September 11 - What I was doing.........

Remember all those who died trying to save the lives of others, on September 11th and everyday.

Sitting at the receptionist desk of the nursing home where I worked, the phonecalls hadn't started to roll in yet for the day (usually about150 - 200 calls per hour all day long was the average). My mom worked in administration at the same place.

She came into work about 10 minutes after I did and said "A plane crashed into one of the World Trade Center towers, Dad just called me & told me. They don't know what happened......... they're afraid a lot of people are going to be lost in this accident." She no more than finished that sentence when a call came through........ it was Dad. The other plane had hit the second tower and flames were everywhere, "Tell Mom it's not an accident - someone did this on purpose."

From that point on, radios were being pulled from every corner & every available TV was tuned into CNN or some local news channel. The horror didn't stop with just those two acts as we all now know. Many of my co-workers had family in Chicago (aboutr 2 hrs East of us) and since no one knew if any other big cities were to be targeted, everyone paniced. They shut down the entire LOOP in Chicago, or at least tried. One woman couldn't contact her daughter (soon to be married) in Chicago.......... trouble with the local phone company prevented a call from going to her home phone (not associated with the terriost attacks we later found out) and no ones cell numbers seemed to be working for some reason they never understood. It was noon the following day Sept. 12th before she heard from her daughter...... she was fine of course, Chicago was not a target.

September 12th............. a young nurse just returing from her very short honeymoon a week prior to the attacks brought in the film from her honeymoon out East............ it was chilling. She and her new husband were on the deck of the ferry boat going out to Ellis Island to see Lady Liberty ........ smiling as the wind blew their hair into a fury. Standing majestically in the background......... the World Trade Center towers.

I recently found pictures of a trip I took to the great city of New York when I was about 16 years old. My sister are standing on the deck of the ferry boat with a friend smiling that silly smile two kids from the midwest have when they think they're taking a big city like NY by storm. Again, in the background stand the towers. My 10 year old son asks, "Mommy, what are those two big buildings in the background?" I answer him and his face becomes very solomn. He is old enough to understand the devestation it caused.

My birthday being Sept. 12th, I still went out for dinner with my family the next night to celebrate. Many called me cold and heartless for not caring about those injured and dead in the mess out East. I saw it a different way........ their purpose was to make America cower, hide, and stop us dead in our tracks. I was not going to let an international group of bullies stop my life. Period.

That's where I was.