A note handed to me the morning of September 11, 2011: Mrs. (That Would Be Me), Please do not turn on your radio during free time since the live reports may upset the students.
A fellow blogger recently had a post titled Where Were You? As I read her account, it got me thinking about my own. I was teaching a small, combined class of 4/5/6th grades. By the time lunch rolled around, I had already lost a few students due to nervous parents pulling them from school early. I didn't blame them. I couldn't wait to get home.
After school dismissed for the day, my husband and dad called to tell me to make sure I filled up with gas on the way home. We were living in the country then and my tank was low anyway, so I didn't think that was a bad idea. The kids and I waited in line for a gas pump for what seemed forever. Getting to our house that day was like reaching a safe haven.
Because we were safe. At least we felt safe in our little gravel-road house surrounded by trees and located in the middle of mid-western nowhere. Watching endless hours of the same television coverage with my husband that evening while our three small children played was a surreal experience. We seemed so far removed from everything, and yet so close.
Those images today are as haunting as they ever were and I echo the sentiments of people everywhere. May we never forget. The Americans lost that day did not just die.
They were murdered.
Some estimates put that number well over 2,900, and considering the number of people still suffering the physical and emotional effects of that day, can you imagine what the actual number might eventually look like? Have you been watching any of the anniversary coverage? Dust, soot, and ash has a lingering, nasty effect on the lungs. Horrific images of people falling to their death do not easily fade away.
Kids left without a mom or dad.
Spouses continuing on alone.
Parents burying their children.
I know I'm not telling you anything you don't already know.
I'm just remembering. Our September has forever been changed.
4 comments:
I was at work that day and in an interview. We stopped the interview as someone said a plane had hit New York. We turned on the radio and stayed tuned to news all day until time to go home. It was comforting to be home with family. Just horrifying all the news that we watched.
I was at work. At morning break, we were watching a TV brought into the break room just for that day and saw the plane that hit the second tower. Sometimes, watching the tributes shown each year on TV, I still have to turn my head or shut my eyes.
I will never forget, those images of that tragic day or the people who died or the terrorists who murdered them. They will haunt me for the rest of my life. I hope and pray that nothing like this ever happens again.
Yesterday, while all the memorials etc were on tv, i couldn't take much of it without just breaking down in tears, over and over again. I realized that i still had an open emotional sore from that day. And if i, who was so many miles away, and who personally knew noone affected directly by this horror, is still wounded and grieving, how much incredibly more painful have the past ten years been for those who were there? And now i'm crying again.
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