story5902.xml

story5902.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-09-12

It was early in Silverdale, about 6:00 am. I had just finished packing up my daughter's stuff so I could get her off to the babysitters and then head to work. I worked for New York & Company, also knowns as Lerners, in the Kitsap Mall, in Silverdale, Washington. As I dropped off my daughter, 2 1/2 year old Mercedes, I breifly heard on the radio about the first plane hitting the trade tower. They joked about it being a terrorist attack. As I pulled into the parking lot of the mall, they screamed "Oh my God another plane has hit the second building." I sat in my car, shocked, angry, and scared. I wasn't just scared for me or my daughter but for my husband, my husband is in the Navy. He was out to sea at the time the buildings and the Pentagon was hit. Of course he and his crew weren't spoken of because they where on a Sub, the USS Ohio. I feared that I'd never see him again, not knowing where all this was going. I said a quick prayer for the families who lost loved ones, for my family, and for America. As my boss and I walked into the mall I told her about what was going on. She was just as shocked and scare as the rest of us. We went into work and proceded with our jobs, when my babysitter called freaking out and scared for her husband and mine. I told her to calm down, to think about the kids, they didn't need to see her upset. So we hung up and about the same time the other manager of the store called to let us know what was going on, and to tell us at that point the Pentagon had been hit. We stood there looking at each other dumpfounded. We continued with our work and what seemed like moments later the manager called back again and told us the First Trade Tower, Second to be hit, had collasped. At that point we rushed into the break room and turned on the T.V. to watch the news. My first reaction after seeing it, was to call my Mother who lives in Orlando, Florida. She works in a tower, a court house downtown. But they had evacuted. I was glad. :) But at the same time scared. A few moments later the security officers at the mall told us to evacute. As we gathered up our stuff I called my babysitter to inform her I was coming home. She told me at that time the Naval Sub Base Bangor wasn't letting the school buses on. See we all lived on the Sub Base. I told her seeing that I was off base already I'd pick up her daughter and her neighbors daughter. So when we finally left the mall, I went to the girls school and picked them up. They where very confused to see me. They wondered where their Mommy's were. I just told them,"Some bad things have happened and I'm taking you home to your Mommys." They smiled. As we approached the base the line to get on the base was very long. We sat there for an hour waiting to go home. I wanted to see my daughter and I know my friends wanted theirs. We finally got to the gate and the Marines and Navy men inspected my car, went through everything to make sure no bombs or nothing was getting onto the base. I was scared and so was the girls but the Guys where great. Once I finally got to the babysitters house, the first thing I did was grab Mercedes and hug and kiss her. We sat down and I finally got to see the actual footage of the planes hitting the building. Mercedes, at the time was 2 1/2, asked me "Mommy, what happened." How do you explain to a 2 year old about bad people. I couldn't I just hugged her. I have never felt so many emotions at once, fear, haterd, toward the people who did this, love, disbelief, helplessness. One thing I do know, is I'm proud to say I'm so glad the action was taken right away, meaning, the way they handled the base, yes at times it was fustrating, but I felt safe. The way President Bush reacted, right away he wasn't going to deal with terrorist. I'm very proud to be an American today and everyday after September 11th 2001. I'm glad my husbands in the Navy, even though he's not over there fighting, but he's still serving his country and that makes me very Proud and honored to be an American......God Bless America. One Nation UNDER GOD!!!!