I noticed the recurrence of the word 'surreal' in all your posts - the perfect word for the events and our feelings on 9/11. I enjoyed reading all your different experiences - especially those who were so close(wow, Ronin1!) - and those who were so far away - even in Australia!
I was watching GMA with Diane Sawyer and Charlie Gibson. They had an instant live feed from their camera crew on the scene as the first tower began to smoke and burn after the impact of the first plane. Their chat of the presumed 'accident' turned to gasps and then silence as we watched the second plane strike. I was glued to the set, but my legs wanted to run - somewhere - I felt like running around screaming "HELP THEM!!!" - but I was immobilized. They talked of other hijacked planes... the Pentagon attacked... Air Force planes deployed. Always the professional reporters, they now stumbled over their words and their voices cracked with confused emotions, desperation, fear - whoa. Stuff was hittin' the fan and splatterin' faster 'n you could duck. I was numbed and shocked by images of people leaping to their deaths rather than waiting for the flames... I gaped in utter horror as those towers collapsed on top of themselves - it looked like the ground opened-up and swallowed them whole! I'll always remember how sick and helpless I felt, thinking that I'd just watched 25,000 people die. Disbelief and sorrow. (I didn't know what a swift evacuation the rescuers had accomplished in so few minutes - they were truly miracle-workers!)
Although I'd been fading for about a year from the wts, yeah, there were some fleeting thoughts about the beginnings of the big A. I called my dd and dh at work, and also thanked God my Mom wasn't alive to see this day... Still, somehow I felt physically safe - living out here in the mid-American countryside so far from any cities or probable 'targets' - but I knew life for Americans was going to change. The first effect on us was price-gouging at gas stations. The jerks.
When dh got home from work we hugged a lot tighter and longer... and we watched with the rest of the world for weeks without tiring of it at all, as the twisted burnt metal was trucked out continuously. We waited hopefully for good news of people found alive, but unfortunately there weren't many stories like that. I was upset when they got back to regular programming on tv - how could they act like it was 'business as usual' when it seemed to me that things would never be 'normal' again - ever?
It makes you wonder about those, who for some unforeseen reason, were late to work or decided to play hooky or called in sick - one guy took his kid to school and thus was late enough to be spared while his co-workers died - one guy was sent out for donuts and everyone in his office died but him - how they must feel like they cheated death. Or maybe they feel guilty to have been spared - and surely they wonder. Remember that priest - Father Mike I think was his name, who died while helping someone on the street - a falling brick hit him in the head and killed him outright. There were heart-wrenching last calls from those knowingly doomed, captured on voice mail or answering machines to their loved ones. It rips my heart afresh every time they're recounted. There sure are a lot of questions ending in "why?".
I didn't realise how much potential fear had to change life for the whole world... And I hadn't even begun to realise what historians have always known I suppose - what a perfect conduit religion is for fear-mongering. I hate what fear can do and has done. I hate what fear wants - which is to replace love. We can't let that happen, people, no matter what... NO FEAR!
"There is no fear in love. Perfect love throws fear outside."
"Imagine there's no religion. It's easy if you try. No hell below us, above us only sky. Imagine all the people living life in peace." Cool - I've always wanted to visit the R&R Hall of Fame.
watkins
