My 9/11

Well, it's that time of year again... it's an anniversary of "the day of infamy."  Only this year, it's the tenth anniversary and the weight of it is hitting me full force, even moreso than years past.  I think it's because so much has happened while the time has whipped by, and I'm in a completely different place than I was ten years ago.

Ten years ago, I was a junior in high school.  The day had just started, and I was super tired, but strangely awake.  You know that feeling?  I call it hyper-tired.  Anyway, I was heading up the stairs to my second class of the day when a girl I was friends with named Liz came running up to me with this kind of shocked look on her face.  Now, if you knew Liz, you knew that this wasn't standard behavior for her.  She was the kind of pseudo-pessimistic but totally cool girl... looking back, she kind of reminded me of Lisa Loeb in a way.  Similar vibes.  Anyway, I asked what her deal was and she asked me if I'd heard.  "Heard what?" Her response will be forever seared into my mind.  "Dude, we're under attack.  A plane flew into the north tower of the World Trade Center in New York and while the news was showing the hole in the side of the north tower, a plane hit the south tower ON CAMERA."  I don't remember anything after that but running to my class and all of us anxiously awaiting the announcement from our superintendent addressing what was happening on the east coast.  It came about a minute after the final bell rang, and everyone sat shell shocked.  No one said a word, no one moved.  The rest of my classes passed in a blur, up until I got to one of my favorite classes: AP US History with Mr Korfist.  He was super cool and a total straight shooter.  We walked into the room and all the lights were off.  A usually chatty class, we were all trying to figure out what was happening, attempting in our sixteen and seventeen year old minds to make heads or tails of what was unfolding.  He got us all to quiet down, then informed us that we were going to go down to the basement drivers ed classrooms and watch live coverage.  "This, as horrific as it is, is history in the making.  This is your generation's JFK moment."  He was right.  I will forever remember the day that the towers, the Pentagon, and Flight 93 went down and where I was.  In that class, we watched the towers fall live on tv.  In that class, we realized the scope of the events and in that class, devastation began to set in.

On my way to lunch, I saw our police liason, Officer Keller (or Keller as he was known).  He and I had a good rapport, and so I asked him if I could go home.  I just didn't want to be in school, I wanted to be with my family, I was totally freaking out.  He told me that I needed to trust the school and him, and say a prayer for those who were unaccounted for and who were affected directly by what was going on.  The school was on lock down and no one was allowed in or out, no one was allowed to leave, even if their parents called them out, except in extenuating circumstances.  (I found out when I got home that my mom had sat on the phone for over an hour trying to get through to the office, only to be told that she could not come get me and I would not be allowed out of the building until we received confirmation that the city of Chicago was not a target.)  Little did I know at the time that there were about twenty of my fellow students who lost direct family members.  One of them was a boy in my grade who's dad was on staff at my church.  He was on the first plane.


I was supposed to head right from school to work, but I got to work and there was a note on the back doormat that said "Go home Becca.  The company (Starbucks) sent out a memo and had the entire corporation shut down until further notice."  When I got home, I hugged my mom and sobbed my eyes out.  Everything that I'd been seeing all day had been building and once I knew I was in a safe environment, I just fell apart.  I had twin brothers who were ten days old and a little sister who was 2 1/2 and I looked at them, knowing that the world they were going to grow up in was going to be very different from the one I knew up until that morning.

My family home is right in the path of Midway and O'Hare airports, so we constantly have air traffic flying overhead.  The two big-name newspapers are the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times, and they covered everything but always came out in the morning.  On the night of 9/11, two things will forever stick out to me. 1.)  There was no air traffic, the city of Chicago was on blackout and it was eerily dark and silent because of this.  2.)  The Chicago Tribune put out its first ever evening edition, and I remember standing in the driveway with my aunt as the newspaper delivery man drove by, tossing our paper onto the driveway.  As my aunt and I were outside putting American flags up and down our driveway, we happened to look up and see a low-flying military drone aircraft.  The one that kind of looks like a flying tank in the shape of a w?  It was so quiet we almost didn't see/hear it... it was just an out-of-the-blue reminder of what had happened and that our world had changed forever.  When I opened the paper up after getting it out of the bag, the centerfold was filled with various images of people falling out of the buildings.  One of the pictures was of the "falling man."  That image will forever be etched in my mind, as will the others.

I have panic disorder- I've had it for as long as I can remember- and so, after the day's events, there was no way in God's kingdom that I was going to be sleeping in my room all by myself.  I'm okay admitting that as a sixteen year old girl, I was terrified of the dark because of the unknown terrors that were hiding in my mind from watching the television coverage.  So, since my mom was sleeping in the living room with my brothers and recovering from a c-section, and since my dad had to be up for work around 4:30 in the morning, I decided to jump on baby duty.  It gave me a chance to help my mom AND not sleep alone.  Two birds, one stone, that whole thing.

Anyway.  Looking back at 9/11 ten years later, it's easier to reflect on but it's still heartrending.  Every time I learn about someone else who died who was a mother, a father, had children on board the plane or were pregnant, it wrenches my emotional floodgate wide open.  Being a parent myself, I simply cannot imagine knowing that because of the actions of someone else, not only was I going to die and leave my family behind, but thousands of others would too.  I look at my children, even when they're testing the limits of my sanity, and cannot imagine a life without them.  While I know that life without me is going to happen at some point for them (hopefully in the far distant future), I hope it's when I'm 95, a great-great grandma, white-haired, and losing my teeth in my pillowcase. 

It never ceases to amaze me how quickly time flies.  It seems like just yesterday but forever ago all at the same time.  As a country, we've grown stronger as we've grieved, we've rallied behind our troops, even as we've been politically divided.  So, even though 9/11 ripped a hole in our nation's heart, we have come back with a resilience in our hearts and our American spirit has found a way to shine.  We are unbreakable.  Our troops answered the call of duty, and those who had never considered having a military career enlisted to protect this great country we live in.  I will be forever grateful and my heart will always be wide open to those who have fought in any capacity for this country, and I will always be thankful to those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for me, a stranger but an American like them.  So, to those who are still active, thank you for all you do.  I pray for you and your safety every single day.  I pray for your families' strength and courage in your absence.  Finally, I pray for peace of mind, peace of spirit, and peace at heart for everyone affected by the events of September 11th.  Hopefully the next ten years holds more peaceful and healing times ahead.

To the readers out there, please be safe this weekend (as every weekend).  I leave you with a parting thought.  It's so easy to point the finger at those who look like the men who perpetuated the crime.  But the thing is, they're not.  So I urge everyone to remember that we are all American, regardless of where we come from or what we look like.  Let's stand united.