nmah4390.xml

nmah4390.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-09-11

It was just any ordinary day. I woke up, took a shower and got ready for school. I went downstairs and saw my mom just like I would every other weekday. I asked her, "So, when are you leaving to work?" She would always reply with a, "Right after you and Stella leave." I don't know why I would ask her the same question everyday knowing what the answer was already. It was around 8 and my sister and I said goodbye to my mom as we gradually walked on our way to school. It takes my mom at the most 30 minutes to get to work if there is traffic. She always would take the PATH train in Hoboken and in a few stops would be her office, the famous Twin Towers. She worked at Tower 1. I would go there occasionally, all the way to the 89th floor to help her out with work but now that school started I was too busy to.
Let's see, first period. Then we all go to homeroom. I sat down and I remember looking around and thinking, "Wow I really like this homeroom." I used to hate it but in that one second I realized how many great people we had in our homeroom. Then less than a minute later our homeroom teacher had an announcement to make. He said pretty casually, "Did you hear about the plane hitting the World Trade Center (tower 1) just now?" I must have been staring at the same spot for 2 minutes nonstop just horrified. I couldn't say anything I just cried. I cried for all of second period and people would come up to me and I couldn't even speak. I never felt that much pain inside of me. I can't really describe, but it's something like a really painful knot inside your heart and you body starts to shake and lose control. My mind kept playing little games on me. A part of me was already making future plans of what I will do without my mom. I haven't seen my dad since I was 3 so I knew my sister and I would have the hardest time. But another part of me knew that God wouldn't take her away from me. Especially like this.

I went to the nurse and I seriously must have cried a whole river. I needed so many napkins, toilet paper, anything I can get my hands on. I finally called my mom's cell phone and she picked up! That was the best feeling. My cheeks hurt because I couldn't stop smiling. Luckily she had an appointment Harlem so she didn't go to work as early as she does most of the time. So I thank God that she is OK and I wish for the best for the victims' families of that day because I got a glimpse of how you felt on that day and no one will ever understand that unless they go through it the way I have or the way someone who really did lose someone has.
So that was my experience of 9/11. It was the longest day of my life and I will never forget that day as long as I live.

After 9/11 my whole viewpoint on life has changed. I now know that life can really end tomorrow. Most of us have to stop living the fairy tale lives that we have been living for the past 10 years and realize that bad things happen. People we love die. We die. I think that is something everybody tends to forget. Deep inside we act and think as if we will never die and everything will always be the same. I learned so much about myself and the importance of life from that day. I just wish that it happened a different way somehow. But, I believe whatever happens you can bring good out of it somehow and we have done the best we can with this situation so I am very proud of our country.

I think that we should remember the families of all the victims and the firemen and rescue teams that saved many of them. We should remember that there are evil people out there who want to hurt us and that we have to show those people that nothing will bring us down. Not even what happened on 9/11. Look how much closer our country got after that day. We're ready for just about anything.

I always had respect for our country but I never showed it with a flag til 9/11 happened. Our flag has so much meaning to it. It represents our country and it was amazing how many flags went up after 9/11. Everytime I would walk on any street I would see at least 10 flags everywhere.