9/11/08

Thinking about 9/11

I just finished reading this post and remembering what I was doing the morning the towers fell. I was getting ready to take the first Western Civilization test of my sophomore year of college and had stayed up far too late the night before squeezing in those last few bits of information. My roommates and I heard it on the radio and then ran down the hall to a friend's room that had a t.v. and watched enough to feel sick and worried for what was still to come. Most of the school gathered in the student lounge and watched the news all day while juggling phone calls to family and thinking about how to prepare for the worst if anything else should happen. Our professor still had us take our test and I can't believe any of us managed an A that day for all of the "what if's" running through our mind.

It's easy to feel like it was just another tragedy that people have commercialized and idealized until you start hearing personal stories of how it stole fathers and sisters and friends and a sense of safety. I can't imagine what it was like to be in NYC on that day and witness the fire and see the fear on people's faces as they tried to get to a safer place.

It all makes me sad today. I'm thankful that it still makes me sad. It helps me put things in perspective when I just want to be sad about the ants that have invaded my kitchen again or the fact that I can't do it all and do it well and have to let some responsibilities go. Its fitting that the weather is overcast and gloomy in Springfield.

5 comments:

Vivianna said...

Today is my brothers birthday. He rather it not be his birthday.

Holly said...

My son was born today, one year ago. It's strange for us to celebrate life on a day that brought so much death and grief.

Mandi Johnson said...

I remember it just like it was yesterday. I was at school, reading a note from a boy... I still have that note. And another one he gave me later that day. Looking at the two notes is crazy- how care free the first was, and deep the second.

Bekka said...

I was in the woods lab for my Appalachian Arts class, and overhearing one of my classmates on his cellphone. I thought for sure I was missing some important part of the conversation, because I remember thinking how there was no way what he was describing could ever happen.

S_tina said...

here, in spain, everything happened at lunch time, and i was cooking whith my mother while we were watching the news......there wasn´t meal that day...