THE BEAR DEN: September 2009

Last year, Bryan and I had the privilege of being in New York City during the sixth anniversary of the attacks on September 11th. I blogged briefly about what it was like for us, and sharing our stories with Nichole- our friend with who we stayed with.

Here's an excerpt from that post...

During dinner, we shared our 9/11 stories.

I had just come back from NYC a week before the attacks. I was in high school at the time, and had summer reading as an assignment that I decided to do while I spent most of July and August in New York. The World Trade Center had a mall underneath the structures, and I bought the books, Madame Bovary and The Things They Carried, from a D.Dalton there. For some reason I saved the receipt- which is hanging in my room to this day as an eerie reminder of how close things could have been. For weeks I wondered if there were terrorist scouts with me on trains, at that mall, behind me in line. I wondered if the courteous salesperson had died, or maybe didn't have to work that day.

I woke up to that morning of September 11th with my dad telling me the Trade Center was on fire, a plane had hit it. Minutes later, I saw the second. Not long after that, the Towers fell. It's giving me chills just typing about it. I don't think I went to school that day. I'll never, ever forget the way I felt that day, and the link that I have hanging framed in my bedroom.

Nichole remembers waking up to a call from a friend saying to "not go to work today, the Twin Towers are on fire." She got up, walked to her view of the NYC skyline (she was living in Jersey at the time), and saw the second plane hit. Seeing her choke up telling the story was something you can't describe in blogs, or even in person. You just had to be there.

And here's Bryan's account, if you missed it-

"I was on a flight home from Ireland, somewhere over Greenland or Iceland- I don't really remember which. The captain first announced that the airplane was turning around, and gave no specific details as to why. As time went on, he gave us bit by bit info until he finally admitted that the United States had been victim to a terrorist attack, and that the World Trade Center was targeted.

The airport was crazy. The media was interviewing everyone, including ourselves. The people on the ground were trying to explain to us what had happened, since we hadn't seen any footage still.

They shut down the airports for days, and told us to keep calling back to see when it was safe to fly again. A week afterwards, I was home. It was a quiet flight."

I was just speaking with my aunt about her experience- about how she was called into work (despite being on vacation) to help out at the hospital downtown where she is a nurse. The hairs rose on my neck when she told me that while everyone on staff was waiting, hardly anyone came other than firemen/policemen/other personnel. She paused for awhile, and then said "I don't think I'll ever forget how quiet it was, just waiting there."

It's stories like the ones told that I feel need to be passed down to future generations. As morose as it was, I recall hearing stories from my grandpa about Pearl Harbor and the resolve that strengthened the country not only from a global view- but more importantly from a person to person basis, which mirrors what happened to all of us just eight years ago. I can't help but believe that the proud and hopeful feelings I had as a child listening to these stories might be the same ones felt by someone else regarding what happened on that dark September day.

I'd like to hear some of your stories as well, if you care to share them. Feel free to send me an email, drop me a phone call, reply down below- whatever works best for you. I'll be compiling some of them for a journal that I'm making.

Here are a few pictures from last year's memorial.