Editor’s note: Today, we take a moment to pause and remember what happened on Sept. 11, 2001. Here are stories from five of our Lumination contributors, reflecting on where they were 12 years ago.
Ariel Jones
I was 10.
I didn’t expect anything out of the ordinary to happen that day. I wasn’t even in the right classroom because I think my actual teacher was still in New Zealand. I remember attempting to figure out some sort of work that I was given to do when one of the elementary teachers came in and took my fill-in teacher aside. I didn’t really pay too much attention, since teachers sometimes floated in and out of classes, to whisper “secrets” as we in my class fondly labeled.
The eighth-grade teacher then wheeled his TV into the classroom. He turned it on to some channel, shushed the class. Aand there it was. A tall building on fire and people running around screaming, covered in what looked to be dust to me.
I didn’t know what I was seeing at first. I thought it was a movie and wondered why he would show us something like this.
One of my classmates hollered out, asking what was on TV.
My teacher said, “They bombed the Twin Towers…they bombed America…”
Someone bombed America? At that moment, I wanted to go home. I wanted to snatch my little brother out of his third-grade class and demand for my dad to pick us up. Within the next hour, parents were picking up their kids.
I don’t exactly remember how long it took my dad to get us, but it seemed like a long time.
Janice Ng
Eyes widened. Jaws dropped.
That was the reaction my family and I had as we stood around the television screen, staring unbelievably at what was left of the World Trade Center.
We had just moved from Nashville to Singapore, a tiny, tropical island-country approximately 10,000 miles away from the United States. I was 7 years old.
We thought it was one of those apocalyptic scenario documentaries we sometimes liked to watch.
But it was very real, and very far away. The devastation committed against such a strong and beautiful country was sickening.
For the next few days, we lived through the small, flickering screen of the television. We saw and felt the terror and anguish of the Americans pouring out into our living room.
So close, yet so helplessly far away, all we could do was pray.
Erkia Thornsberry
On Sept. 11,2001, I was in the third grade. I walked into my school that morning, probably with pigtails and some kind of Ninja Turtles shirt. The only worry on my mind was whether it’s pizza or chicken nugget day in the cafeteria. I left that day with such a heavy feeling. I was so afraid that these “people” were going to come after my family.
After the attacks happened, my teacher stopped class to tell us that two planes had just hit buildings in New York, and the people behind it were called terrorists. Up until that moment in my life, I have never heard that word. I remember that when she said the word “terrorist,” a terrible chill went through my whole body. A word that I didn’t even know one second suddenly became this horror. After that, we finished up the last hours of the school day, with our teachers calming us all down and reassuring us that we were safe.
I think the teachers were so shocked at the devastation that they almost didn’t know what to do themselves. At the age of 10, my classmates and I couldn’t wrap our minds around what had really happened. All we knew was that we were scared, and whatever just happened would have an impact on our lives forever.
Carter Sanderson
I was in Miss Martin’s fourth-grade class, simply working on my multiplication skills, when we were instructed to turn on the TV. Sirens, smoke, screams and a whole bunch of confusion is all I could depict from the screen. I was confused. I didn’t know what was going on. Was my family all right? Was I going to be OK?
The tragic events were alarming, and several students began to panic. I, however, immediately began to think of what I vaguely remember my mother telling me as she dropped me off at school.
“I’m going to pick up your father from the airport,” she said. “I’ll see you this afternoon. Have a good day!”
That was the moment I began to panic. My dad was in the air and on his way home. I was scared to death and had no way of finding out whether or not he was OK. Being a fourth-grader, and the first child, my parents didn’t believe in me having a cell phone. I was unable to make calls or figure out what I was supposed to do next.
The rest, well, it’s all a blur to me now.
I somehow found out my father had landed safely in Nashville and had made his way home with Mom.
I asked my dad — a basketball coach –what he knew about what had happened that day.
“I was in Dallas recruiting son,” he began. “The earliest flight home left at 6, and that’s the one we took.” “I didn’t find out what was happening until we landed.”
That was all that mattered to me at that point. My father had made it home and safely returned to our family.
Now, on the 12th anniversary of that day, we think back and reflect on all the lives that were taken. I was one of the lucky ones, with a family member who returned safely from his travel, but thousands of others weren’t so lucky that day.
Monaih Sam
It was the last day I shed a tear.
I was a 19-year-old private in the Marine Corps, having just graduated from boot camp a couple of days before 9/11. I came back to Nashville on leave in late August before I shipped off to wherever Uncle Sam needed me.
It was very exciting time for me. I finished the toughest boot camp in the world and I got to see my family for the first time in months. My happiness was short-lived.
I went on an early-morning run with my recruiter. After finishing a fast-paced six miles, we walked our exhausted bodies into the recruiting office and noticed everyone hovering around the TV. We quickly joined them and we watched as the second plane plowed its way into the World Trade Center.
Suddenly, everyone got quiet and we looked at each other with blank stares. We didn’t know how to react. It was such a surreal moment. After the attack resonated, so many emotions went though my mind and spirit. I was so angry and hurt – I even shed some tears and asked God “why?” … but I never felt so helpless in my life. As Marines, it was our job to protect this nation, but we couldn’t do anything but stare at the television screen.
From that moment, I knew my military career was heading in a different direction. Security levels were on high alert and training regimens got tougher. We knew we were training for something bigger. In the back of my mind, I knew war was inevitable, and a year-and-a-half later, I found myself knocking on the doors of Iraq.
I’ll leave war to the politicians, but the best way to ease the pain of 9/11 is to remember it. Remember the people we lost that day. Remember the heroes and know that life is precious. I will never forget that day.
Photo courtesy of Central Coast News, www.kcoy.com.