story5345.xml

story5345.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-09-11

I was at work and on the busiest day of my week. I work in a clinic for the developmentally disabled. I remember hearing people gather outside the office, in which I was meeting with a client, in the hall talking quiety about something and wondering what had happened. When the session was over I went out and asked what was going on and someone pointed to a television that a coworker had run home to get. On it was a scene I never thought to see in reality, only in the movies. A plane was crashing into the World Trade Tower and people were saying "no, not, again, not another one." I had to leave and begin another session. I had to put aside what I had seen and work with the person who had come to me for help. I remember thinking what is going on? What had happened? At the end of that session I went back to the television to see the second tower come down. I didn't realize that I was seeing the second tower, I thought that it was a replay of the first one. When I realized what I was seeing I was horrified and kept thinking, "all those people, all those people who were still in there and the people helping." I stood there with tears running down my face with about five or six other people watching this happen. I don't even remember what they were saying on the television. I do know that we didn't speak, we couldn't, what could we say to each other about what we had seen. I had to meet with another client then. I spent the remainder of my work day going between clients and the television trying to make sense of what had happened and of all the statements that were being said by the news people, the pentagon was blown up, the white house was gone.

At some point in that morning we heard that a coworker had a daughter that worked in one of the towers and that he was frantic to hear from her. I remember thinking what more? If I go back and look at that television what are they going to tell me next? My next thoughts were of my children and my life partner. I wanted to be with them to tell him that I loved him and that I loved my children. And I wondered how I could explain this to my son, he's only 10. How do I explain anger so far removed from him but yet strikes out at him for things he doesn't even know about or understand. The older children are horrified and stay glued to the television until we force them to go to bed. They plead with us to stay home the next day so they can watch CNN and we say no and send them to school.

One month later October 11...All through the news they are talking about the anniversary of the terrorist attacks. It is my son's 11th birthday and I want to turn off the television and the radio and let him have his day..let him be 11 and not know about this kind of anger and hatred. I have tried my best to help him to understand but he has never experienced this first hand and can't understand how people can hurt each other this way. His questions asking me about God and how their religion leads them to make these kinds of choices I can't answer but I try to help him. I can't answer his questions because I don't understand myself. I have to tell him I don't understand and try to explain to him about extremists but he still doesn't understand why people want and then feel good about hurting each other this way. He saw the news footage of the people celebrating this event. I feel angry because this has cheated him out of part of his childhood and stolen from him some of his innocence. I hope that the other children can get past their view of what has happened and the anger they have. They don't want to talk about it anymore and they don't want to watch it on television any more.

September 11 one year later...we, as a nation, still don't have any resolution and my son and I still don't understand. He is older now and has discussed this many times with different people and has come to the conclusion that terrorists don't like other people and likened them to historical figures like Stalin and Hitler that he has only begun to learn about. I am still angry because he has had to learn about this from something that happened here and within his life and I wonder how this will have changed him and his outlook on life. The other children remark on the day as an anniversary and go on with their lives, they have homework to complete, a paper to write and a speech to prepare. Someone has to feed the dog and the cats and turn off the lights in the fish tanks. Life goes on, but at what cost to our children?