story1456.xml
Title
story1456.xml
Source
born-digital
Media Type
story
Date Entered
2002-08-25
911DA Story: Story
Tuesday, September 11, 2001 I was sitting in a friend's office at work, just about 9:00 in the morning, when we got word of the first plane crash via email from a co-worker, who was in our corporate headquarters in Cleveland for the day.
We got to CNN's web site and saw a picture of the gaping hole in the first tower. We were trying to count floors to estimate how many people died. It was horrible to think about being on the plane. Then we thought about looking out your window and seeing a plane come at you.
Suddenly word came (from others in the department) that there had been a second plane, to the other tower. By this point we could not get out to the internet - everyone was trying to hit CNN's web site, as well as the other news web pages.
I called my best friend, and told her to put the TV on. She was home on maternity leave with her first child. I will never forget hearing her say "Oh my GOD, oh my GOD, look at that plane". She was looking at the video of the second plane crashing into the tower. Then she said "Look at that thick black smoke. Why are they showing the penatagon? Wait, the pentagon is on fire too!"
From that point on, we were all in each other's offices for the next hour or so, huddled around radios listening to the news.
No one could get work done. About 11:10 am a group of us went to a sports bar that had dozens of tv's, showing all of the major networks reporting the news. It was very somber. I was still in shock, in horror, amazed by the terrible things such as people leaping to their deaths from the buildings, and the buildings themselves dissolving, melting away into a billowing, monstrous evil cloud of dust. It was as though a volcano had suddenly exploded and was trying to swallow everyone in its path. There was a rain of papers. Business papers were fluttering everywhere. The gray ash was so deep, and the clouds rose so high into the sky. It was beyond comprehension.
We went back to work, and I followed my normal routine of leaving at 2pm to go and get my children. My son's babysitter, was distraught over the presently un-accounted for Godfather of her own child. "He worked next door and he's the type of guy who would just help people."
When I got home, I turned on the TV again, watching the same footage over and over, with new information added in, reeling every time the plane ripped into the tower, astonished every time the towers sank as though in quicksand.
The mayor of NYC spoke and I cried when he made reference to all of the children whose parents wouldn't be coming to get them that evening. I cried and cried, and my seven year old daughter didn't understand why I was crying. I tried to explain to her that the plane had hit the building, and it was very sad, because lots of nice people had died. But she didn't understand. Mercifully, she was too young to have it seem real. Too young to understand that somewhere in the city two hours away were girls who wouldn't have their mommy coming home that night.
I signed on to AOL and my friends were frantic about me. They knew I was in NY state but not where. I had actually given my phone number to one friend, S, and she had left a tearful message on my answering machine at home. She thought it was my cell phone and when she couldn't get through to me she didn't know if I had been in the city and killed. So I logged on and immediately my friends created a chat room just for me to talk, cry, and to "be with" my friends from all over the country. S was distraught, having been through the Oklahoma City bombing. Others worried about me having friends or family in the city. (At this writing the only person I knew was a former co-worker of several years before.) And my beloved Canadian and English friends were offering love and sympathy.
The most gutwrenching thing in the days to come was the flood of individual faces of the people lost. The stories, of who was late and who was early, and thus spared, or lost. The signs, everywhere ... "Have you seen me?" put up by desperate relatives.
My friend (another AOL pal) lives in NYC and works in Manhattan and sent a gripping email describing her day. We were so worried about her until we heard from her. (It was two days).
Mass on Sunday was very hard for me. I walked in and right near where we always sit were the prayer candles. They were white, with red and blue candles forming the cross in the center. I started to cry then. I cried through God Bless America and the other patriotic songs. I went outside and saw close friends, and we all cried together.
I had a painting that I had done, when I took a watercolor class in college. It was part of the flag, draped over a blue and white fabric. I put it in the front window -- it was there for the Gulf war, and now it is there again. I don't really know when I'll put it away.
We got to CNN's web site and saw a picture of the gaping hole in the first tower. We were trying to count floors to estimate how many people died. It was horrible to think about being on the plane. Then we thought about looking out your window and seeing a plane come at you.
Suddenly word came (from others in the department) that there had been a second plane, to the other tower. By this point we could not get out to the internet - everyone was trying to hit CNN's web site, as well as the other news web pages.
I called my best friend, and told her to put the TV on. She was home on maternity leave with her first child. I will never forget hearing her say "Oh my GOD, oh my GOD, look at that plane". She was looking at the video of the second plane crashing into the tower. Then she said "Look at that thick black smoke. Why are they showing the penatagon? Wait, the pentagon is on fire too!"
From that point on, we were all in each other's offices for the next hour or so, huddled around radios listening to the news.
No one could get work done. About 11:10 am a group of us went to a sports bar that had dozens of tv's, showing all of the major networks reporting the news. It was very somber. I was still in shock, in horror, amazed by the terrible things such as people leaping to their deaths from the buildings, and the buildings themselves dissolving, melting away into a billowing, monstrous evil cloud of dust. It was as though a volcano had suddenly exploded and was trying to swallow everyone in its path. There was a rain of papers. Business papers were fluttering everywhere. The gray ash was so deep, and the clouds rose so high into the sky. It was beyond comprehension.
We went back to work, and I followed my normal routine of leaving at 2pm to go and get my children. My son's babysitter, was distraught over the presently un-accounted for Godfather of her own child. "He worked next door and he's the type of guy who would just help people."
When I got home, I turned on the TV again, watching the same footage over and over, with new information added in, reeling every time the plane ripped into the tower, astonished every time the towers sank as though in quicksand.
The mayor of NYC spoke and I cried when he made reference to all of the children whose parents wouldn't be coming to get them that evening. I cried and cried, and my seven year old daughter didn't understand why I was crying. I tried to explain to her that the plane had hit the building, and it was very sad, because lots of nice people had died. But she didn't understand. Mercifully, she was too young to have it seem real. Too young to understand that somewhere in the city two hours away were girls who wouldn't have their mommy coming home that night.
I signed on to AOL and my friends were frantic about me. They knew I was in NY state but not where. I had actually given my phone number to one friend, S, and she had left a tearful message on my answering machine at home. She thought it was my cell phone and when she couldn't get through to me she didn't know if I had been in the city and killed. So I logged on and immediately my friends created a chat room just for me to talk, cry, and to "be with" my friends from all over the country. S was distraught, having been through the Oklahoma City bombing. Others worried about me having friends or family in the city. (At this writing the only person I knew was a former co-worker of several years before.) And my beloved Canadian and English friends were offering love and sympathy.
The most gutwrenching thing in the days to come was the flood of individual faces of the people lost. The stories, of who was late and who was early, and thus spared, or lost. The signs, everywhere ... "Have you seen me?" put up by desperate relatives.
My friend (another AOL pal) lives in NYC and works in Manhattan and sent a gripping email describing her day. We were so worried about her until we heard from her. (It was two days).
Mass on Sunday was very hard for me. I walked in and right near where we always sit were the prayer candles. They were white, with red and blue candles forming the cross in the center. I started to cry then. I cried through God Bless America and the other patriotic songs. I went outside and saw close friends, and we all cried together.
I had a painting that I had done, when I took a watercolor class in college. It was part of the flag, draped over a blue and white fabric. I put it in the front window -- it was there for the Gulf war, and now it is there again. I don't really know when I'll put it away.
Collection
Citation
“story1456.xml,” September 11 Digital Archive, accessed December 23, 2025, https://911digitalarchive.org/items/show/6437.