Where were you?

Where were you when you first heard the news of September 11, 2001? What were you doing? Who told you?

At 8:46 am, I was 16 minutes into 2nd period class. I had no idea of what was going down. No word had reached my ears. It was not until about an hour later, when I was walknig to the teacher lounge that a student who was standing in the doorway of another classroom said to me, "Mr. C, did you hear? A plane crashed into the twin towers." I was of course skeptical, especially it was from a student I had taught who was notorious for stretching the truth. So after a stop at the vending machine and the restroom, I was listening to the sounds coming from the open doorways of classrooms as I returned to my own. Could it be true? Had a plane actually crashed into the World Trade Center?

The first thing I did when I got back to my classroom was turn on the TV to see. Not only had a plane crashed into the World Trade Center, two planes had crashed! One into each building! This is could be no accident, could it? And there I was, sitting watching CNN in my classroom as the buildings burned. And then, the unthinkable happened, the building collapsed on itself. Despite the fact that a massive explosion had occured, it never dawned on me that the building could fall, it was, truly, unthinkable. What was left? An encore by the second tower.

Alone I sat, thinking... Is this possible? Did I know anybody there? Are they OK? Trying to call my parents in New York turned out to not be an option as all the phone lines were busy.

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