I was sitting in AP Government writing notes the Madgwick was reviewing on the projector. Mr. Kessler came in with the news. We were in shock and first reports said it was just a small plane. Soon after, he came back with worse news, another plane had hit. Bush was calling it an act of terrorism. We were in our brand new high school with no working televisions. All we could get was from the internet that was heavily bogged down. Kessler was with his class trying to gather as much news as he could. By the end of that class, the towers were gone.
I had first lunch that day. I had to get home because my dad needed to take the truck to work. He was working at Detroit Metro Airport at the time. He had traded shifts with another guy so that he could be at Senior's night at the football game the following Friday. We sat watching all of this unfold on television, unable to look away or focus. I remember on the drive home listening to the radio coverage of DC and everything going on there. The confusion of the reporters and the people they were trying to interview. I watched this and listened to the reports of the flights being grounded. I did not want my father to go to work that night. I remember the daze and haze that followed when I returned to school.
School was like a zombie land. People were trying to make sense of what happen and we were teenagers, we didn't know what to think other than we were at war. It wasn't official yet, but as a country we have a history of not taking stuff like this lightly.
Our princepal came on the overhead after the lunch hours were completed. She explained what had happen for those that had not been able to go home and see the destruction. I still have the newspapers from that day. I remember seeing them in the office after school.
They tried to keep life normal. Sporting events were canceled for the night, but as school had just started, it wasn't too bad.
The days that followed are still a blur to me. I remember the Friday as Senior night, but it was such a somber event. I don't recall much of it at all.
Fastfoward ten years. I'm married. I'm an adult. And it still hurts. I have wondered, every year since, is this what the people at Pearl Harbor felt like? Is this what my grandfather's generation felt when they saw images year after year? It was different in so many ways because cameras were not capturing it live. They were not feeding these live images into homes across the country. They did not witness these people jumping from buildings. The images were scary, but they didn't watch it unfold. What are my kids going to experience that they will never forget? I'm afraid to think of that, but I worry about what my kids will have to see some day. I was old enough to understand what was going on to a point, but what about those that are just entering their senior year today? Did they understand then? Or has it taken them years?
When I have kids, how will I explain to them what this day means to me and Brad? Will they even care?
I can't forget. The images are burned in my brain. Carefree senior year quickly evaporated.
As I did that night, I'm doing now. I'm watching the news coverage from that day. I still can't believe it.
Never forget.
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