Memories of September 11th

University has kept me extremely busy...so sorry I have been away for so long!

Today is September 11th, and I'd like to share my memories of that day in 2001 with you all.

First, I need to flashback to when I visited the World Trade Center in 1996.  I was six years old and visiting my aunt and uncle in Manhattan.  We rode the elevator to the very top at rapid speed, my ears popping as we made it to the top floor.  I remember the carpet, the movie theater inside, the machine where you could mold a penny into a design of the towers.  The view was spectacular.

On the morning of September 11th, my Dad left to go on a business trip to San Diego.  He was in a plane during the attack.  The flight attendants thought there was a bomb on his plane, and he called my Mom with a voice, she told me, she would never forget.  His plane emergency landed in St. Louis, and he and his colleagues had to to drive a U-Haul 10 hours home to Columbus.

I was in Mrs. Caplin's 5th grade class.  The school guidance counselor came in and told Mrs. Caplin something in the hallway.  She came back into the classroom looking pale and simply told us that New York had been bombed.  I immediately thought of my uncle who worked in Manhattan, right across from the World Trade Center.  Thankfully, he was on a business trip in Philadelphia that day.

The teachers never told us the specifics of what happened.  It wasn't until I got home that day that I realized what really occurred.  I was petrified as an 11 year old, that such a thing could happen to thousands of people and in a place where I had once stood.  I remember going upstairs to find photos from our World Trade Center visit in 1996, and I found two photos that my sister took from the roof of the tower, overlooking New York City.

Looking back on how I handled 9/11, I realize that I sincerely mourned the loss of those towers and the thousands of victims.  I printed out pictures of the towers and taped them to the walls of my room.  I wrote a poem from the perspective of the towers on the six month anniversary.

I am proud that our country is ingraining this event into our collective memory.  We must never forget the victims that suffered on that day, and pray for peace in our present.