(no subject)
It's a little hard to believe that the Pentagon and the World Trade Center attacks happened nine years ago. It feels like a lifetime has passed between then and now. The world has changed so much in the interim, the United States is almost unrecognizable from then to now. Sometimes it feels more like decades have passed. But I can clearly remember every detail from that day.
In 2001, I was twelve and living in Japan because my dad was stationed there. On Wednesday, September 12 at 6:00 am, my dad came into my room to turn off my alarm clock. It woke me up, and I remember being groggy and confused when I asked him what was going on. I remember his voice being urgent, like he was in a hurry and he told me, "You don't have school today. Go back to sleep. America's been attacked." The only thing I'd really processed at that point was that my dad had said I didn't have school, so I went back to sleep. When I woke up three hours later, I went downstairs and saw my sister sitting on the couch, staring at the tv and just crying. I looked at what she was watching and I saw the burning buildings and the smoke and I asked her, "What movie are you watching?" She looked at me and said, "This isn't a movie. This is real." We sat there for hours until my dad got home, watching the coverage, unable to really process what was really going on, the magnitude of what it was we were witnessing. It was terrifying. Even two days later, after the schools reopened and life on base resumed, things weren't exactly back to normal. Intermittently we'd see tanks rolling down the streets, or men with machine guns patrolling the gates. We weren't sure if the attacks on the World Trade Center were going to set off attacks on military bases overseas and for a while we lived with that fear hanging over our heads.
The fear is gone now, but the memory is something that will last forever. For the victims of September 11th, our troops who've died overseas and the casualties of this war, we salute you.
In 2001, I was twelve and living in Japan because my dad was stationed there. On Wednesday, September 12 at 6:00 am, my dad came into my room to turn off my alarm clock. It woke me up, and I remember being groggy and confused when I asked him what was going on. I remember his voice being urgent, like he was in a hurry and he told me, "You don't have school today. Go back to sleep. America's been attacked." The only thing I'd really processed at that point was that my dad had said I didn't have school, so I went back to sleep. When I woke up three hours later, I went downstairs and saw my sister sitting on the couch, staring at the tv and just crying. I looked at what she was watching and I saw the burning buildings and the smoke and I asked her, "What movie are you watching?" She looked at me and said, "This isn't a movie. This is real." We sat there for hours until my dad got home, watching the coverage, unable to really process what was really going on, the magnitude of what it was we were witnessing. It was terrifying. Even two days later, after the schools reopened and life on base resumed, things weren't exactly back to normal. Intermittently we'd see tanks rolling down the streets, or men with machine guns patrolling the gates. We weren't sure if the attacks on the World Trade Center were going to set off attacks on military bases overseas and for a while we lived with that fear hanging over our heads.
The fear is gone now, but the memory is something that will last forever. For the victims of September 11th, our troops who've died overseas and the casualties of this war, we salute you.