story11313.xml

story11313.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2005-02-23

I?ll always remember that day in little snapshots, moments that stand out in brighter colors, images that are sharper then the rest. In between these moments, everything else is a fuzzy kind of blur. When I concentrate on trying to recall more, a sick feeling comes into the pit of my stomach. If I can?t remember the details of some parts of that day, I can remember the way I felt, it seems.

My day began early that Tuesday morning, at about 7:30AM I stopped at a local gas station to fill up my tank. I met up with a fellow employee of the software company I worked for at the time and in my car, we headed south of out of the city. I live in South Bend, Indiana and we were headed to a small town roughly an hour and half away.

My co-worker, Patty, and I chatted on the drive. I had a music CD in the entire way there, it just kept repeating, but it was turned down low so we could talk so I didn?t really notice.

We arrived at our destination, which was a home for children with disabilities to install the software package handled by our company. My first clue that something unusual was going on was when my contact for the client greeted us and said to just ignore ?some of the girls this morning.? When I questioned her, she responded in a very off hand manner, ?Oh, a plane hit a building in New York this morning.?

The way that she said it was very casual. In looking back, I think this was her way of coping with the immediate situation. By trying to make it less than it was, she could deal with it. My first thoughts were of a small plane and that someone in air traffic control must have screwed up.

As we were led through the facility, we passed through a large room where the children were set in their wheelchairs so that they could watch two enormous large screen TVs, one on either side of the space.

As we passed by I glimpsed a picture of smoke billowing from one of the towers and started to know that something serious was happening. The lady in the office I actually had to work in that day was much more affected by what was going on. She was the one, I think, to tell me that it was the World Trade Center.

I remember trying to work, to install the software, to pay attention to my job, but then there came a delay while a program was running and I walked back out into that big room with the TVs again.

I stood next to the lady from the office and watched as a rather frantic reporter described the screams of the firefighters that could be heard over the radios. That was when I felt tears starting to come. It was the strangest thing, to see all those children arrayed about these screens that I am sure normally display cartoons and Disney movies ? but that day the images on those screens were of fire and death and panic.

I didn?t stop to think about it at the time, but it?s a shame that someone didn?t think to move them away from those images. I?m certain that this must have bothered many of them, no matter how much they were thought to be ?aware? of what was going on around them.

My next sharp memory is of walking through a hallway, my eyes on the ugly brown carpet, as I overheard someone saying that the Pentagon had been hit. I still thought it must be some kind of terrible mistake, that those outdated air traffic systems had finally burned us. It wasn?t until I heard about the plane going down in Pennsylvania that I knew we were under attack. Maybe I heard it whispered, maybe it was something I realized on my own, I?ll never know. It was then that I started to feel frightened.

Up to that point, I?d just been sick at heart over the suffering I was seeing and hearing on the TV. Now it was bigger and scarier.

The rest of my time at that facility is a blur, with one exception, the director announced over the PA system that there was going to be a brief prayer meeting in the main room, and everyone ? staff and visitors ? was welcome to join. He extended a personal invitation to me, but I knew that I would completely lose it and start crying if I joined in. I was trying very hard to stay professional. Patty just wanted to get done and get back home to her kids. I remember seeing a group of people in a circle, holding hands, heads bowed. The murmur of their voices echoed down the hallway I was working in, haunting me.

When we finally left and started the drive home, we immediately turned on the radio and started hearing the various different broadcasts about what was happening. At this point it was probably about 2PM in the afternoon. While driving through a section of the downtown I spotted a sign for a gas station up on my left and was going to turn in so I could buy something cold to drink.

Before I did more than put on my turn signal I realized that there were dozens of cars already in the lot and many more trying to turn in. A line stretched down the street. Patty realized before I did the significance of what we were seeing. ?Oh my God, everyone is trying to get gas!?

I turned off my blinker and just concentrated on getting us through the traffic. I settled for drinking cold coffee from that morning while we listened to the reporters say more and more that just dumbfounded us.

And every little town that we had to drive through on our way back was choked with traffic. There were lines and lines of cars trying to fill up at gas stations, police cars with lights flashing were parked here and there as their occupants tried to direct the traffic. Their faces were tense as they waved us through. And every station we passed had higher and higher prices, I think the highest we saw that day was just about $3 per gallon.

More than anything else, seeing that people were panicking and reacting here in our safe little Mid-Western part of the world was bringing home the fact that this was a Big Deal. A trip that should have taken just under an hour and a half took a bit over two.

I called my boyfriend at the time that worked in another city about 45 minutes from South Bend. He seemed calm and said that if gas prices kept rising the way they were now, he would be staying the night at work to avoid using gas. My heart fell because I was really wanting to see him that night, I wanted to be around someone that would make me feel safe.

I called my mother and was angered by her casual attitude about the whole thing. The tone in her voice was best described as ?Oh yeah, its terrible, but do you really need to get so worked up about it?? The conversation did not last long, I hung up angry and ironically I felt better being angry. Once again, she must have been trying to control the situation by playing it down.

After I dropped Patty off in that same parking lot I?d been in early that morning, I was on the phone with another co-worker of mine who I was friends with. He and his girlfriend were good friends of mine and lived close by. In response to my request to come over and sit with them for a while that night they were very kind and said to come over as soon as I wanted to.

I will be grateful to them for that always. I can?t imagine sitting alone in my apartment on that first night. It was still too new. As it was I spent time with Deanne and Mike, sitting in front of the TV, watching the first interviews of survivors that had escaped from the falling buildings. Occasionally Deanne and I would go out to the porch and have a smoke, just to release some tension. Our conversation was excited and nervous. Mike pointed out that if it came down to a nuclear attack that with the Hummer plant in town we would be on the list of targets, maybe not the first on the list, but not too terribly far from the top. That just made us feel worse.

I don?t remember going home that night, but I know I did. My recollection of the days to follow is that I was always listening to the radio or glued to the TV. I remember sitting on the floor of my apartment, in the dark, crying and chain smoking in front of a large fan that blew out the smoke out of the open screened doors onto my balcony.

I remember seeing the footage shot by a doctor, released a few days after the disaster, where he was engulfed in a cloud of smoke and debris. I had thought I had a handle on myself by that point, but that footage made me sob again like a little baby.

To this day, although I?ve quite smoking successfully for a long time, traumatic events and feelings give me the urge to light up again. It?s a defense mechanism. So you don?t know how to deal with your emotions? Do something with your hands, light up and feel that drug give you a buzz!

Thankfully, I?m always able to get past the craving, but its probably going to be that way from now on.

Gradually, the media coverage lessened, but for many days, weeks maybe, all I watched was the news. I couldn?t get enough. Some people would feel overwhelmed after a while and want to think about something else. I couldn?t. I don?t know why. The whole experience affected me deeply and I will always remember it. I will tell my children and my grandchildren some day. I will occasionally start a conversation with, ?Where were you on September 11?? Hearing those stories fascinates me.

I have not forgotten, I will never forget, what happened. God save us all from such a day every again!