Five years ago, Meghan collected some of the September 11th memories from our staff and published them as a Facebook Note. Tomorrow marks the 15th anniversary of the attacks, and we'd like to republish that post here. If you have a memory you wish to share, please feel free to leave a comment and join us as we reflect on and remember the sacrifices that were made that day.
“I
remember walking into work that morning and literally thinking “It’s
the perfect day!” The weather was beautiful. I was working at the front
desk that day and I was on the phone with my sister. She had the news
on while we were talking and I remember she yelled when the second
plane it.”
“I was nine years old and the fifth grade.
Didn't know much back then. The teachers were out in the hall most of
the day acting real weird. Being kids the whole class was enjoying the
free time by throwing stuff around and talking real loud.”
“I
was sitting in a class and I got a text on my phone. One of my friends
was telling me about the World Trade Center. Then I got another
text....and another. I got five texts in a couple minutes.”
“I remember exactly where I was. I was in West Roxbury, right in the hygiene room, working on patients.”
“I
was in the seventh grade. The school I went to didn't tell any of us
what was going on so I didn't know until my mother picked me up from
school. It wasn't until I got home and saw all the footage that I really
understood what had happened.”
“I dropped my daughter
off at school. As I was pulling up to the school to drop her off I
heard it on the radio. School was going on as a normal day and I
thought she’d be safe there, so I still dropped her off and came to
work.”
“I had just started my junior year at the
University of Rhode Island. My professor briefly touched upon the
attacks but did not go into detail. So I had to sit through my 90
minute lecture wondering what was going on.”
“At the time
of the attacks on the World Trade Center I was performing a root canal
on a patient. I was in the West Roxbury office, which had a small TV in
the lobby back then. Once we heard what happened we immediately turned
on the TV.”
“I walked the kids to school I then walked to
the Joyce Kilmer to vote. When I got home, my phone was ringing and it
was my friend asking if I heard about the airplane and told me to turn
the TV on.”
“We were walking down the hall I saw a group
of teachers crowded around a TV. They watched in silence. I didn't
think my teacher had a life outside the classroom, that she even
watched TV, it was weird. One teacher was actually crying, I didn’t
know what was wrong with her.”
“I remember being on the train wondering why people were crying and whispering about towers and planes.”
“Where
was I that day? Canada. In the airport. Headed home on a 9am flight.
Standing in line with a group of Americans as we saw the tragedy. A few
days later I walked across the border to drive home. I was so happy to
join my loved ones.”
“My teacher came in with a radio,
TV, and laptop that he connected to the overhead projector. No one said
a word and we spent 42 minutes listening and watching the coverage.
While he wrote explanations of people and things I had never heard of
before on the black board. OSAMA BIN LADEN, Al-Qaeda, Afghanistan
(where the hell is that?). We watched live as the first tower came
down, we heard when the president boarded air force one. We saw over
and over again the planes going into the towers. It was surreal, how
could this be happening in New York city, it seemed like it was war
footage in some foreign country, this doesn't happen in America.”
“I
was at a doctor's appointment and the receptionist had the TV on, I
saw the plane crashing into the tower then left and called my husband
who was watching at work. I called my brother because he worked in
Boston, and they said the plane was from Boston. He said he was getting
out of the city. I wanted to make sure my family was safe, it was very
scary.”
“I phoned my parents in Florida to make sure
they were alright. That they were home safe. I drove home for lunch
that day, to turn on CNN coverage and to witness the horror of the
attacks. Once it was time to head back to the office I was stopped at a
red light on Centre Street in West Roxbury. My windows were down, as
were the woman's in the blue Pontiac next to mine. I looked over at
her and saw her sobbing. That brought it all home to me.”
“I
was so overwhelmed by emotion. It was horrible. To see some of the
images they were showing, to see the measures people were willing to
take to try to survive...just awful.”
“I remember getting to the nearest television and watching the devastating act thinking ‘This is surreal. Is this a movie?’”
“I
was outside with my kids and our neighbors and no one at first knew
what to think. We stayed together all day and tried to keep updated. I
remember how silent it was with no planes flying afterward, and also
seeing the first fighter jets fly over West Roxbury.”
“When
I got home I was glued to the TV watching it all. It seemed so
unbelievable. The following week I was down the Cape on vacation and it
was so quiet down there. It was almost eerie.”
“I remember that all cell phones were down and my mom was so nervous for myself and my brother where we were away at college.”
“When I got home I remember my mom called all my family in New York to make sure they were all right.”
“My
daughter was in the sixth grade, and the school hadn’t told them
anything. It was business as usual for them. I was so stressed debating
what to tell her, when to tell her, how to tell her. I didn’t want to
tell her right away. It was a tough question, how much could an
eleven-year-old handle?”
“It was a time of shock and
disbelief that this could have happened in a split second and it was
out of our control. As the hours went by the day became a blur. It was
such a terrible disaster which would change every American's life
forever.”
“I remember watching it on television and
thought this can't be real. I really thought it was a movie, thinking
no one is really this cruel, til my kids’ school called to pick them
up. On my way there I remember feeling depressed with tears running
down my face scared that something will happen here in Boston.”
“This
other girl got a text on her phone, too, and she raises her hand and
tells the professor. At first the professor didn’t believe her, she
thought she was mistaken or trying to get out early. So I spoke up and
said I got five texts saying the same thing. The professor was shocked,
you could tell, but she tried to keep things all business. We had
twenty minutes left in class and she made us sit through it. I guess
maybe she didn’t want us to panic.”
“It was just a
normal workday and then people started talking about what happened. We
tried our best to keep things normal, but I think we were all in
shock.”
“I had to stay focused and finish my patient’s
treatment. She was under the effects of nitrous oxide, but in her
laughing gas "fog" was confused about all that appeared to be
happening. At one point she removed the mask and asked if what she was
hearing was really taking place.”
“I know people who
were home that day sat watching the news and crying. We couldn’t do
that. We had to work, we had to hold it together for the patients, to
make the day as normal as possible even though it wasn’t.”
“We
were all dealing with the same emotions. But we did the best we could
to keep things normal because that’s all you can do. Patients still
came in to get their teeth cleaned and I still cleaned their teeth.”
“In
the following two or three months, there was no sound of honking
automobile horns. People were all numb. It was a silent grieving, we
were all family bonded in a deep loss.”
“My husband is a
firefighter and his firehouse was beginning to organize a group of
firefighters to go from the area to be stand-ins for the New York Fire
Department. He had volunteered but he didn't end up going.”
“The
next few days were hectic, every time the news came on you worried
something else, or something worse happened. Eventually the fear
subsided but the government kept saying we had to be vigilant, it just
made me more aware of my surroundings and I tried to be vigilant,
whatever that meant.”
“Over the next few days, I thought
it was really touching to see people band together and try to help each
other through the grief and shock. It almost slowed life down a bit as
people made time to be kind to each other.”
“I worked
downtown on the weekends at the Swan Boats. The mayor instructed us to
open for business that Saturday, the city was dead, it was like a ghost
town, again surreal. The Hancock observation deck and top of the Pru
were closed to tourists. We were open for 2 weeks after till the end of
the season and everyday I worked it was weird. Something had changed
in everyone.”
“It was so sad to see people holding up pictures of lost loved ones and hearing about Gerard Dewan.”
“The
thing that affected me most about that day was the story of Flight
93. Just the fact that they had to take down that plane and the
highjackers. The passengers on Flight 93 saw that they could change
things, that they could take control. That’s always the thing that
bothered me the most.”
“My kids were young, so I always
watched them closely anyway. I was afraid to fly though, for a long
time. I still don't like to fly!”
“I was a senior in high
school at the time. That spring Senator Ted Kennedy and Supreme Court
Justice Anthony Kennedy visited my school. All the seniors in the AP US
history class were involved in a round table discussion. We talked
about the concepts of freedom and terrorism, civil rights, foreign
policy, diversity and tolerance. It was an interesting experience to
have two people with that much authority sit and listen to an
18-year-old’s thoughts.”
“9/11 was one of those disasters
that had me wondering what if I was there...or worse a family member?
It really put things into perspective.”
“Going from a
hateful man like Osama to electing a man named Obama shows the
diversity and strength of a country united in the goal of equality and
freedom. We have lots of problems as a society but my experience having
such a literally "in your face" job proves to me how wonderful and
beautiful human beings can be. I believe the 9/11 heroes left their love
to each of us. We owe it to them to succeed, take an active interest
in life, and make it our personal responsibility to add value to our
world.”
