story3252.xml

story3252.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-09-11

I am a Californian and I was 31 on 9/11/01. I am embarrassed to say that if you had asked me, prior to 9/11/01, I would not have been 100% certain that the World Trade Center was in New York.

I moved to a new home in Malibu, with my son and my husband, the last few days of August, 2001. We have a Great Dane and the house didn't yet have a fence enabling me to let him roam the yard to find the perfect spot to go to the bathroom, and because he is a skittish Great Dane, he hadn't gone to the bathroom in 2 days due to the change of environment. I had been walking him while my son was getting ready for school and my husband was running. My dog had just gone to the bathroom and I was overjoyed. Suddenly, my husband drove around the corner, fast enough to barely miss hitting us and he told me he just heard on the Howard Stern Show that a plane had hit one of the Towers. I didn't know what that meant. What kind of plane? How is that possible? What does it mean?

We ran in the house and turned on the television. My husband, my son and I watched the television in awe, in horror, in silence.

This was inconceivable. My generation lived under the assumption that the United States was untouchable. We knew about Pearl Harbor, but look at our response to Pearl Harbor? Who would put themselves in that position to welcome the kind of revenge that is characteristic of the United States? I was born in 1969. I am too young to have any memory of Vietnam. My life was not changed by Desert Storm.

We didn't know what would happen next. This wasn't the usual kind of aggression that is expected in war. I couldn't imagine who we were at war with anyway. Had I missed something in the news? While I was so embroiled in moving to a new home did I miss some vital information going on in the world that would explain this?

I knew there were rules in war. Civilians are never supposed to be the main target. Who would do this?

I didn't cry for days. In fact, it wasn't until weeks later that, while watching footage of the events that took place that day, that I broke down. I cried for hours and on and off since that day. My initial reaction was one of horror, anger, and fear, but the long term reaction has been one of such sadness and grief. I have spent months trying to come to grips with the reality of it. In fact, on this one year anniversary, while my family and friends have shied away from media coverage, I have saturated myself with it in hopes of trying to understand, or at least, to allow myself to accept the reality of it.

I like the analogy of the United States as a family that argues within itself, but when faced with an insult, bands together and forms a shield of righteous dignity. I have been so touched by the outpouring of grief across the world for a nation that has made freedom in every nation one of it's primary goals. I understand that the strongest will inevitably be resented by the weakest, and I am so proud to be a citizen of the strongest nation in the world.