September 11th
Ten Years Ago - September 11, 2001
I can’t believe that 9/11 happened a decade ago. I still get goose bumps when I see any of the images from that day.
I was living with Diana, in the house where I grew up. My Dad and I were not speaking because I had chosen to move back with Diana so that I could continue attending Highland High School.
Diana was driving me to school and we heard the news reports, school started at 7:30 so it had to have been around 7am that we were in the car which means it was already 10am on the East Coast. I walked into my first period class, a computer class of some kind with Mrs. Chattaway, and I told her “something really bad is happening in New York City.” And she shushed me and told me to get to work. I went running out of the class at the end of the period to second period, I was a TA for Mr. Raimer. The first thing I saw was CNN replaying the crash of flight 175 into the South Tower. I was literally so shocked by what I saw, that I stumbled backwards. We spent the rest of the day tuned to CNN and as soon as I got home from school, I immediately turned on CNN. I was just in shock, the day is just a blur, I just remember watching the CNN coverage and seeing those horrific scenes replayed endlessly.
When I went to NYC for the first time ever, Ground Zero and the 9/11 Memorial were one of the first places I went to visit. Chills and goose bumps galore.
Ten Years Later - September 11, 2011
Ten years later and we’re still fighting in Afghanistan. Osama Bin Laden, whose name was mentioned as a responsible party almost immediately on CNN, has only been dead for four months. The Twin Towers haven’t been rebuilt and rebuilding efforts aren’t expected to be fully completed until 2020. Congress had to be shamed, *SHAMED*, into giving 9/11 responders and volunteers the healthcare benefits they needed as a result of health issues from the dust and ash. The unity and bonding we experienced, the “We are one America” feeling that existed in the aftermath of the attacks, have faded. Our country seems more fractured than ever. The NYPD has been accused of racial profiling and a secret division devoted to spying on Muslims has been revealed. And, despite repeated bashings by Democrats, the Patriot Act was renewed in May and is still with us.
9/11 was used by many to further agendas that otherwise would have been DOA. I’ve been so heartbroken by so many of the things that have been done, and haven’t been done, in the last ten years. I was feeling despondent over the whole thing. And then, as the ten year mark started to get closer, Yahoo News rolled out 9/11 Remembered.
Day after day, story after story I read about the people affected on 9/11.
The only American not Earth that day
The man who lost his wife and the child they were going to have
The retired fire fighter who went to Ground Zero and ended up making history
The shoemaker who is determined to open shop at the WTC again
The photographer of the 9/11 Falling Man
The last person out of the South Tower
A child wise beyond his years
The widow who went to Afghanistan after 9/11
The family who honors their loved by sending kids to baseball and softball camp
The man who saved 2,500 employees
One of the heroes of Flight 93
The 9/11 Babies
The last 90-ish minutes of the lives of Frank and Pablo
Every single one of those stories gave me goose bumps and brought me to tears. The hardest story was about the 9/11 kids. Their fathers died before they were born and they’re all trying so hard to connect with them.
I have a hard time sitting through anything 9/11 centered. It is just emotional overload for me. So those short little stories were perfect for me, it was just a little bit every day and I could handle that. 9/11: The Heroes of the 88th Floor debuted on Sunday, September 4th and we were at home just flipping through the channels. For some reason, I ended up in the living room by myself and I brought up the guide. I’m the one that turned to the channel when I saw the show was starting. I almost always try and avoid the shows about 9/11, just because they are so hard for me to watch. Once I had this on, there was no channel flipping - which is a rarity, my Dad always takes the remote and ends up flipping between two shows. My family ended up watching the entire program, I got up and left the room several times because I just couldn’t watch at times. There is a logical part of me that was watching and knew that Frank and Pablo didn’t make it out of their alive. They had several people speaking about the day and they never showed Frank and Pablo, so that was a big sign right there. But there was just a part of me that was hoping they did make it out alive. On one of my trips out of the room, I ended up googling their names and found them both on a list of causalities from the day. Throughout the program there is a clock that is counting down to the tower collapse and I just cried when they showed the tower collapsing because I knew that I was watching Frank and Pablo die. I mean, watching the towers collapse is hard enough, because you know that people are still inside, but after watching the program and learning about Frank and Pablo and what they did that day…it was even harder to watch. There is a part where Nicole, Frank’s wife, talks about how she was walking and all of a sudden there was a commotion and she knew something very bad was happening but she couldn’t look back at the towers because, she hoped that Frank was behind her like he said he would be, she knew that he wasn’t. That just broke my heart. Frank and Pablo saved so many lives that day and yet they were unable to save their own. And you’re watching and you know that they probably died but you just hope that maybe you’re wrong.
Many good things happened that day, something horrific happened of course, but people just reacted selflessly to try and help their fellow man. And so many loved ones have gone on to do terrific things to honor their loved one.
Debra, one of the 9/11 widows, says the country and its elected leaders have lost sight of their sense of national focus in the 10 years since 9/11 and I completely agree. I would love to see a return of the unity that we all experienced post-9/11. When you strip us all bare, we’re all just human beings and that’s who we should be first, last and always.
I can’t believe that 9/11 happened a decade ago. I still get goose bumps when I see any of the images from that day.
I was living with Diana, in the house where I grew up. My Dad and I were not speaking because I had chosen to move back with Diana so that I could continue attending Highland High School.
Diana was driving me to school and we heard the news reports, school started at 7:30 so it had to have been around 7am that we were in the car which means it was already 10am on the East Coast. I walked into my first period class, a computer class of some kind with Mrs. Chattaway, and I told her “something really bad is happening in New York City.” And she shushed me and told me to get to work. I went running out of the class at the end of the period to second period, I was a TA for Mr. Raimer. The first thing I saw was CNN replaying the crash of flight 175 into the South Tower. I was literally so shocked by what I saw, that I stumbled backwards. We spent the rest of the day tuned to CNN and as soon as I got home from school, I immediately turned on CNN. I was just in shock, the day is just a blur, I just remember watching the CNN coverage and seeing those horrific scenes replayed endlessly.
When I went to NYC for the first time ever, Ground Zero and the 9/11 Memorial were one of the first places I went to visit. Chills and goose bumps galore.
Ten Years Later - September 11, 2011
Ten years later and we’re still fighting in Afghanistan. Osama Bin Laden, whose name was mentioned as a responsible party almost immediately on CNN, has only been dead for four months. The Twin Towers haven’t been rebuilt and rebuilding efforts aren’t expected to be fully completed until 2020. Congress had to be shamed, *SHAMED*, into giving 9/11 responders and volunteers the healthcare benefits they needed as a result of health issues from the dust and ash. The unity and bonding we experienced, the “We are one America” feeling that existed in the aftermath of the attacks, have faded. Our country seems more fractured than ever. The NYPD has been accused of racial profiling and a secret division devoted to spying on Muslims has been revealed. And, despite repeated bashings by Democrats, the Patriot Act was renewed in May and is still with us.
9/11 was used by many to further agendas that otherwise would have been DOA. I’ve been so heartbroken by so many of the things that have been done, and haven’t been done, in the last ten years. I was feeling despondent over the whole thing. And then, as the ten year mark started to get closer, Yahoo News rolled out 9/11 Remembered.
Day after day, story after story I read about the people affected on 9/11.
The only American not Earth that day
The man who lost his wife and the child they were going to have
The retired fire fighter who went to Ground Zero and ended up making history
The shoemaker who is determined to open shop at the WTC again
The photographer of the 9/11 Falling Man
The last person out of the South Tower
A child wise beyond his years
The widow who went to Afghanistan after 9/11
The family who honors their loved by sending kids to baseball and softball camp
The man who saved 2,500 employees
One of the heroes of Flight 93
The 9/11 Babies
The last 90-ish minutes of the lives of Frank and Pablo
Every single one of those stories gave me goose bumps and brought me to tears. The hardest story was about the 9/11 kids. Their fathers died before they were born and they’re all trying so hard to connect with them.
I have a hard time sitting through anything 9/11 centered. It is just emotional overload for me. So those short little stories were perfect for me, it was just a little bit every day and I could handle that. 9/11: The Heroes of the 88th Floor debuted on Sunday, September 4th and we were at home just flipping through the channels. For some reason, I ended up in the living room by myself and I brought up the guide. I’m the one that turned to the channel when I saw the show was starting. I almost always try and avoid the shows about 9/11, just because they are so hard for me to watch. Once I had this on, there was no channel flipping - which is a rarity, my Dad always takes the remote and ends up flipping between two shows. My family ended up watching the entire program, I got up and left the room several times because I just couldn’t watch at times. There is a logical part of me that was watching and knew that Frank and Pablo didn’t make it out of their alive. They had several people speaking about the day and they never showed Frank and Pablo, so that was a big sign right there. But there was just a part of me that was hoping they did make it out alive. On one of my trips out of the room, I ended up googling their names and found them both on a list of causalities from the day. Throughout the program there is a clock that is counting down to the tower collapse and I just cried when they showed the tower collapsing because I knew that I was watching Frank and Pablo die. I mean, watching the towers collapse is hard enough, because you know that people are still inside, but after watching the program and learning about Frank and Pablo and what they did that day…it was even harder to watch. There is a part where Nicole, Frank’s wife, talks about how she was walking and all of a sudden there was a commotion and she knew something very bad was happening but she couldn’t look back at the towers because, she hoped that Frank was behind her like he said he would be, she knew that he wasn’t. That just broke my heart. Frank and Pablo saved so many lives that day and yet they were unable to save their own. And you’re watching and you know that they probably died but you just hope that maybe you’re wrong.
Many good things happened that day, something horrific happened of course, but people just reacted selflessly to try and help their fellow man. And so many loved ones have gone on to do terrific things to honor their loved one.
Debra, one of the 9/11 widows, says the country and its elected leaders have lost sight of their sense of national focus in the 10 years since 9/11 and I completely agree. I would love to see a return of the unity that we all experienced post-9/11. When you strip us all bare, we’re all just human beings and that’s who we should be first, last and always.