Remembering 9/11

Ten years.

A day that changed our country forever.

A day that changed everyone's lives forever.

You will always remember where you were and what you were doing on this day.

I was at work and heard about it on the radio.

Of course the early reports only speculated that the plane was a small commuter plane.  No one suspected it was a commercial jet.  No one suspected that this was something that had been planned out.

We all thought it was an accident.

The more customers that trail in, the more information I receive.

I start to get scared.

I call Randall at home.  Wake him up.  Tell him that something is happening and he needs to get up and turn the news on NOW.

He turns the TV on just in time to see the second plane hit.

He calls to tell me what is going on.

The radio reports the second plane.

I think everyone realizes that at this point, this was no accident.

My crew and I talk with our customers.  There is so much information but no one really knows {or understands} what is going on.

Randall calls to tell me about the first tower going down.

I am shocked.

I am scared.

If this can happen in New York, what's to stop it from happening in my hometown?

My boss comes in to work.  She lets me take a few minutes to go watch TV.

I work at a McDonald's inside a Wal-Mart so I head for the electronics department.

There is a crowd gathered around the TV's.  The second tower starts to collapse.

We watch.  Speechless.

I am in tears.

The sadness I feel for the families of the people who were lost is overwhelming.

It won't be until later, as I sit plastered to the TV, that I learn about the people who were jumping off the towers.  Knowing that they were going to die anyway so they took their own life before the terrorists could.

I remember feeling angry.  I remember wondering why someone would want to hurt us as a country like this.

And now, ten years later, I am still angry.  Still overwhelmed.  Still sad for the loss of life.

It is hard to explain this day to Kaylee.

She was not even conceived.  Not even a twinkle in her Daddy's eye yet.

She does not understand why her parents are glued to the TV watching the shows about this day.

She does not understand why we get upset.

She does not understand why I cry.

I know she will understand, someday.

I just hope that she will never see a tragedy like this in her lifetime.

I don't want her to have to try and explain something like this to her kids.

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