Comments

I can't see it either.

I live too close to the pentagon. 9/11 was a day that I can't shake off. I was home with my three and four year olds. I remember standing outside with my neck craned to the sky, wondering when another plane was going to hit. Wondering if I should just take my kids to the nearest church and pray. Wondering how close my mom's office was to the next target. Wondering if our friend, a flight attendent for American, was on that flight that commuters watched fly into the pentagon.

This was followed up by a summer of the sniper. I would yell at my kids to hurry, hurry as I ran with them into the grocery store.

Sheer panic. Helpless.

-- NicksMama - 28 Apr 2006

Wow, NicksMama^?, that is pretty up close and personal.

I can't see it either, not on the big screen.

Fantastic poster, though.

-- SusanS - 28 Apr 2006

I'm not going to see it. I hope it has a reminder affect for people, but I don't need to be reminded. I'm rather political/foreign policy oriented in my interests, so it's something I've thought about every day since that day.

-- BenCalvin - 28 Apr 2006

Ed and I spend night after night watching and re-watching sci fi.

Have you seen Firefly?

-- BenCalvin - 28 Apr 2006

I can't see it either. Glad to hear I'm not the only one! And I was in living in California that day.

NicksMama^? - I can hardly imagine how horrible that time must have been for you.

-- StephanieO - 29 Apr 2006

Nope, can't see it.

I'm rather surprised they made it. Maybe in a decade .. but it's too soon.

-- CarolynJohnston - 29 Apr 2006

Nick's Mama & Ben

I'll never shake off 9/11.

Ed took the train early that day, and saw the first plane hit the first tower. He called me to tell me I was going to see it on TV.

He told me, and this is Ed-to-a-t, "It was a small private plane."

I was at my neighbor's house with a group of moms she'd invited over for breakfast. I started saying, 'Oh no! Oh no!' and everyone got upset....just the image of such a terrible accident was horribly distressing.

At the very end of the conversation, Ed said, 'Some people around here said maybe it's terrorism' and immediately I knew it was terrorism.

Seconds after I got off the phone the second plane hit and I called back to tell him to get out of there. Naturally he refused (Ed-to-a-t); he said he was going to go ahead and give dissertation exams.

Shortly after that the phones started going in and out, a woman ran screaming into his office to say there was a man with a bomb outside, Ed and his staff spent the rest of the day locked in the basement of their building without food and water....and I was here in Westchester trying to collect autistic children from their schools. Jimmy's teacher called and said there'd been an attack at Camp Smith - I had no idea there even was a Camp Smith, or where it might be - and to come get Jimmy.

Andrew was across the county; his teacher was waiting to find out whether her brother, who worked in the buildings, had lived; his principal was waiting to hear whether her husband was alive.

Our high school was already mourning; they'd had word immediately of a death.

Andrew didn't get home until 5; Christopher cried all day long; we were in a state of fear and horror.

We had the particular wrinkle that we'd lived through the Northridge earthquake, so we knew that buildings shouldn't fall down the way the WTCs had fallen down. (At least, in L.A. they wouldn't fall down that way....) So we thought there had to be someone on the ground, too, and there were reports that there'd been a second explosion down below, not just the plane.

Basically, no one knew whether we were 'just' dealing with planes in the sky, or whether there were people on the ground, too.

Ed ended up walking from the Village to Grand Central to get home. I picked him up after dark, in Tarrytown. I took two knives with me, a big butcher knife and a small serrated tomato knife.

This is what's never reported - the uncertainty of that day. The not knowing what the dimensions of the threat were. I was new to Westchester County, and had no idea what the population was like: do we have radical mosques here or not? (I still don't know, though they seem to be in Brooklyn & NJ.)

When I got to the Tarrytown station the police were there, along with news cameras. I started to get out of my car when it occurred to me that I was now in danger of being arrested for walking around with a butcher knife in my hand.

So I buried the knife in my knitting bag and walked to the train with the bag on my shoulder and my hand on the handle of the knife - now trying to be careful not to attract the attention of cops!

It was the lone moment of comic relief that day.

-- CatherineJohnson - 29 Apr 2006

Both planes flew directly over our house.

-- CatherineJohnson - 29 Apr 2006

Nick's Mama

omg

I was forgetting the sniper (how could I?)

that was unbelievable

and with little kids

-- CatherineJohnson - 29 Apr 2006

of course, we had anthrax immediately afterwards....

I remember trick or treating with my friend Penny that Halloween, talking about the anthrax. I was saying, 'They need to hit Marin County! Marin County is full of sinners! Or Las Vegas! Infidels!!! Lots and lots of infidels in Las Vegas!'

Penny said, 'Yeah, share the love.'

-- CatherineJohnson - 29 Apr 2006

Our anthrax story was actually funny.

For one thing, we lost the entire year's worth of State Tests.

For another, NAAR sent me a big box of NAAR brochures to take to the upcoming autism conference, and the box was postmarked Princeton, which was where all the anthrax was coming from.

By the time I noticed this the box had been sitting in my foyer for awhile, and nobody was sick.

So I reasoned the whole thing through in my head, and figured that if the box did have some residual spores, there was a possibility that while there weren't enough to make us sick, there might be enough to give us immunity.

I decided to leave it sitting there.

Then I had a crisis of conscience, because my neighbor's son was coming over all the time to play.

So I was thinking, 'ok, I get to make this decision for my own family, but do I get to make this decision for my neighbor's family?'

The answer appeared to be 'no.'

Then I started thinking, 'And do a whole conference-full of parents of young autistic children want me to help them develop immunity to anthrax via my possibly-contaminated NAAR brochures?'

Again, the answer appeared to be 'no.'

BUT.....otoh, I didn't want to throw out an entire box of NAAR brochures, seeing as how the whole thing was probably silly, and the brochures probably didn't have any anthrax in them anyway.

SO.....should I just tell my neighbor about the brochures-from-Princeton and let her decide?

The answer seemed to be 'yes' BUT I was pretty sure she'd decide her kid didn't need to be playing in the vicinity of a whole box of Princeton mail, which would mean Christopher would lose his next-door friend.....

Talk about zero cognitive flexibility.

I just could not think my way out of the box.

Finally I noticed that the brochures had been sent via UPS.

-- CatherineJohnson - 29 Apr 2006

I haven't seen Firefly - what is it?

-- CatherineJohnson - 29 Apr 2006

Firefly

It was a Fox series that was cancelled in the middle of its first season. Developed by Joss Whedon (of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" fame), it is a very intelligent series with fascinating characters.

The night I got my copy from Amazon, my wife and I started to watch it after our son went to bed. Cheryl insisted that we watch every night thereafter until we had finished the series.

It is certainly one of the best pieces of filmed SF that I've ever seen.

-- DougSundseth - 29 Apr 2006

I'm getting it - I can't wait

-- CatherineJohnson - 01 May 2006