9/11/01

Sitting in the classroom—teacher reading aloud—I was enjoying Juny B. Jones as the Mr. Z, the principle, came over the intercom loud and clear, “Open house will be postponed tonight until further notice due to the attacks on the Pentagon. Thank you.” Although I had never known a pentagon could be attacked, I knew the teacher should have had some emotional reaction to the news. I recall looking left and right at my buddies Nathan and Jury respectively, and wide-eyed we imagined the attack. We—as do most boys that age—loved the idea of violence, of fighting; to us, war and fighting would be fun like it was when we played war in the neighborhood! Oh, our innocence!

When school and ended and I returned home, my sister ran me over to my aunt’s house across the street, she was frenetic and over-the-top with her screaming and crying of oceans. She began to make me worry and become frightened. At my aunt’s home, we saw the images of two buildings burning and then collapsing, smoke filling the streets, and a man in a suit walking toward it all. Now, again, I began to get excited; and so I ran home and grabbed my Legos, ran back to aunt Maureen’s, and built those towers and destroyed them multiple times! No one appreciated my innocence that day. I began, not to worry or be scared, but rather angry and frustrated that the grown-ups were irritated with me! What had I done?!

It was only later, several weeks later, had I learned why. However, during the time I was angry everyone asked the same thing: “Where’s Kathy? Is she okay? Has anybody heard from her?!” Now, I was seriously confused. First they were shocked, appalled, dumbfounded, and aghast at the scenery on the television. On top of that, they were nearly angry with me for some reason. And now they were screaming for Kathy! Ah, the insanity! It was, I might want to inject, the need to know about Kathy that horrified me the most. After an hour or so, I connected some dots: We were worried about Kathy because she lived no more than three or four blocks from the buildings that just fell down! It was then that I broke down and poured tears and screamed for Kathy.

That night was abysmal. No one knew a thing about Kathy’s condition, her whereabouts, not a thing! Me and my sister were crying and praying hard for her. We didn’t go to school next day, my mother was worried something might happen. That seems silly now, but not then. Any place, any building, any town or neighborhood was a very likely target. I remember hearing rumors of terrorists attacking the New Year’s Celebration in Times Square!

Only after about four days did we hear from Kathy. She was absolutely fine, her apartment wasn’t damaged, nor she. Her phone was out of service, and—understandably—she never thought to call, with all the chaos and such. We were now at ease, and could sleep much sounder. That night we heard from Kathy, my parents didn’t drown their sorrows but rather buoyed their spirits with cheery drinks. I had a coke, and my sister had coffee (she was a grown-up sixth grader then).

The story does not end yet! For it was a fortnight or so after 9/11, in the middle of the night or the early morning hours I heard a loud, deep boom! My entire family heard it, and we ventured outside to find the whole street emerging as well. There was a murmur flowing up and around the street corners “They nuked Orlando”. . . “They got Leesburg”. . . “It’s all over”. . . That was perhaps the most frightening moment of my life. There was a comedy though, the next morning, when we learned that was just a sonic boom from some military jet or space shuttle.

We all remember where we were, that morning of September 11th, 2001. It wasn’t a space odyssey of enlightenment; it was a act of war that lead to the longest engagement in America’s military history. I remember I was sitting right next to Jury Wedell who sat next to the wall of books in the rooms left side, and next to Nathan Blamick whom I can’t say I know too well these days. All in all, that was a day, a week, and a month I shall never forget. Nor should I. Nor should any of us.