story6468.xml

story6468.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-09-12

On that day I took my daughter to pre-school and when I came home I turned on the television to the news. I don't usually watch the news in the morning but I just felt like watching that morning. Right away the vision of the twin towers smoking was in front of me. Only the first tower was hit at this time and I watched with my mouth dropped open as another plane flew into the other tower. I ran to my younger sister's room to wake her. I went downstairs to my roomate and told her to turn on the tv downstairs. We had 2 tv's turned to different news channels. Then we all watched as the third plane went into the Pentagon. I got ready for work and listened on the radio. It was rumored that a plane had been hijacked from Dallas Texas. All the way to work I was worried that plane was headed to Amarillo. At first I thought "Why would they crash a plane in Amarillo?" but then a co-worker reminded me of the nuclear disassembly plant Pantex that is just outside Amarillo. I knew people that worked there and always in the back of your mind you think Pantex will blow up and I'm not with my daughter! At lunch I went home and ran to my daughter and hugged her. By this time the damage was done, we continued to hear of the towers and other buildings being unstable and collapsing, but air traffic was shut down so I went back to work listening to the radio hearing about the damage done and the estimates of the lives lost. I put my American flag sticker like many other Americans and tried to calm my fears so that I can calm my daughter's fears. It has now been a year. I took my daughter to kindergarten and came back home to get ready for work. With the funny feeling in my stomach I turned the tv on to the news and watched the memorials. Now we have a new baby in the house, my nephew is 3 months old. As the National Anthem was sung at the Pentagon I held him with his little hand across his chest and sang the song to him. And just like last year listened to the radio on the way to work and cried.