[Lingster]

I believe I'll set us back on track and share my recollection about that day.

Thanks, Kate.

[fm07]

Guys. This thread was started with the recalling where we were on Sept 11th. Lets not sour this over the "how", I'm sure there will be plenty of other opinions on that, but it doesn't help anyone here by fighting over it. It was a bad day for everyone. I think JimmyDimple's intention was just to reflect back.

I'm seriously tempted to say "!@$%Q#$^Q%&" <– where that includes what I think is blatantly obvious about the how of that day, but, I'm going to stick to my statement above and not. That and I've already posted earlier about where I was!

[Agent Highmax]

I was in the schools lounge. Or rather on my way to it when I saw my boy Omar jump over the help desk where he worked and booked. Of course I followed seeing as how a lot of people were in a mad dash but I didn't find out until I got home. Id had to slowly settle in my mind what happened then I started franticly making calls to my friends in NY. This was truly the defining moment in our generation where the world changed.

[Lingster]

I deleted all the "truther" discussion from this thread.

[cpbell0033944]

A foreign viewpoint might be good to add a bit of perspective here?
I was coming towards the end of my first summer holiday during my degree (I had started the previous October).  My parents and I were eagerly looking forward to a short holiday to a major historic motor-racing event about 200 miles from here; my father was still at work, as he was starting his few days' holiday at the end of the week.  I'd just finished lunch, and was watching the TV (BBC2) where Tony Blair was about to make a speech to the TUC (Trades Union Congress) conference. Suddenly, they stated that they were interrupting programming because of a breaking news story from the US.  I switched-over to BBC1 where they were showing the then new News24 channel.  The first plane had already gone in, so they were showing the footage of that on a continuous loop and talking about it, when suddenly, they went over to live coverage and we saw the second plane go in.  Both me and the newscaster took a second or two to realise the horrendous truth that this was not another replay but was the second act, so-to-speak, being played out in front of our eyes.  Then they showed distant footage from a rooftop in Washington DC of smoke rising, but, for a long while, they thought that it was coming from either the White House or the Capitol building rather than the Pentagon. 

After the initial shock subsided slightly, I remember various thoughts raced through my head.  What if it had been the White House or the Capitol building?  Who would run the US if the President and/or most of the Senators etc. had been killed?  Then I started to fear that, having attacked the US, we might be next.  I was dreading that they might do the same to the Houses of Parliament or Buckingham Palace.  Downing Street would have been very difficult to hit with an airliner, thank goodness, because it's basically a street of smart, three storey townhouses in a heavily built-up area, but even so, I started to quake at the thought of major western powers being without governance.  After an hour or so of realising that no other planes were off-course and that there would be no more attacks, (especially after the incident in Pennsylvania) the horror of how many people must have died, how many people must have been bereaved and how, as Agent Highmax said, the world would never be the same again, started to sink in.  Although I was like a kid in a sweet shop at the historic racing event, the atmosphere was subdued; flags flew at half-mast and everyone seemed to feel a bit guilty at enjoying themselves only a few days after what must count as the most incredible, shocking and awful single day the western world has seen in many centuries.

[JimmyDimples]

Well, there was a bit of an epilogue to after my workday at the distribution center:

After I was done, I'd gone back home, and discovered I'd needed groceries.  At first, I thought that going about everyday life with this atrocity going on seemed kind of callous, but I realized that simply sitting at home and wringing my hands wasn't going to help anybody.  So I went over to the local Wal-Mart Supercenter to pick up the edibles.

Mood was midnight quiet and tomb somber.  No crowds.  No noise.  The monitors which usually had all those loud, colorful, raucous "Thank You For Shopping At Wal-Mart!" spots were tuned into CNN and the news footage from New York.  Not a yellow round smiley face anywhere.

I couldn't help but think… it took an assault on the nation to get rid of them.

When I got back home, I stocked the stuff, turned on the TV and got back online.  All my friends had been counting cyber-noses and making sure we were all present and accounted for.  I was worried that my computer was going to end up hash because I suspected a major scale terrorist attack like this would probably have a virus blitz to come up next.  Didn't happen, but I was watching my virtual "back."

Then finally, I'd gotten a phone call from a nervous cyberfriend… from BRITAIN.  I'd been a web paranoiac about trusting my phone number with just anybody, and she'd finally gotten mine.  Now she was chattering away about how she'd been trying to contact a friend in New England but couldn't reach her since the main call processing center was in the destroyed World Trade Center.  And she said her brother was going on about he was expecting America to go completely bat-shot and start launching nukes any second now.  I reassured her that we weren't going to be THAT bullheaded. 

I surfed on, and noticed which major media conglomerates owned what by the news arms that had overridden the stations… CBS News took over MTV, VH1, CMT and USA; ABC News took over the ESPN stuff, CNN took over TNN, TNT, the WB and TBS, Fox News commandeered Fox Sports… and even The Learning Channel was showing the BBC.  Even the Home and Garden Channel had put up an announcement graphic saying they were suspending programming due to the national tragedy. 

As I'd written before in one of my fictions, when I saw how many channels were controlled by how few hands… that realization alone was pretty frightening. 

But there was one ray of light in the whole mess.  On foreign viewpoints:  TLC's BBC newscast reported that many people in New York were volunteering on the spot to help out… free water, helping others search for loved ones, offering a shoulder to cry on, first aid… the reporter on site had said there seemed to be a Dunkirk spirit among the locals, like the British civilian boating volunteers did when they evacuated their troops in World War II. 

I have to admit, that did my heart proud.  And in the week following, I'd gotten into the volunteer spirit.  Helped out with a blood drive at my church.  Donated to a food drive.  Kept praying for the nation.  And bought a flag or two for my car.  (Once I found some at K-mart… they were sold out in my town for a while.)

And that's what I took away from that… that's what this now-divided nation needs.  Remember September 11th… but also the 12th, 13th, 14th, and all those days onward.  Those days when all Americans and their friends worldwide got together… red, yellow, black or white; rich or poor; Ph.D or G.E.D.; male or female; Christian, Jewish, Muslim, atheist, or something else; city slicker or redneck bumpkin; liberal sissy or right-wing caveman…

…and buff amazons or, like me, fat slobs.

We need, love, compassion, unity, mutual support, charity drives, self-sacrifice… and resolve not to let the terrorists keep us scared or divided.  And we need to get it back BADLY.

I just hope and pray America doesn't need another September 11th for that to happen. 🙁

[cpbell0033944]

Well, there was a bit of an epilogue to after my workday at the distribution center:

After I was done, I'd gone back home, and discovered I'd needed groceries.  At first, I thought that going about everyday life with this atrocity going on seemed kind of callous, but I realized that simply sitting at home and wringing my hands wasn't going to help anybody.  So I went over to the local Wal-Mart Supercenter to pick up the edibles.

Mood was midnight quiet and tomb somber.  No crowds.  No noise.  The monitors which usually had all those loud, colorful, raucous "Thank You For Shopping At Wal-Mart!" spots were tuned into CNN and the news footage from New York.  Not a yellow round smiley face anywhere.

I couldn't help but think… it took an assault on the nation to get rid of them.

When I got back home, I stocked the stuff, turned on the TV and got back online.  All my friends had been counting cyber-noses and making sure we were all present and accounted for.  I was worried that my computer was going to end up hash because I suspected a major scale terrorist attack like this would probably have a virus blitz to come up next.  Didn't happen, but I was watching my virtual "back."

Then finally, I'd gotten a phone call from a nervous cyberfriend… from BRITAIN.  I'd been a web paranoiac about trusting my phone number with just anybody, and she'd finally gotten mine.  Now she was chattering away about how she'd been trying to contact a friend in New England but couldn't reach her since the main call processing center was in the destroyed World Trade Center.  And she said her brother was going on about he was expecting America to go completely bat-shot and start launching nukes any second now.  I reassured her that we weren't going to be THAT bullheaded. 

I surfed on, and noticed which major media conglomerates owned what by the news arms that had overridden the stations… CBS News took over MTV, VH1, CMT and USA; ABC News took over the ESPN stuff, CNN took over TNN, TNT, the WB and TBS, Fox News commandeered Fox Sports… and even The Learning Channel was showing the BBC.  Even the Home and Garden Channel had put up an announcement graphic saying they were suspending programming due to the national tragedy. 

As I'd written before in one of my fictions, when I saw how many channels were controlled by how few hands… that realization alone was pretty frightening.   

But there was one ray of light in the whole mess.  On foreign viewpoints:  TLC's BBC newscast reported that many people in New York were volunteering on the spot to help out… free water, helping others search for loved ones, offering a shoulder to cry on, first aid… the reporter on site had said there seemed to be a Dunkirk spirit among the locals, like the British civilian boating volunteers did when they evacuated their troops in World War II. 

I have to admit, that did my heart proud.  And in the week following, I'd gotten into the volunteer spirit.  Helped out with a blood drive at my church.  Donated to a food drive.  Kept praying for the nation.  And bought a flag or two for my car.  (Once I found some at K-mart… they were sold out in my town for a while.)

And that's what I took away from that… that's what this now-divided nation needs.  Remember September 11th… but also the 12th, 13th, 14th, and all those days onward.  Those days when all Americans and their friends worldwide got together… red, yellow, black or white; rich or poor; Ph.D or G.E.D.; male or female; Christian, Jewish, Muslim, atheist, or something else; city slicker or redneck bumpkin; liberal sissy or right-wing caveman…

…and buff amazons or, like me, fat slobs.

We need, love, compassion, unity, mutual support, charity drives, self-sacrifice… and resolve not to let the terrorists keep us scared or divided.  And we need to get it back BADLY.

I just hope and pray America doesn't need another September 11th for that to happen. 🙁

Well said.

[JimmyDimples]

Excuse the thread necromancy, but I figured this would have been appropriate.  I figured the newer folks on this site who hadn't seen this might want to share their experience, if they wanted.

I'd have posted earlier, but this site loads molasses slow during the evenings here in China. 

(Oh, and I encapsulated my comments here and experiences in an article on my DeviantArt site.)

Lest we forget.

[SammiChung]

This is the hardest thing I think to explain to people…

The Towers, the planes…the people, the tragedies of that day.

Its not the why, the how, or even the who…

On September 11, 2001 I was coming into work…I worked for Walgreen's at the the time…I came in the morning shift as usual, I was fairly new, so I still was learning somethings…I had no TV no Radio, no computer even…I had no idea what had happened. The Managers were ensconsed in the office and I had to be let in by the passing associate who saw me knocking….
Anyway I went in, I got my shift vest on, i got everything squared up…and then I saw the Managers all burst into tears…I went in to the office…and naively I asked what happened?
They turned to me as one and said..
"Planes crashed into WTC in NY…"
It was like the hand of Satan himself slapped me in the face and then tried to yank out my heart…I stared dumbfoundedly for a few minutes…I took my till and went out…the mood in the store was like the Qin Emporer's tomb…silent, dreadfully quiet, monolithically so. A few people came in…we had opened…then suddenly…the intercom crackled to life…the CEO of Wlagreens came on, and in the most somber of tones…relayed each and every event…
I couldn't take it anymore…I burst into tears…the customer across from me at my counter looked aghast and she too started to cry…that day…we all cried out as one, the injustice, the terrible atrocity…the fear, the anger that this was the catalyst…the final end game…leading up to Global anhilation but we didn't leap off into the abyss, we stared into it, we marshalled our forces…we made a choice and we took our anger out on where we knew once intellignece was revealed….there was an enemy and his name was Usama Bin Laden, and his weapons of choice were innocent lives.

When the day rolled onto its conclusion I ran to my moms, I held her and we both cried for the losses.. we spent hours on the phone talking with everyone, planning, just in case what might happen if things went worse…

I ran home and hugged my significant other, I shook my friends hand and hugged him…I hugged neighbors…strangers…males, females….
dogs, cats…everything…

I would like to say I too dismissed the hatred that poured through me but that would be a lie…in the days that followed…I was not afraid of Muslims, I was not fearful of anyone middle eastern and nor did I treat them any different…
but I did wish…with all my heart…that the US would rally and destroy there enemy with one decisive blow..and if that unfortunately meant erasing an entire country to do it…then I would gladly fly the planes myself.

I want everyone to know, that the terrorists..are still here, still plotting…still waiting for the day we turn our back…

and to throw the only Star Trek Phrase I find worthy of uttering…

We may forgive….but we WILL NOT forget! -Chancellor Gowron Star Trek Deep Space Nine..season eight

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