lc_story174.xml

lc_story174.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2003-12-25

It was my day off and I was still living at home with my mom and my little brother in Burnsville, MS. A little after 7 that morning, my mom came into my room and woke me up saying "Wake up, you've got to see what these people are doing to us!!" Being 20, all I gave her was a crazy look and asked "What?" She said "They are flying planes into buildings!" Well, needless to say, that got my attention. I went into the living room and witnessed the worst images I had ever seen.

Sitting there on the couch with my mom, I watched as people screamed, cried, and cursed. I just sat there with my hand over my mouth on the edge of tears. I was just waiting for something to happen on our street, that's just how close I felt to being totally terrified without actually being there. My boyfriend (now my husband) called me from work and asked what was going on because they were hearing it on the radio. About the time I was telling him what I was seeing, the images of a person jumping and falling from a window several stories up flashed across the TV screen. I stopped breathing and tears fell down my cheeks. A person willingly throwing himself from a window, that's more desperate than I could possibly imagine

I felt like the horrific events on that day how brought our community and nation closer together. We didn't actually know how much we needed each other and just how far apart we had become. It was the reality check we needed. It was not an attack on any racial or religious basis, it was just because we are Americans and believe in freedom and justice for all, even other countries.