an place that would likely be part of a first strike attack.

All I wanted to do was gather up my children from daycare and hold them. However, we continued with the day, seeing patients and listening closely to the radio as the horror unfolded. I thank God that in the end my children and I were safe the whole time but I will never forget those who never got a chance to have one last moment with loved ones and whose lives were so callously and unfairly taken away.

This song is stuck in my head on this September day:

Try to remember the kind of September
When life was slow and oh, so mellow.
Try to remember the kind of September
When grass was green and grain was yellow.
Try to remember the kind of September
When you were a tender and callow fellow.
Try to remember, and if you remember,
Then follow.