My September 11

UPDATED WITH PICTURES FROM NEW YORK CITY BELOW.....

Since today marks the 5th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, I decided I would chronicle my September 11, 2001 experience.

Five years ago today I was pregnant with Landry. I was not working full-time, but was substitute teaching a few days a week. Our friend, Tim, was in town from Nashville and staying with us while he attended a Finance conference in Dallas. Since Tim was in town, I decided not to take any sub job on Tuesday, Sept. 11.

I was still sleeping when Jeff called me on his way to work and said that they were talking on the radio about a plane crashing into the WTC, but he wasn't sure of all of the details. I went into the living room and turned on the TV to watch the Today Show coverage of the first tower that was hit. As I was watching, I saw the second plane fly into the second tower. Utter disbelief. At this point it was apparent that it was terrorism and within minutes they were talking about other planes that air traffic control had lost communication with. I went downstairs and woke up Tim and told him he'd probably want to see what was going on. We watched together the towers collapse, the Pentagon coverage, the United 93 coverage, people aimlessly wandering the streets for miles and miles in NYC, people pleading on the news for help or information about their loved ones. It was crazy and chaotic.

Meanwhile, Jeff's employer let the employees go home. He worked in an obviously much smaller building than the WTC, but it was a tall building near DFW and at this point we didn't know what else in the country was targeted.

I was also concerned about my family. Brady and Lindsay were in school, but I was concerned for my parents because they were at a dental conference in Florida which is where President Bush was at the time of the attacks.

When Jeff got home, we took Tim to see if his conference was still going to be held for that day. It was supposed to be at the Westin Hotel, which is connected to the Galleria. They had canceled his conference, so we decided to get a bite of lunch at the Galleria. That turned out to be harder than expected because the only people in the Galleria were me, Jeff, and Tim. It was a ghost town. All the stores/restaurants had closed and EVERYONE had left. It was eerie. In all honesty, though, Corner Bakery was still open and we ate there, but there were probably only 5-8 other patrons.

After lunch we went home and were glued to the TV watching the coverage. Tim was supposed to fly back to Nashville the following day, but of course air travel was completely suspended. His parents came from Abilene on Wednesday and picked him up and drove him on to Nashville.

Jeff also went back to work the rest of the week. I, however, continued to stay at home and watch the news. By Thursday, I was completely depressed from all of the coverage and all of the extremely sad stories. ALL channels, network, cable, and otherwise showed nothing but 9/11 coverage and I was desperate for a change. I hadn't gotten called to sub and I was just dying for something to do.

In November 2001, my family, Jeff and I went to NYC. We went to Ground Zero and since it was barely over two months since the attack, it was still very surreal. The clean-up and recovery efforts were still occuring, there were still hundreds to thousands of mourners passing by Ground Zero, and memorials were still being left near the site.

It was unreal. Although the towers had collapsed, they were still about 7 stories tall. Of course there were no windows, but you could still see evidence of what used to be offices; office chairs, rugs, copiers, etc were among the debris.

Since 9/11 our country has come together and been divided again. There are many that get fed up with the decisions made by the leaders of our country for various reasons, but I do feel we are safer now than we were then. I believe we do still have very strong enemies that would like to attack our nation again as was done on that day. And, I believe that we have been diligent to intercept and stop those plans (i.e. the plot in London that was foiled just recently).

My wish is for my children and theirs to grow up feeling safe and secure and enjoy the freedoms of this nation that were and are still being fought hard for.

You can see the remains of one of the towers in the background.

This was the window of a clothing store.

Make-shift memorial at the cathedral near Ground Zero (can't remember the name of the church).

Mayor Rudy Guiliani at the Today Show. It's hard to see, but one of the signs in the background says "United We Stand"......all the other ones are for Destiny's Child. Quite patriotic. :)