Today marks the seventh anniversary of that terrible day in 2001 when terrorists flew two planes into the World Trade Center resulting in its collapse, another plane into the Pentagon and a fourth into a field in Pennsylvania. Many say that was the day everything changed for America. Most of us remember what we were doing when we heard the news. I was living in Pacific Grove, California at the time and didn't have to be at work until noon. It was late morning, and I had just turned the television on and saw footage of one of the planes hitting the World Trade Center. I wasn't sure what it was, but I instinctively knew something was very wrong. My son was in the other room and I said, "Something's happening. Turn on your TV." I couldn't believe what I was seeing and hearing. As I headed to work, I noticed how quiet everything seemed. No one was around. It reminded me of right after the 1989 earthquake. All was eerily quiet. When I arrived at work someone had turned on a television, and it was all we could talk about. And yet we didn't really understand it. As the days unfolded after that tragic day, we would find out about Al Quada, about Afghanistan, Osama Bin Laden, radical Islam -- subjects few Americans knew much about. We would try to make sense of what happened. Can we ever make sense of an event like that? Share your stories of September 11, 2001. And read more about it so we can try to understand and never forget.
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We were spending what was to be our last day in London before heading home to Seattle on 9/12. Wandering through Hyde Park, we passed by a man on a cell phone who said, "What do you mean, they've blown up New York?" Having no context for the comment, we continued on to a pub near Harrods. While I was waiting outside for my husband, he peeked out the door and signaled me into the pub, where he told me to sit down. Two off- duty London policemen told us what had happened in New York and at the Pentagon.
Our hearts plummeted to the bottom of our souls. We raced to Harrods to watch the horror unfold with about 200 other people. It was, and still is, surreal. In the following days, we were embraced completely by the Brits. They showed such empathy, stopping us on the street to show support. We were lucky to be in an allied nation during that time. We were on the first United Airlines flight to the West Coast, on Friday 9/14, and as we pulled into the gate at about 8:30 pm, we were greeted by ramp vehicles lined up, lights on, ramp personnel standing atop them waving the U.S. flag. All of our lives were changed forever.
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