Seven

Seven years ago I'd just come out of my first trimester of pregnancy. I wasn't nauseated anymore, and the depression was manageable.

It was Primary Day, and I was scheduled to go out and flier for my candidate at the subway stop near my apartment. My husband called right before I left to ask if the news was saying anything about some kind of crash or explosion at the World Trade Center. I flipped to New York 1 (all-NYC news TV station) and they were just starting to show it and had no idea what it was. I told him they didn't know yet. Then I called my mom in Ohio to tell her something strange had happened, but it was probably nothing and we were fine, and she might not even hear about it on the news. I headed out to flier.

After about 15 minutes, people started coming out of the subway, crying. Then people started coming out of the subway dusty and grimy and crying. I kept asking what happened but all people could say was "plane crash," "explosions," "terrorists."

It was so confusing. I had no idea what to do. My first instinct was to go vote in the primary before the polls closed because of whatever this was. I decided not to, but just to go home and wait it out. I watched the whole thing unfold on TV, and heard sirens blaring from all sides as emergency vehicles rushed past me heading downtown. I got another call from my then-husband, who said they'd all rushed into someone's office to try to see what had happened, when they saw the second plane coming in. They stood there and watched in horror as it slowly circled and crashed into the second tower eight blocks away from them. Then they all ran down 29 flights of stairs and started running away from the site. He was calling from a barber shop about halfway home.

The rest of the day unfolded like a slow, grinding blur. By the end of the day the caustic, thick smoke had reached my apartment. It smelled like burning metal, and like something else. A few days later I was talking to a friend who'd grown up in another country, and she said it was the smell of the crematorium in her town, the smell of burning flesh.

That smoke stayed with us for six weeks. Through the initial days of fear and hope in which people covered the city with "Missing" posters of their loved ones. I couldn't decide which ones were more heartrending--the ones that were hastily slapped together, as if getting them out quickly would mean their brother or husband or cousin would be found. Or the ones that were done precisely and professionally, as if doing everything perfectly would increase the chances that their mother or college roommate would return to them. One day as I was walking across Union Square I caught one of the posters out of the corner of my eye and recognized a woman I'd worked with five years previously. She was so much fun. Generous, hilarious, and free. She'd have 600 friends on Facebook, if she'd lived to see Facebook.

I think we're mostly over it. I didn't seize up on Monday, like I have been every year when the weather's the same as it was that day. And I haven't cried yet today. But I did get irrationally angry when I saw that it's been named "Patriot Day" by the people who make the calendars. It seems so reductive, Patriot Day. There's so much more to it than that, and it's all still going on, here and in DC and everywhere someone was lost, and in the places and with the people who caused it to happen. What happened on 9/11/01 was just one tentacle of something sad and hopeless that's still there, even as we live our lives in hope around it.

Peace, everyone.

Comments

[perries]

Thank you for this post. 7 years ago I was driving in to work from Arlington VA to Washington DC and listening to NPR. They stopped the news to say 'we have a report that a plane has crashed(?) into the WTC.' There was a short silence and a fellow commentator asked, "a commuter plane?" No one could grok it, and nor I. It was another half hour or so before it began to even dawn. Who knew that at my back as I headed into the city was another planeful of my fellow citizens flying toward the Pentagon and their doom.

At that time I lived just a mile up the road from the Pentagon. When I finally returned home that day, I drove on the freeway past it. A pall of smoke hung in the air, the fire trucks continually sprayed on the devastated pentagon section, an acrid chemical smell was everywhere, and the roads were empty (they had been closed post evacuation). My roommate told me that night she was headed for the shower that morning when the plane flew right over our house, really low. All night we heard the fighter jets patrolling, that night and every night subsequent, and the big truck bomb barriers went up in front of all the monuments and government buildings. But too late, too late. I was taking a night class at the local U and in my class were several people who worked at the Pentagon and all were shocky, but as if compelled to come and tell their stories to us, to everyone to anyone. Like my post.

[hedra]

Peace, Moxie.

We have friends in NYC. Two worked in the WTC, both survived, but both were marked by the experience notably.

I was also pregnant - 8 months. I remember wondering what kind of a world I was bringing this child into.

Since then, I've heard Mariane Pearl (wife of Daniel Pearl) speak, about hope and the necessity of proving to our kids that their world is full of hope. We can't just say it, she said, because they know when we're lying. We have to prove it, by creating it ourselves. In whatever way we can, big or small, anywhere. Mariane Pearl said this not in forgiveness, but in anger - she isn't about playing nice, she's about beating terrorism where it lives... and hope is the one thing no terrorist truly has, so filling the world with hope is her truest revenge, as well.

Moxie, thanks for making one more place of hope in the world. Right here, you're changing the world.

[rudyinparis]

You’re right. I’ll never forget how blue the sky was that day. And how silent the sky was in the days after. And how, driving in my car, even the sound of the radio seemed to be too much, so I turned it off and it stayed off for weeks. So mostly I remember the blue sky and then a long, shocked silence.

[Maria]

Patriot Day? Really?

[Shannon]

Wow, the stories of you NY and DC residents are so powerful. I lived in Southern California at the time, and I'm still haunted by the thought of watching the whole thing unfold on the news. I do think 9/11 changed the world. I definitely think of life as being either pre-9/11 or post-9/11.

[SarcastiCarrie]

I knew today was the 11th and I knew what that meant, but I was not prepared to walk out onto my very own front porch this morning to see that my husband had put the flag out and my son wanted to know why. Why, exactly? If only I knew....

[r+k+mama]

I don't know what made me turn on the news that morning. I was a stressed out college student that didn't have time for the world outside my bubble but for reasons I still can't pinpoint I turned it on in time to see the smoke and then the crumble. Later that day one of my professors got angry at a group of students referring to the event as a tragedy. "No!" he yelled, barely containing his anger. "A tragedy implies these people as victims of circumstance. An unpreventable outcome. There was a choice made here to end their lives. This is not a tragedy. It is a travesty. A horror." How right he was.
I agree "Patriot Day" is more than a little lacking in representing the day. But can you think of anything that would encapsulate the feelings we all felt that day and in the following weeks? How can you coin such volatile feelings of despair and hope felt by an entire nation?

[hedra]

I don't think we have our heads around the entire picture of how our lives, perspectives, or our understanding of the world shifted - culture-wide - that day. Maybe when we do, we can give it a new name, or the existing (eh) name will take on new meaning... right now, it's not working for me. Granted, I'd end up with something like "Transition Day"... better not put me on the committee.

(Now remembering how G said that he 'felt buildings falling down inside his head' for days after, and we had to talk about how architects like daddy design buildings so they would stay up, and that this was unusual conditions and that buildings would not fall down on him as he was walking by... and remembering trying to get through to my sister and SIL in DC, and later hearing the too-close stories of friends in NYC, relatives in NYC... I think I'm doing better because I can't recall all the details of the stories anymore. I suppose that's a good sign...)

[marian]

7 years ago seems like a lifetime in some ways and like yesterday in others. I was working at the WTC for Morgan Stanley at the time (Tower 2, 59th floor) when we heard the explosion of the first plane hit the North Tower. We ran to our conference room to see paper and other things on fire falling from the top of the tower. All my coworkers immediately said we need to evacuate, as they had been there in '93 and didn't want to relive it. Thankfully we got out but my coworker Jen did not. Our bldg was hit 2nd but was the first to fall. I was running home in heels over the Bklyn Bridge when the second one fell. Was just a a nightmare on so many levels. Thinking about my other friends I've lost today and giving my 18 month old an extra hug.

[Laura]

I was driving in to work in DC when I heard about a bomb going off in the World Trade Center, before we knew it was a plane. We got to work and watched on tv until my boss closed the office. I told him he had to once they started talking about bombs on 14th Street (which was closer to us than the Pentagon). He and I lived not too far away, so we drove out together. I remember everyone driving with the radios on and the windows down so that the people literally walking out of DC could hear what was happening - those walking were often faster than those of us in cars. I remember not being able to get through on the phone lines to tell my family that I was safe and spending the next several days trying to make sure everyone was okay and receiving calls from friends all across the country wanting to know if I was alive. Just before I left, I promised my best friend from high school's mom that I'd get her son out and then he decided to stay because some women were staying at his office and he didn't want to abandon them. I was terrified I'd never talk to him again. Finally, we got home (we lived in Virginia but had to route through Maryland because all the bridges were closed going south) and I remember hearing them talk about all planes being down across the country but still hearing them fly overhead because we were so close to DC and the security planes were still flying.

[ccr in MA]

I hate that they call it Patriot Day. The first time I saw it on a calendar, I couldn't believe it. How utterly pointless is that?

[caramama]

I was not living around DC at the time, although my family was still here. I heard it on the radio while driving to work in Georgia. I heard when the second Tower was hit. It was a travesty.

I wrote about it on my blog today, too.

Also, please check out Burgh Baby's Mom's site, because she did a post about Flight 93 and her ad revenues this month will go to the fund to build a permanent memorial in Shanksville, PA: http://www.theburghbaby.com/

[caramama]

Oh, I also meant to say that I really feel for those of you who were right there when it happened. I send virtual hugs to you all. We knew someone who got out of the Tower and someone who should have been at the Pentagon. I feel for those who lost someone in these attacks, and for those who survived them.

[attiton]

I remember that smell too, Moxie. It was caustic and it lingered for so many weeks.

I also remember the beauty of the weather and the way that everyone seemed just to be wandering through the streets, unable to work, looking at each other with fear, wonder and shock in their eyes, talking about what had happened. It was utterly and unforgettably uncanny.

[Nella]

I was working in the IBM building in downtown Chicago at the time. We were told to evacuate the building, as the plane that ultimately crashed in PA was rumored to be headed for the Sears Tower. I remember so clearly hearing the announcer on the radio saying, "we are under attack!"

When we left the building and headed home the city was eerily empty. The one way roads headed out of downtown were jammed with cars and the inbound roads barren.

It obviously does not compare with the terror and pain of those in NYC and DC but I will tell you that Chicago was on edge; we were so sure we were next.

[Jenny]

I was going to tell my story, but it's exactly the same as Laura's. Except that I arrived to work without hearing about the crash. I went into my building and there was a janitor cleaning the floor and he looked at me and said, "Goddamn terrorists blew up the Pentagon." I didn't respond, I just thought, huh, crazy janitor, and I went upstairs. And then it sort of turned out to be true.

The rest of my story is Laura's, exactly. Went through Maryland because of the bridges. Thought I'd run out of gas because it took me so long. Couldn't get through to anyone. Terrified. And listening, listening for everyone else.

[Kristin]

What a beautiful post. You know...I was actually thankful it is grey, cloudy, and raining where I am today. That made it seem a little different from that day 7 yrs ago and made it a little easier to take.

[meanderwithme]

Beautiful post, Moxie.

For me, I had just gotten out of the shower, and instead of hearing Bob Edwards (NPR) doing the normal morning news, everyone was speculating about the "small plane" that had "accidentally" (because why would it be on purpose?) hit a tower. Then the second plane hit, and everything changed.

Since I was in Colorado Springs (three air force facilities and an army base), the lack of planes overhead in the days afterward was especially spooky -- we were used to a LOT of air traffic.

This is nothing compared to what y'all from NYC and DC felt; I can only guess about the trauma.

I sure hope that today's ceremonies are kept free of politics and focus on the UNITED States.

[Jamie]

I remember that day clearly. I was at an airport in Florida riding the shuttle bus from a car rental place to the terminal when someone on the bus stated that there had been a plane crash. I was thinking "great, just as I'm about to board a plane..." Nobody knew what was clearly going on.

As we got closer to the terminal there was talk about the plane having hit the WTC. Everyone still thought it was an accident- a fluke. I remember entering the terminal, going through security, when I then saw two stewardesses sobbing. This seemed odd but I thought maybe they knew the crew on board that plane. It was only after I arrived at the gate and started watching the news that I realized there had been a terrorist attack. Initially, the planes were delayed - then, the entire airport was shut down. All of the luggage was taken off the planes and we all moved together to collect our personal belongings. My parents were in another terminal altogether but managed to find me. We then went back to my parents' place and holed up in their condo for four days watching the news. Finally, I was able to fly home (my parents drove). On the plane, on one of the first flights on the first day air travel was permitted, the pilot made an announcement pre-flight that he promised to keep us all safe. It was eerie, sad, and horrifying.

[Tzipporah]

I was a grad student in Virginia at the time, and turned on the TV to catch the weather forecast before going in to teach.

Having lived in Israel for most of 1996, where the Prime Minister was shot by a fellow countryman, bus bombings happened only blocks away from my apartment, every bus stop had a 19-year-old with an Uzi, every shop and restaurant had you stop to get your backpack inspected - I was less shocked than those around me. I remember my first thoughts were, "wow, somebody finally realized how easy it is to get away with something like this here."

One of the professors had it right on the money, within half an hour of the first bombing - "Bin Laden" he said. At the time, I'd never heard of him.

Some of the students in my classes had parents and friends in D.C., and a few in NYC. It took me until the evening to really grasp what had happened.

Yeah, the silence with no planes overhead afterward was strange. I had forgotten that part.

[MorahLaura]

'Patriot Day' strikes me as especially inappropriate here in Massachusetts, since we already had a holiday called 'Patriots' Day' which commemorates the first battles of the Revolutionary War. I feel such a similar name diminishes both days.

[meggiemoo]

I was 2 days into my honeymoon in Bethany Beach, DE. All of my family and friends were still in Maryland (where the wedding was) when it happened, so they ended up staying in extended stay hotels for days and days. Our honeymoon was effectively no longer a honeymoon, so we invited friends from Denmark to join us, since they couldn't go home.

My Aunt from California was so shaken by the events that she refused to fly even once they could, and they ended up driving across country. She still has panic attacks on airplanes.

Not anything like other people went through, but every year when my wedding anniversary comes up, I still think about this day, and how it changed everything.

[Pedantic Jack]

Patriot Day is a terrible name, but it was not created by calendar makers, it was created by the US House of Representatives, and is as legitimate a designation as any other.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Day

[Jen]

I used to drive by the pentagon every day to/from work, incl 9/11. I got to work, my phone ringing, and my now DH telling me about plane 1. watched plane 2 hit on tv. Then we got the news about the pentagon. i felt like I was hit in the chest with it all going on. Then the news about other planes headed for thw White House and the Hill (my office is 2 blocks from the dome). The fed govt closed and DC basically evacuated. I drove home, heading down 395S. I could not believe it wasn't closed!! I was able to drive right past the disaster area that was the Pentagon and see what was happening.

I don't have anything to add other than to say that I still get choked up seeing the coverage and shows about 9/11 on History Channel and the like.

I also hope that politics is kept out of 9/11 memorials. . . and out of using 9/11 for political reasons, generally. Makes me sick.

[pnuts mama]

i'll never forget that smell either, moxie- i remember thinking 'this is what death smells like'- god it all floods back, doesn't it?

i was in my room brushing my hair listening to the radio when the dj's mentioned that a plane had accidentally hit the WTC- i immediately looked out the window and thought "that's odd, there isn't a cloud in the sky"- and there wasn't, i mean the sky was the most gorgeous blue that day and the weather was beautiful and it was at such odds with the horror that was about to unfold. i went out to turn on the tv- i watched with katie couric and matt lauer as that second plane flew in- and oh my god what we all thought at that moment- what in an instant we realized- i'll never forget that either.

the man who raised me is a retired battalion chief from the FDNY- battalion one, in fact, and if he had been working it would have been his emergency to deal with- and we sat together in mostly silence as it all unfolded- we didn't know what else to do or where else to go- in NYC there was so much confusion- you couldn't evacuate b/c where would you go? all the bridges were getting shut down, it was rumored you couldn't even leave or enter the city anyway. we sat and watched and prayed- he would talk about what protocol would be involved with an emergency of that scope- he told me "there's no way those buildings can survive that impact, the heat of those fires. those buildings are coming down. those men are going in to do search and rescue, there's no way they can put out a fire like that, the standpipes are probably out..." on and on, and we watched people jump from windows to escape the heat and smoke and flames, before the media realized what they were broadcasting, and we watched the towers fall and knew that thousands had been lost- and lost our tv signal then, since it used to be sent from the antenna on top of the north tower...

and the phone calls, the sadness, the emptiness, the disbelief. so many people we knew, knew of, learned of. the fliers. the not knowing anything. i remember staying up all night watching tv waiting for news that people had been rescued, not yet comprehending the unimaginable destruction that that type of collapse would have on a human body, thousands of bodies, thousands of souls going right into the peace of an all-loving creator, who wept along with us those days and weeks and months afterwards.

ikwym about being mostly over it- it's the families and friends of those lost who still suffer, still lose the scab and bleed every year on this day especially- the rest of us have grown scar tissue over the part of us that disappeared like the towers on 9/11/01. i hate the politics associated with the phrase 'patriot's day' i hate the exploitation of human grief and sorrow with so much that it associated with the phrase "nine-eleven"- in so many ways it has turned into an "event" instead of an anniversary.

my prayer this year, as always, is for the peace that i am assured those we lost dwell within finds it way into the hearts of those who still grieve and suffer.

[ginger]

Thanks for posting this Moxie. Today is one of those days that lots of us need to share stories.

I wasn't in NYC or DC, but like so many others, I have a story too. We'd returned from our honeymoon three days before, so like a PP my anniversary is tied up with 9/11 in my head too. I was teaching an 8am lab that semester. I was already in class when the news hit, and one of my students was a local EMT. He got the news on his phone/beeper/something and told me about it. I simply didn't believe him. I think I said something like, "really?" and went on with class. I still feel guilty for dismissing him like that.

About 6 weeks later we flew for the first time since the attacks to attend a funeral. I'll also never forget the soldiers with M-16s everywhere at O'Hare.

[Steph]

Grab a tissue.....

www.PeaceTodayMovie.com

Peace,
s

[Albania]

So much has happened to us, the the world and to me since that awful time. We deserve so much better and here's hoping that we get it.

I too remember the awful sights and sounds, and later smells of that time. There was so much sadness and little hope. Now there's still sadness but a little more hope.

[Cloud]

I was living in SoCal, but my sister was at that time still living in NYC, and worked in lower Manhattan. I remember that sick feeling of worry until we heard from her- it took until about 11 a.m. our time before she was able to get to a coworker's apartment and send an email. And sitting in my living room in my bathrobe crying while I watched the news. By the time I got up and out of the shower and turned the TV on, everyone knew what had happened, but I still remember the disbelief as I figured out what the TV was saying.

Also, the realization about a week later that my now husband, who had arrived in the US on a J visa exactly one month before the attacks, would not have been able to come in if details had worked out to have him arrive a little bit later. And how happy I was that he was there with me that day and during the weird time that followed.

I had a previously scheduled trip to Barcelona at the end of September, to meet up with a friend who was traveling around Europe. I left San Diego on the first day international flights were flying again. I got to the airport really early, because that's what we were told to do, and then sat around a mostly empty terminal looking at National Guards carrying machine guns and feeling freaked out. Everyone on the plane applauded when we took off. Everyone in Europe was so very nice to us- it remains the only time I've ever traveled abroad and not heard a single comment disparaging America.

And then worrying again on 7/7/05, this time about our friends in London, and how that reminded me of how I felt back in 2001 and made me cry all over again, even once I knew our friends were safe.

And finally, how amazed I was when I went to write the date on my daughter's milk for day care today and I actually had to go look on a calendar and check. This is the first year that I haven't just known.

[ramy]

First, I'm a lurker who has suddenly felt the need to comment the last few days. maybe I won't continue to be a lurker.

on 9/11 I was living in Tanzania, starting my dissertation research. I'd been in the country for several months but we were supposed to move out to my study village that day. we kept finding things we'd forgotten to buy that day and at that moment were in an electronic store buying a flashlight or a radio or something. They happened to have a TV on and I remember letting my husband deal with the purchase while I was zoning out on the TV (we didn't have one and were about to not have electricity for 2 years). I noticed that CNN had the WTC on and the building was on fire. and I asked, when was the WTC on fire? and the Indian guy who owned the little place and my husband were as confused as I was. And as we watched, from the other side of the planet, the second plane hit. What were the chances of that?

We stopped at every electronic store on the walk home and found shocked Americans in each one. When we got back to our flat, we listened to the BBC as they announced the Pentagon plane. and we wondered if there was going to be a war while we were off living in mud huts.

when we finally got to the village we were invited to the party that followed a circumcision ceremony. all of these old men, living without electricity, not speaking english (or even swahili), dressed in plaid cloth and covered in beads--they were all talking about the planes and what America was going to do. and this was *before* we walked in. When we showed up we were mobbed for information. every day the village leaders passed by to ask what the news was (as if they weren't listening to BBC Swahili every morning). If Bin Laden's name was mentioned they would spit in the dirt and stomp on it. I learned a lot of words in Swahili that I'd never had use for before.

In Arusha, people would stop us on the street and ask if we were American so they could give us our condolences. It was the most amazing thing and loving thing. One night out in the bush, on the VOA we listened to a show of just NYC radio coverage during the attacks and it was so scary. I cried for hours.

[Kelly from Almost Frugal]

I had just moved to France to live with my now husband. My French still wasn't that great. We were in a large grocery/department store, buying stuff, and I was killing time in the electronics section. I didn't understand what movie they were showing.

We kept walking from TV set to TV set all afternoon, and I was shell shocked.

My uncle worked at the Pentagon. His office very nearly missed being hit, although he lost a lot of people in his department.

He died of brain cancer eighteen months ago and I still miss him.

[Goldilocks]

My first thought that Tuesday was whether the beautiful weather would hold until our wedding on Saturday. And it did. And we did. And then everyone who could (or would) make it to D.C. got very, very drunk.

There's never been another time when I've been so glad to have been surrounded by so many people I love.

[Lisa in Canada]

Your post really struck a chord with me, Moxie. It's really amazing for me to read a first hand account of what happened from someone I sort-of know. ;)

Even far removed from the events, I remember very clearly what I was doing that morning and how I felt. I had just gotten in the car to go to work and was listening to the news on CBC Radio. The first plane had already hit and the talk was of an accident. I clearly remember thinking, how in the world could a plane accidentally hit the World Trade Center? The second plane didn't hit until I was at work already. We got news from patients (I worked in Diagnostic Imaging and we didn't have any TVs in the department) and from my coworker's husband (who worked for one of the newspapers). I can remember the overwhelming feeling to be with my then-fiance (now husband) and talked to him a lot on the phone that morning. I spent a lot of time on the phone that week, just wanting to talk to loved ones.

My thoughts and prayers are with all of you.

[moxie-mom]

I was in DC that day, across the river from the Pentagon, standing on the 9th floor of the Watergate Building.

Thanks for the beautiful and moving post.

Peace to you

[Cali Angel]

It definitely is a chaotic time that we live in. One good way to stay solemn and sane is soulful music. I personally recommend some of the artists on The Hotel cafe it helps ease the tension and stress of knowing what's out there. I think everyone remembers where they were the exact minute they found out.

[Charisse]

I was living in San Francisco, and woke up to the confusion of checking the web, seeing on CNN.com that a plane had hit the World Trade Center, and thinking "weird, errant Cessna or something?"...and then my mother calling frantically because my father was in the air on an international flight, returning to the US from China. Still not really understanding what had happened until I got out of the subway downtown and met several colleagues turning around and saying my company (I was working at a brokerage then) was closed for the day, probably more. I listened to the towers falling on the radio on the train on the way back--everyone was crying and in shock.

I went home, found Mr. C, and started gathering local friends and trying to reach New York ones--it didn't seem like any American should be alone. My dad turned up safe in Vacouver BC a few hours later after a scary but ultimately harmless experience.

Planes stopped flying, and when the poet part of me responded, that was the lens I could deal with it through:

http://cydharrell.com/groundstop.html

[effective nancy]

@Nella, I'm with you. I was working in Chicago, barely across the river from Sears and next door to the Mart. The day was impossibly crisp and beautiful as we evacuated the office, looking up out the windows the whole way home. That feeling that we were next was too strong to be denied. And like another PP, I am glad that today has been more overcast, less lovely, as there's been an unusual number of crisp and beautiful September 11ths in the last few years. Today's the first one, too, since 2005, that hasn't triggered my PTSD (from an unrelated incident, which was followed in mere days by the London bombings). I can't imagine having been in New York, or DC, or especially having lost someone close to me in the attacks. My heart goes out to everyone suffering like the woman I heard on NPR this morning; she said she still feels it in every cell of her being.

[Aurora]

I don't know if I should post all of this, but I sort of feel like I have to. It's a very different story than I've heard, but it's true and it's mine. I don't have children so I haven't commented here before, but I have been reading for awhile and I'm so glad this community exists. It makes me happy to read about people thinking about what they do and trying to do it better and it's good, too, to think of children being raised with respect. Please don't read this if you want to keep all the politics, even the politics of seven years ago, out of your mourning and remembering. I understand and respect that desire, but I was sixteen in 2001, and that day was my political coming of age.

I was far away from any of the places planes crashed that day; at school in New Hampshire. No one I knew lost or feared for anyone specific. We were lucky.

I remember feeling sadness, and shock, but mostly I just remember the feeling of a new weight placed over us all. The political shape of our adulthood was about to be decided and we didn't have the least bit of say in it. I felt guilty, a little, that that's what was forefront in my mind; felt that I should have been mourning, that I should have been angry, that I should have been frightened of what else terrorists might do. And I was, a bit, but what I was really frightened of was what would happen next: what would be done with those emotions swirling so strongly in everyone around me; what would be done in the names of the dead.

Even in the first hours, I knew the inevitable shape of the next few years. We were going to go to war with people who might or might not be connected to this. We were going to let cries of patriotism and vengeance overwhelm thought. We were going to polarize the world. I knew it because I had watched the election that put Bush in power and I was sure his power over the country came out of the simplest sorts of thinking and most visceral, unexamined emotions. With those running so high, his power would grow very strong, and I had no trust at all in what he would do with it. I didn't know the specifics, but I knew that by the first election I could vote in, we would have accepted the invitation to make this world a much scarier place.

Maybe it was a cold reaction, to think of the future instead of the dead that day. I'm sure it would have been very different if I had been closer to any of the sites. But the weight of dread was just so heavy I didn't really have space left over for mourning. I was afraid too, I think, that if I really let in sadness or anger, I would become manipulable. Sixteen was a terrible age to be, that day-- too young to vote, too old to imagine that the adults would take care of it. So much helplessness. Yet I still believed that a good response was possible. I think I still believe that somehow, a brilliant leader, politically, emotionally, and intellectually brave, could have led us through that into a safer world not only for Americans, but for everyone. Mixed in with the helplessness and the dread was a great sadness for that lost possibility and all the death and misery that were to come from it.

There are no points for prediction. No joy in having gotten it right. I want out. I hope it won't be too many years before we find something else to define ourselves around. We're all supposed to love our country, but I don't know how. I love the land, the people as a part of all people, a lot of the ideas and ideals, the possibilities, some of the customs and shared culture. But when I think of loving "America," all I think of is a handle to manipulate me and a means to ignoring the good of the rest of the world. I don't know if that's a bad thing, but it sure is sad.

[caramama]

I had forgotten about the National Guard in the Atlanta airport with their big guns. I flew barely a month after it happened. Wow. How could I forget that? It was surreal.

[katiev]

Gosh, reading all these posts definitely brings back a bunch of memories for me about 9/11 and the months that followed.

My husband and I had moved out of our Brooklyn apartment months earlier, and were floating about, squatting on friends' floors and sofas. We were getting ready to buy a used sailboat in South Carolina, sail it up the coast, and live on it in a marina in Jersey City, directly across from the WTC. We were in Connecticut on 9/11, staying with a bunch of friends, and we were all peeled to the TV. There was this weird time before either tower fell, when I was actually thinking: "Man, those buildings are going to look strange with their top floors missing." I could not have conceived that they were going to collapse and be gone from the cityscape forever. Inconceivable. Just a weird, random thought, among so many that were going through my mind.

We did eventually get our boat, and sailed it up the Intracoastal Waterway during October '01. What we encountered along the way was eerie. We anchored near an air force base in VA, and were quickly told to move farther away by some navy dudes who zoomed out to our boat. All night long, aircraft shot out from the base into the clear, starry sky. We sailed past enormous navy destroyers in Hampton Roads, VA, and again were cautioned to STAY IN THE CHANNEL, by navy guys with guns.

When we finally approached New York Harbor before dawn in late October, we were leery about sailing our crappy little boat into such a highly guarded body of water. It was to be the first time we had been back to NYC since leaving pre 9/11. There was thick fog, and before the sun burned it off, you could almost imagine the buildings were still there.

The marina parking lot in Jersey City was staged to receive bodies from the WTC, but by the time we arrived it was no longer needed. Some guy who helped us tie up our boat said: "Yeah, everyone was really nice to each other for a while, but now everyone is back to ignoring each other."

The experience of sailing up the coast, and sailing into NY Harbor, and living really near the highly guarded Statue of Liberty post 9/11 made me feel like I was under suspicion. It made me feel like I had done something wrong. It made me feel creeped out.

[eccentriclibertarian]

Out here in the SF Bay Area, as people emerged from a dazed shock, they were nicer - everyone noticeably nicer, calmer, more patient...for about a week.

We flew to NYC for a wedding in early October, and my husband, who grew up in Manhattan and had worked at the WTC, was dreading seeing the skyline without the towers, as that would finally make it irrevocably real to him. As our plane approached, people grew quiet, and when the NY skyline came into view - with smoke from the fires still burning under the rubble of the WTC clearly visible against the brilliant blue sky, the entire plane was silent. Completely silent for about 10 minutes.

FWIW, I hate 'Patriot Day' too. I feel myself to be a patriot of my country every day - including acknowledging its faults and flaws, and doing my best to improve them. If it must be labelled, I'd rather something like 'Remembrance Day'.

[petiteboo]

It was warm and sunny here in Toronto that morning. I was at work when I heard that planes at struck the Twin Towers. We have televisions all over our offices so it was easy to catch up on what was going on. At the time my parents lived in Maryland - and my mother worked in the heart of D.C. When I learned of the Pentagon's doom I became slightly hysterical. I couldn't get a hold of either of them so I called my husband who had just heard of it courtesy of the Howard Stern radio show. As I sobbed about my fears for my mother he reassured me that she was probably okay. Shortly after I hung up I shut down my computer and made my way to the subway. Even here in Toronto they started beefing up security everywhere. It was a scary, frenetic, and terribly sad day. That evening we attended a wedding rehearsal dinner for which we were both attendants. What a strange evening it was. We couldn't help but turn the tv on at the restaurant bar and continue watching coverage of what felt like a nightmare come true.

[pennifer]

Seven years ago, I was sitting in the departure lounge at SFO, waiting for my flight to Moscow, via JFK. Even at that hour, I noticed the energy change around me, and then overheard a flight attendant say, "No one is going to New York today." into her cell phone. At that point, I knew something was up, so I got up and wandered a bit. I happened to wander past an airport bar and stood, spellbound, with other slack-jawed travelers, as we watched the second tower wobble and then collapse. Utter horror. I remember turning away after a bit, thinking, I had better get out of the airport before it's not possible to get a shuttle. In the meantime, I heard people seeking their own solutions, trying to rebook their flights, yelling at airline staff, looking stressed and impatient. I managed to reclaim my luggage and walked straight out to the airport shuttles. On my van, most of us listened to the events unfold on news radio, while two silly girls chattered on about nothing, until they were finally shamed into silence along with the rest of us.

It still makes me cry thinking about it. My other memory is feeling my heart in my throat watching fighter jets escort planes into SFO a few weeks later as I was driving past. I cried and cried and cried as I drove.

All my hopes are pinned on Obama winning the election and changing our path.

Maudlin, yes. Tired too. Someone skipped their afternoon nap today.

[Shannon]

This is a great piece of writing.

[sueinithaca]

7 years ago, I was temping at a car dealership in a suburb of Columbus, OH. I was lucky - all of my friends in New York and DC were unharmed. Someone called someone and by the time the second plane hit, we were all watching the 13 inch tv in the employee lounge.

The most striking thing to me is that the only "coming together" I saw was vicious and defensive. By the next morning, my fellow coworkers were rude and pointedly unhelpful to anyone with an accent. And after the customer left or hung up, they would loudly complain about "goddamn foreigners." I complained loudly to management (my husband is, after all, not a US citizen) but they didn't see it as a problem. In fact, they pointed out that since my husband is a white Canadian, he was not the type of "goddamn foreigner" they hated (yes, in those words). I left the job within a day or two.

[Mrs. Higrens]

I was working at a private boarding school in VA when my boss came in and said she had heard the DJ on the radio talking about a plane hitting the WTC. He was known to be a joker so she wasn't sure if he was serious or not. I pulled up CNN.com and saw the 1st tower smoking.

What I remember most is the blue, blue sky that day and the feeling that it should be pouring rain instead.

DH and I flew in/out of Newark for a wedding less than a month after 9/11 and saw a guy profiled for looking middle-eastern (the other passengers pretty much breathed a sigh of relief when the armed guards pulled him aside after he went through security). From the airport shuttle we could see the WTC site still smoking.

[sudru]

I haven't read any of the comments, it's painful every year, been thinking though. My dad's birthday was yesterday, he died last August, 12 days before baby was born. I talked to my mom yesterday, she's in assisted living now, last year was so chaotic, we both agreed that we can reflect more on it this year than last. Baby cries...must go.

[chanel earrings]

Looks like very difficult work...great shot!

[Super Bright Led Flashlight]

yeah, that was so confusing.

[gadgettown]

I can't believe how much of this I just wasn't aware of. Thank you for bringing more information to this topic for me.