9/11: Where I Was in New York, What I Was Doing, and How I Felt
I wrote about 9/11/2001 in 2016 as part of a “Breitbart Remembers 9/11” article for which several of my colleagues and I expressed our recollections about a day that no one alive at that time would ever forget. Sometimes, honestly, I wish I could forget. I don’t mean I want to forget to pay tribute to those who so tragically lost their lives that day or forget to honor those who sacrificed themselves to rescue others. I just mean it’s haunting to think about it all, to see the images, to hear the stories—to remember. So I don’t engulf myself in the coverage anymore. But I never do forget. I never will forget.
I am a born and raised New Yorker, and it would be more than a decade later before I would relocate. So, of course, I was there in the state on that day. This is what I wrote for the 2016 article as I recollected where I was, what I was doing, and how I felt:
September 11, 2001, is cemented in my memory in the way that defining moments inhabit our lives and remain. I had just finished teaching one of my seventh grade English Language Arts classes in Hudson, New York, and was walking down the hallway in between classes. A colleague approached and told me a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center.
As with all tragedies, I felt a sense of “how sad,” but I didn’t get it—not at all. It was only when news came that a second plane had hit the other Tower that I knew this was no ordinary accident. As information unfolded, the horror descended, and I joined coworkers in the computer lab, where live—unspeakable—footage played out.
Hudson is about two hours from New York City, but all my family lives in the City. So close to the chaos, I was, yet so far—so far from my family, with only the hope of hearing a voice to let me know they were well. Concern gripped me, as the phone lines were jacked up and calls could not get through.
We, as teachers, were neither sure how much students could understand nor how much we should share; we just got through the day. Later, when I turned on the television at home, the nonstop coverage held me captive. The footage of the buildings’ collapse was like something out of a sci-fi film. This couldn’t be happening to us.
Because my brain is wired to digest specifics, to envision what goes on behind the scenes, images engulfed my mind and ripped at my heart—the people in the buildings, the pain. For the first time in my life, the sound of a plane overhead was not just the sound of a plane. To this day, it is not. To this day, that sound stirs up a certain feeling. I wouldn’t call it outright fear, but it certainly is caution.
I’m a New Yorker. I was born in New York City and spent my life there and in Long Island until I moved Upstate after college. I am, of course, also an American. I had never before considered that that combination made me a target. It was eye-opening, but it also evoked pride. Like many New Yorkers, I purchased flags—the kind that attaches to car windows—and I flew those flags proudly, watching them wave in concert with other flags on other cars. A piece of my heart died on 9/11, but, as strange as it is, something inside also came alive.
May we never forget 9/11, and may we never allow it again.