story934.xml

story934.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-07-25

September 11th was a brilliantly blue late-summer day in Forest Hills, a quiet neighborhood in the borough of Queens, New York City. I was teaching my 7th grade English classes that fateful morning, administering their first spelling/vocabulary quiz of the year. My classroom is directly on Union Turnpike, a major roadway that forms the service road for the Jackie Robinson Parkway leading to Brooklyn. My schedule included two classes of 7th graders back to back, and the day was also scheduled to be 'Picture Day' for our school. Since I am the advisor to the school yearbook, I needed to check on the progress of the photography when I had my first break, scheduled to be about 10:15.
At 9:10 there was a break between first and second periods and I had 5 minutes to run down to the cafeteria and grab a quick cup of tea. The day seemed to be progressing as usual--slightly more hectic due to the disruption of the day due to the picture taking schedule. While in the cafeteria, our college counselor mentioned that a plane had flown into one of the Trade Center towers. My initial reaction was sadness for the person on the plane, but I was sure that it had probably been a small private plane that had veered off course. At 9:15 I returned to class to lead the next group through their paces. Probably about 9:45 I became aware of the almost continuous screech of firetruck and ambulance sirens racing down Union Turnpike. Since my classroom is so near to the street, traffic noises often briefly interfere with class, but this was never-ending. I even remarked to the class that 'something big must have happened' since the sirens were relentless in their cacaphony.
At 10:15 at the end of class, a colleague came into the classroom to speak to me. He had been in the faculty room watching the unspeakable images unfold on the CNN link to the computer terminals. His words of "We are under attack!" seemed an impossibility to me, and it seemed as if my blood ran cold.
I reached the faculty room to see the impossible picture of both towers engulfed in clouds of black smoke, and all I could think of was the hundreds and thousands of people who work in those buildings.
I went out to check on the progress of the pictures. All seemed right with the world--smiling innocent faces, blue skies, garden flowers and trees, laughter and childhood silliness. The word had trickled down to the mothers who had come to help, and the beginings of panick were beginning to eat away at their calm demeanors. By now no cell phones would work, there was no telephone service in all of New York City. Fear had taken hold.
The decision was made to tell the Middle and Upper School students at 11:30. Specific details were kept to a minimum for the Lower School kids, but by noon, many parents were coming to pick up their children and bring them home. All of us were consumed with a driving need to speak to our families. I was lucky that I had spoken with my husband who worked in Eastern Long Island, about 60 miles from Manhattan. He was my link to the news media, as most network TV stations were dark, their transmitters crashed in the rubble of the Trade Center. I was consumed with a burning need to speak with my three children who were at school in Nassau county. The overwhelming fear and uncertainty that further attacks were imminent was palpable. After all, the unspeakable had occurred--the landmark beacons of New York City had been attacked and destroyed. Life as we knew it was gone. My need to reach my teenagers wasn't fulfilled until the end of the school day when they returned home to stare dumbfounded at the television images they saw.