memories

[antof9]

About 4 months ago, someone asked "how often do you think about the events of September 11, 2001, or how does it affect you?" Here's what I wrote, unedited.

Comments

[mhchipmunk]

It was such a surreal event. I remember seeing the runways at Vancouver International. It was just plane after plane after plane, all lined up because all the air traffic headed to the US was forced to land there when US Airspace was closed. I think about it every time I get on a plane.
Sight...there just seems to be too many surreal events happening lately.
(((Antof9)))

[antof9]

isn't it weird the things that remind us? Surreal is a good word for "lately".

{{{{{{{{mhchipmunk}}}}}}

[katcolorado]

I was at home, it was one of my days of. I think it was my husband who first read about what was happpening in the US on the internet. It said the twin towers had been hit and that another plane had crased into the pentagon. It spoke about more planes in the air, about which they weren't sure yet whether they were hijacked as well.

We turned the tv on and mostly stayed in front of it all afternoon and evening (we are 6 hours ahead of NY time) It was so very unreal, like an action movie come true, it didn't seem real at all. I think it took a couple of days for me to believe it had really happened.

I mostly remember it when I hear a plane really low. In these situations I always think: is it supposed to sound like this, should it be this low or is it going somewhere it wasn't meant to.

[antof9]

we stayed in front of the tv, too (after I was sent home). Unk even brought the little tv in from his office to the living room, so we had news channels on multiple tvs. Not healthy, I'm sure. But we couldn't stop looking.

I mostly remember it when I hear a plane really low. In these situations I always think: is it supposed to sound like this, should it be this low or is it going somewhere it wasn't meant to.

I think and hear the exact same thing.

[atabei]

I would never leave the house if I thought that about every low-flying plane.

[antof9]

{{{{{{atabei}}}}}

One more reason I'm glad we're not in Chicago any more. We were almost directly in one of the flight paths of O'Hare. Everybody hates how far DIA is from Denver itself, but that's another good thing. Having it farther away is good in this sense.

[myopicmeringue]

I was in Canada on holiday when it happened, and my plane home was cancelled because all the planes were cancelled. I remember it clearly - watching it on the news and being so shocked.

{{{{{{{antof9}}}}}}}

[antof9]

Wow -- that must have been upsetting, too. How long did it take you to get home? We were supposed to go on a family vacation that weekend, but we offered to give up our seats on the plane as they had just started flying and had a lot of people to get back home. We didn't go until October.

{{{{{{{{{MyopicMeringue}}}}}}

[myopicmeringue]

That was nice of you to offer up your seats on the plane.

It didn't take me too long to get home. I don't remember exactly, but I think there was a plane a couple of days later. I remember having to phone work and cancelling a shift because I was still in Canada longer than I was supposed to be, but it was only one shift that I missed. I remember wishing the planes had been cancelled for longer, because I was terrified of flying after that and I was really really scared on the flight home. I think that's when I got my first panic attack, the night after I arrived home in England - but then the doctor didn't say it was a panic attack - he said it was probably a rare type of migraine. But now I look back the symptoms were the same as the panic attacks I get now.

[antof9]

I know you weren't asking for advice, but have you ever gotten counselling for the panic attacks? What you lived through was certainly big enough to post-traumatic stress disorder (is it a disorder?), or belongs in the same family. I'd guess your reaction then and ongoing is totally to be expected, and probably many people are in the same boat.

We have a family friend who lived through one of "the" plane crashes (not the Lockerbee, Scotland one, but one like that, that was all over the news at the time), and he couldn't even drive a car for something like 2 years after that. He still has significant issues, but counselling has helped.

I just wonder if it would help you, too. Mostly because I care about you :)

[sunneschii]

I was on university information day on 9/11... and on my way home (I wasn't living in ZH at that time), I found it strange that in every shop in the mainstation they were listening to the radio. All I could say is that something happened, but I didn't know anything exactly. I only knew it was something in NY. SO, I went home, and the first thing I did was to switch on the TV. I was completely shocked. I think I came home short before the second plane hit. I just couldn't believe it... and I couldn't left the TV. I was glued in front of the TV. I was alone at home, when my mother and sister came home, they first didn't believe it.

Now, I'm almost never thinking at 9/11.. it's more like a tragic fact in the background of my mine (like for exampel WWII). But I've never been to NY, so I don't have any personal relation to it.
But life has changed. It lost a huge bit of it's former unconcern.

[antof9]

we couldn't turn the tv off, either. Weird, huh?

That's a good way to describe life, Sunne. Part of growing older, too, I suppose.

[trav28]

I was working in a comic book store at the time and we couldn't believe what was going on. We set a TV up on the counter and felt our collective blood run cold. Linda and I were in NYC only 5 months earlier and to see the destruction and loss of life was overwhelming.

We returned in Sept 2002 and I took this image at the site of the WTC.

[antof9]

What a beautiful picture. Thank you for sharing it in my journal.

Isn't it amazing how it affects you when you have a connection?