nmah5220.xml

nmah5220.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-10-10

It was the beginning of the Fall Quarter at Louisiana Tech University and I was working Class Registration. Students began coming in reporting that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center. At first we did not know what to think - everyone thought it was an accident and we did not have access to a TV. There were about ten students workers, including me, in the Registration Center and we started asking every student who came in what was happening "in the outside world." Finally, one of us was able to load www.cnn.com and we kept that one computer free to keep up with the events. Many of us stopped our work to pray and all of us worried and wondered if this was only the first of many attacks on the U.S.
When the reality of the situation starting to sink in nervousness and fear did as well. Even though we were in Ruston, LA, far from the NYC, it seemed everyone knew someone that may have been affected by this horrible tragedy. I worried about my good friend's brother who worked for the State Department. Then it hit a little closer to home when reports of Air Force One landing in Bossier City, LA, came in. Barksdale Air Force Base is not only close to my hometown and only minutes away from my fiance, but it also houses a LA Tech campus.
Classes were still going on, but no one could talk about anything besides the attacks. Lines for gasoline were 10 deep in this small LA town - people were filling up generators and gas tanks and stocking up on food and bottled water.
Since I had just arrived on campus only days earlier, I did not have my cable hooked up yet so I sat at friend's house for hours watching and worrying and trying to stay in contact with my family.
My father was in Colorado on his annual hunting trip. I assumed he was the only one in America who did not know what was going on. When he came home, days later, he said someone had hiked up the mountain to inform the hunters in case they had family involved, but that he had also noticed the morning of 9/11, that no planes were flying overhead and how unusual that was.
If we only knew that morning how unusual everything would seem in the days to come.

My life, per se, has not changed, but my attitude. I have always loved my country, but today I am proud. I see other countries celebrating at the loss of lives that day and I see hatred in the eyes of our enemy, and to them I say "I AM PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN!" And I will support all measures to see that they are brought to justice.

I think the spirit of unity should be remembered. When strangers helped strangers, when firemen and other officers knowingly ran into a fatal situation, when people from all over the USA and the world pulled together and gave blood, money, time, & supplies.
Also we should not forget the terror of it all and the anger that we felt. We should not forget the reason we are fighting a war against terror and we should continue fighting that war to avenge the wrong done to us.

I did not fly a flag simply because in my apartment there was no place to put one.
However, the flag is now an important symbol to me. It invokes courage and sadness all in the same glance.