Posts: 2578 |
Esteban Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 12:10 PM |
The day the world changed, forever.
RIP. |
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Peewee Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 1:54 PM |
R.I.P |
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Turtleneck Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 2:18 PM |
That was the weirdest day, watching history unfold before our eyes on television.
My daughter was just over two months old and she just started smiling when prompted that day. I was watching Regis and Kelly (a morning entertainment show that is live in New York) and the reports started coming in that a plane had hit the Trade Center. Was it an accident? A small commuter plane, they thought. Then the second plane hit and it was obviously no accident. They switched to all news coverage. Watching the towers swaying, swaying, the fire burning. My daughter smiling like crazy while I had tears in my eyes.
Then the pentagon. Then another crash in a field. The towers starting to collapse. It was all live on TV. Everyone was wondering if there would be another target and if so, where?
A lot of people left work at that time. My husband came home, they closed his office. It just felt better to be together. Everyone wanted their families close.
For the next several days all channels were all news all day and all night. The coverage never ended. The search for survivors that was so difficult and so dangerous and so...fruitless, continued. People put up pictures of their missing loved ones all over New York, so few reunions.
People were just stunned. We were so much kinder to each other for a while. Drivers were more polite. Remember that? I do. It didn't matter if you had to stop to allow someone else to pull out. It just seemed natural to do it.
It took such a long time to get back to normal. It was a big deal when they decided to put Jay Leno back on TV and he didn't know how he was supposed to do a comedy based show after what had happened. It was almost like when you have a death in your family and you realize when you smile or laugh for the first time in days, it felt almost unnatural to laugh.
I hate what the terrorists have done to the world. I hate that new airline restrictions. I hate that we can't trust anyone anymore. I hate the war and all the losses it has caused. And who knows if we're any safer than we were.
Anyway, that's just my remembrance of the day. |
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Posts: 7598 |
weirdmom Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 3:04 PM |
I was sleeping (hubby had already gone to work) and a friend called, waking me up, to tell me some planes had crashed into the towers. I started watching and it was still at the point where they didn't know if it was an accident or what. Then more information and more crashes and it became clear this was no accident.
I was hugely pregnant at the time and I remember looking at my stomach and thinking, "what am I bringing you into?"
I was the news source for several people that day because all the news websites were getting overloaded and crashed so people at work were calling me so I could relay info from the TV.
I also spent a lot of time trying to call everyone I knew in D.C. or NYC. It was to get a connection but I felt such a relief as I spoke to each of them and knew they were OK.
For our honeymoon we went to Maine and NYC. We stayed in a hotel right next to the towers. We were reasonably high up, at least the 20th floor, and I remember when I looked out the window it seemed like it could remove the glass I could touch one of the towers. I associate those towers with such a wonderful time in my life that I felt such loss not only for the people who died and my country but specifically for those buildings.
My first Travis concert was about a month later and I remember Fran talking about it and just saying we have to choose to put love and good things out into the world and that was the only way to get through this. |
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megg_inc Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 3:26 PM |
My English classes started that day. I turned on the radio before going to my friend's house. They said there had been a terrorist attack in NYC. Back then my idea of a terrorist attack was they landed on a roof and took hostages, the truth wouldn't even cross my mind.
My friend Agy opened the door looking very scared and very pale. She told me planes crashed into buildings. Still, I had no idea what that actually means.
When I came home few hours later, my parents and grandparents were watching TV in a complete silence. I walked in, sit down and stayed like that for hours.
Anyone read 'Windows on the World' by Frederic Beigbeder? Devastating book. |
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Posts: 8142 |
minnmess Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 3:33 PM |
| i was in grade 11. I didnt have class first period and was sitting at my locker, probably doing homework that i didnt do the night before. A friend of mine who also didnt have class showed up and told me what happened and i just remember saying "what are you talking about?" and at the time thinking it was a small plane or some sorta accident. I then had english class, but bc we were in class no one had tvs or the radio or anything on so when i asked my teacher if she had heard, we still didnt know. Next was lunch and we went to the library and looked it up online. Right when i was doing that, they made an announcement telling us what had happened, offering to call families, etc if people needed to check on family in the area or anything. By the time of my afternoon classes all we did was go online and keep reading articles and i remember walking by a history class that had the tv on with the news. I hate this day. I hate this date. I dont ever want to write it down, or see an email dated Sept 11th or see it on any reports at work. |
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Posts: 1918 |
Moray Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 4:36 PM |
| I don't think I'll ever forget it. I was working in a bank during my summer holidays. We got sparse news reports during the working day from the customers who were trying to describe unbelievable events that were happening. I don't think anyone was able to truly grasp, let alone express the enormity of it all. I listened to the news on the car radio driving home, but it wasn't until I saw the pictures on the news when I got in that it hit me. |
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Meridith Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:22 PM |
| It's a day that I will never forget. Like Kayte said it was such a weird and surreal...tragic day. I remember getting into my car that morning and turning on the radio...one plane had already crashed into one of the towers. As I sat there listening...the other plane hit the other tower. I remember thinking "is this a joke?" I ran back into my house and turned on the tv and told my husband what was happening. It was just so weird. When I was at work, I found out about the other crashes. None of us worked that day. We just sat there in shock watching the tv as everything was happening. It was supposed to be a good day...it's my wedding anniversary and my husband and I were supposed to go out for nice dinner that evening. Needless to say, we didn't much feel like celebrating. We had just returned from England a couple of days before too...we kept wondering if we hadn't come home when we did...if we would've been stranded somewhere or not. I was also pregnant with my daughter and wondered what kind of world I would be bringing her into. It's just so sad. My heart goes out to all. Kayte is right...people were so much nicer after all of that...our country really pulled together. It's so sad that it takes something like that to pull people together. It is so sad that we are in this stupid war. Seriously...why can't we all just get along? I will remember today those who lost their lives, but I'm also going to remember that happy day 12 years ago that I married my best friend. |
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ElspethOllie Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:22 PM |
I was 13 and in 7th grade. It was a normal Tuesday. It was the 2nd Tuesday of the month so we got out of school early that day. During a passing period into our 3rd hour, a girl that my teacher had the previous year ran into her room and said, "The Pentagon's on fire!" Our teacher ran out of the room to get more information and get an extension cord for the TV. At first we thought it was just a fire you know, nothing that was on par with what it actually was. Our teacher came back 10 minutes later, 3 minutes late for class, out of breath and visibly distraught. She explained to us that in NY two planes had crashed into the WTC and that in Washington DC a plane had crashed into the Pentagon. A lot of students didn't know what the WTC were but I knew what they were WTC from an episode of the Simpsons (heh). The rest of the day we watched TV in every single class. The most shocking thing was when the towers fell, I don't think anyone could have predicted that. We watched as the South tower collapsed and then as the North one fell a half an hour later. The coverage was the same. It was like a scene from a disaster movie. Faces covered in soot and dust. People crying, and mass confusion. Reports of other hijacked aircrafts. Of bombs planted in the buildings around the buildings. It was scary not only because we were uncertain but teachers were uncertain, newscasters were uncertain. My dad came and picked me up and asked me if I had heard what happened. He said, "Let's go to Starbucks." He didn't normally pick me up so he wanted to go get a drink. But we got to the Starbucks and they had closed at 2 leaving a message about how they closed because of the attacks. My friends at the sister middle school said they weren't allowed to watch the news. A couple of students were angry because they said they were missing history in the making, but I guess they didn't allow them to. My brother had a pen pal in Virginia right outside of DC, he said that they were watching a video and a line in the video went, "... and that's when everything changed." Moments later they heard a crash and they were allowed to go out to the field and see what happened, but all they could see was smoke. So, that was my day, it was a normal Tuesday. Or so I thought.
*EDIT: I looked at what Kayte said about Jay Leno and I thought about how hard it was for late night shows especially the ones based out of NY like Conan, and Letterman and SNL to go back to work. I found this video of Jon Stewart opening the Daily Show which is based out of NY. They went back to work on September 20th.
The Daily Show intro, 9/20 |
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Scottish Dubliner Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:30 PM |
Thank fuck I thought this was gonna be a "take that" thread
oh and for the record it's 11/9, that's how the rest of the entire fucking world works with a calendar.
Dubz
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weirdmom Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:39 PM |
Scottish Dubliner wrote: oh and for the record it's 11/9, that's how the rest of the entire fucking world works with a calendar.
Dubz
But it happened here. If it happened there I would say 11/9. |
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Scottish Dubliner Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:41 PM |
Get Over It
Dubz
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ricv64 Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:43 PM |
weirdmom wrote: Scottish Dubliner wrote: oh and for the record it's 11/9, that's how the rest of the entire fucking world works with a calendar.
Dubz
But it happened here. If it happened there I would say 11/9.
rudy says it's
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Posts: 346 |
th74 Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:46 PM |
| I can't believe it's been seven years, I remember that day so well that is seems more recent than that. Think of how much the world has changed since then, and the ramifications of that day. One of the most moving things I've ever seen was going to NYC and seeing where the Twin Towers were. |
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Scottish Dubliner Posted Thu 11 Sep, 2008 5:48 PM |
ricv64 wrote: weirdmom wrote: Scottish Dubliner wrote: oh and for the record it's 11/9, that's how the rest of the entire fucking world works with a calendar.
Dubz
But it happened here. If it happened there I would say 11/9.
rudy says it's
Rudi Can't Fail
Dubz |
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