Remember II things: 9/11 Retrospect
by Jennifer Payen on Saturday, 10 September 2011 at 22:29

There are some people that I've spoken with in the past that have said to me, "It seems just like yesterday."
Over the past 10 years, regardless on whether or not your are American, British, Chinese, Indian, German, whatever, if you were alive, over the age of 5, and didn't shut your eyes to the world around you, you WILL remember at least one of the following or maybe more:

1. where you were;
2. what you were doing;
3. friends or family you spoke with;
4. the phone calls;
5. texting;
6. emails;
7. and even maybe the clothes you were wearing and what you had for dinner.

The day after was a bit like a rude transition, from a dream into a cold harsh reality, and public reaction, as the ash was still settling(literally) and unsettling, fires still burning(and did so for 3 months afterwards), our shocked minds huddled together in an awkward silence.

Although there was no one I knew personally that died or was injured in such a national and more importantly a human tragedy in a new century and a decade still in its infancy, I did feel an overwhelming sense of sadness, similar to losing a group of friends or family- a terrible and unavoidable accident.

But it wasn't an accident; there was a purpose. To inflict fear, to make us weak, to knock us off the wall like Humpty Dumpty, falling to pieces.

The irony in all of this was the simple fact that even when events became more clear, the destruction and loss of life self-evident, a strange thing happened...

We came together as friends, neighbors, communities, and families.
Together we united as a country.
Standing taller, unfaltering.

Other countries reacted with sympathy, but mostly with understanding and disbelief of what just took place to a country. We were viewed as the superman country of the world, but we were faced with a strange kryptonite. For this to happen, it was unthinkable.

There was an overwhelming sense of AMERICA, our nation that was born only 225 years before.
We were living the definition again, breathing it, believing it.
We actually looked at people in the eyes more, as we all felt that we had a shared experience, no matter the circumstance.

Now, here is my personal experience of the day.

I was half asleep in my dorm room. I was a sophomore at university.
The sun was peeking through the curtains. It was a bright day already.
As I didn't have a class until close to 10am, I didn't feel the need to get up quite just yet.

It was just before 8am, central time.
All of a sudden my roommate, Nicole bursted into the room, as she had an early class.
She shouted, "We are under attack! Turn on the TV!"

I jumped out of my bed in one fellow swoop to my 19'' television I brought from home and switched on the news. Not too much was known but the more I watched, the more that was being unveiled in real time.
At first it just seemed like a fire. I watched in shock as the newsreaders were saying that it possibly was a terror attack from a group based in the middle east.

I never had heard of this group and being naive, didn't realise these groups actually existed.

My initial reaction to take action, as much action I could do from a dorm room, I picked up the phone.
I called my parent's house.

"Dad? Are you okay? Are you watching this? I can't believe this is happening!"

I don't remember the convo verbatim as I was in a weird state of shock.
But nothing, NOTHING prepared me for what I was to witness next.

An explosion. The other tower.
I thought it was a replay of the first.

"Dad? That.."
"Jen, that was the other tower..."

I couldnt believe this was happening. What was going on. I felt hopeless and a bit nervous, and really just wanted to go home. Another plane had crashed, with people most likely on the aircraft, into the other tower.

As I watched more, strange things randomly were falling from the towers are they blazed. It wasn't till later that I found out that people that had no means of escape, hope to live, wanted to have some sense of control in there last act of being alive. People were jumping out of the tower.

What goes through someone's mind at that point, I ask myself but would never want to really know.

I then got ready for my meteorology course with Prof Wolf.
As I walked through campus, I felt like a ghost, blood drained from my heart.

My professor was also in shock and visibly angry as he too was feeling helpless. We all chatted for about 10 mins and he let us go home early. He wanted us to contact our families as this was something bigger than JFK getting shot.

This was my generations JFK moment, forever in our memories, in stone - a tribute to Gilgamesh.

I had another class in the late morning. I walked to the classroom, only found two other people waiting, and the professor just told us to go home and that most classes would be cancelled campus-wide.

At that point, I got in my car and went home.
Driving back home, only 25 minutes away, I felt that not only had I changed, but everyone else around me too.

As the days past, like dandelions, american flags started popping up everywhere, on houses, in gardens, stickers on the window, on people's t-shirts, and even on cars.

I put red, white, and blue streamers on my car antenna. Even a year after the fact, I got a nod from a stranger in a parking lot, as he looked at my streamers, a respect/to recognise our shared experience.

One of the STRANGEST reactions to me out of all of this was when songs were being banned from airplay. Anything that had any reference to flying, airplanes, etc.
I even had a top 100 songs listed on my dorm room for the longest time as it was so strange, the censorship.

So, here I am, writing down my memories, distorted by time, but the emotion I felt on that day, the days to follow and even now, it's still with me, shaping my ever-present, reflected in the puddles of the past, and shining a light on my future as well.

We are the culmination of our experiences, but today, please Remember II things.