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NewRad

September 11, 2002 is a day that I think no one will ever forget. I never really understood what that meant before. All my life I have heard my parents & grandparents talk about how they remember exactly where they were & what they were doing when they heard the news that Pearl Harbor had been bombed or when President Kennedy was assassinated. Though I heard those stories, it never really made sense. How could anything make that much of an impression? I understand that now, all too well.

September 11 started just like any other day for me. I got up, showered, dressed, checked my e-mail& went to breakfast. It was coming out of the cafeteria that I had my first hint that something had gone wrong. I noticed on the TV in the lobby of the student center that there had been an air crash in New York City. I was late for Organic Chemistry, so I didn't give it too much thought. It was only two hours later that the reality of the situation hit me. I was leaving Aquatic Biology & was on my way to check my mail. I walked into the student center to see a large crowd of people around the TV. I was just in time to see the first tower crumble. Some people cried, others hugged each other, I just stood there in shock. The thing that I remember most about that moment was the silence. The entire student center, with over a hundred people in the lobby, was quiet. Even the waterfall on one of the walls seemed to stop gurgling. The silence lasted until well after the second tower went down. As if by some unspoken command, we all woke up from our shock & horror & went about our lives. Some went to classes, others went to call their families.

I was in the latter group. My parent's both work for a large defense contractor. They both worked at the shipyard where the U.S.S. Cole was being repaired. Before I could do anything else, I had to know that they were okay. Once I made sure that everything was all right, I forced myself back into my duties. I was an Orientation leader & there were several freshmen in my group from the New York area. I called them all quickly & found out only one had family in the area. Hamilton had an uncle who worked in the World Trade Center. I found my co-leader & we went to his dorm room & spent the rest of the day with him waiting for news from his family. He was lucky, his uncle hadn't gone into work that day. I can't even imagine what we would have done if his uncle had died. In my mind I still can't imagine what it must have felt like for those families that lost loved ones so suddenly. I know the world isn't fair, but what had happened went beyond just being unfair. It was evil.

That night my roommate slept with the lights on--because I couldn't stand to have them turned off. Thinking back, that was really a wonderful thing for Jason to do, because he was not the type to be scared by events that were so far away. At that time, we didn't know how many people might be dead in the WTC, the Pentagon, & in Pennsylvania. The highest counts held the possibility of several tens of thousands. The thought was staggering. How could something like that have happened? To this day, I haven't found an answer to that question. I think, however, that I found something better. It happened when I stopped focusing on the evil & hate in the situation & began looking at the beauty & good that had come from it.

We've all heard the stories of the firefighters, paramedics, & police officers who gave their lives just doing what they do every day. We also have heard the stories of the office workers, teachers, & civilian staff of the WTC & Pentagon who gave their lives to save others or stayed with friends so that they didn't have to die alone. And maybe the most touching of all, we know the story of the passengers of the flight that crashed in Pennsylvania. Jeremy Glick & a group of other men on the plane attacked the terrorists & forced the plane down so that they could not destroy any more landmarks & kill more innocent people. All of those men had families, some of them had new babies. But they willingly gave their lives to protect the lives of others & the freedom of the country that they loved.

Then there are the stories of those of us who weren't directly involved. Those of us who lined up to give blood, who waved American flags, who donated to the relief efforts, who said prayers, who will always remember the sacrifices made by a new generation of heroes to protect others. No one who saw what happened will easily forget the horror of that day. What we also cannot forget, is the unbreakable spirit that was formed that day. It is that spirit, the Spirit of America, that we must hold on to at all costs, because if we let go of that, the terrorists win. But if we hold on to it, if we never forget what happened & we let it make us better people, better citizens, better Americans then nothing, no amount of bombing, killing, or terrorism will ever be able to conquer us.

NewRad