Sophmore year in high school. Gym class. We were changing to play paddelball. Principal came on speaker and told us the planes had crashed into the buildings. My friend started crying because her parents were flying out of boston that morning and she didn't know if they were on those planes.

We were sheparded off to class, forbidden to use the phones or internet (they didn't want us to panic, like that could have prevented it).

I just remember feeling terrified and feeling like the world was going to end.

Then I remember going home and watching the news all night with my mom, and crying.

I was at a Military base in Georgia when the towers crashed. Behind my fifty caliber machine gun I cried. 9/11 makes me angry but the older I get and the more I study, I learn more and more that those innocent people did not have to die. Everyday I realize more and more how this sad morning was orchestrated through decades 9/11s around the globe. The murder of innocent people anywhere is something that should move us all to create fundamental change in the way we treat one another on the street and around the world. I am writing this behind a wall of tears. The names of the dead in Nicaragua, Dominican Republic, Iraq, Palestine, Afghanistan and many more will unfortunately never be read. 9/11 was dreadful but so was 9/10 and 9/12. I'm going to stop here because I cant see the screen anymore.

Eddie Pages

Getting ready for work, and then on the promenade in Brooklyn Heights when the first tower fell. It's so vivid in my memory: walking across the bridge, the smell, the sounds, the missing people posters everywhere to follow, the color of the sunset from the smoke, the sadness and loss. Today I am not in NYC, it feels strange to be away from home and seven years later still feels odd to go about my day on this date.

It was sophomore year in college and I was in my dorm room blowdrying my hair for my morning class and one of my friends down the hall came in and told me to turn on the television. I remember being horrified and having this heavy feeling come over me... like you're not really sure what's going to happen in the coming minutes, days, and months.

I just talked about this last night with my college friends-- it was my Junior year at University of Illinois, U-C. For some reason none of us can remember, my three roommates were all awake at that time of the morning (even my roommate who slept 14 hours a day) and we saw the second plane live on TV. We just stayed in one bed all day watching it. At this time not everyone had cell phones, so even though classes were cancelled, some student's didn't know what had happened and showed up to class. The professors had to keep making the same announcement over and over about "America being under attack."

Now I just think about the fact we had the sympathy and the support of the majority of the world, and now we have squandered that bond. Very sad.

I was in my last year of high school and I live on the west coast and my family wakes up really early so I remember in shock looking at the television as it was breaking, watching in real time as the second one happened and then thinking how crazy it all was but how in all likeliness no one would have heard at school. They all had, and we sat in our first period history class and were all just stunned and in disbelief.

Sadly I also have stark memories of when they started bombing too..

well said EddiePages. Loss of life is loss of life and it doesn't matter what nation, it's a tragedy.

i was at work (on 54th and Madison). we could see all the way downtown and were facing the plane-shaped hole of the plane which struck the first tower. we didn't know what was going on at the time. we thought it was just a terrible accident. all we could do was stand at the window and just look. after looking at the hole for some time, i turned to my coworker in shock and quietly said, "hundreds of people are dead right now".

i turned away from the window only a minute before the second plane hit the second tower. but i heard my coworkers' screams as they witnessed it. towers fell. we were advised to stay at work until the company could charter vans to drive us all home.

i rode through the smoke of the demolished towers on my way home. horrible.

I had just gotten married and was getting ready for work when my mom called me and said that a plane had hit the tower....I watched the news as the second plane hit. I do not think that I will ever forget that day.

At work in the family buisness in Michigan. Someones mother called in with the news. I tried to keep everyone calm by explaining the towers had been hit before by small craft. Then another call... large planes.

The radio reception there didn't work very well, bits and peices about afganistan. I took them all into the sales managers office and showed them where it was on the map.
BBC.com was the only news website that wasn't crashed.
Calling calling calling my father so I could release people to go home, several with school age children were panicing.

Met my father at his house watched him panic.
I was 19.

I had just voted in my Boreum Hill neighborhood in Brooklyn. It was an election day primary I think. I was just leaving the polling place when I heard a loud distant boom. Not close enough to be really aware of the size or seriousness. I walked to the subway station at Bergen St. and it was still to soon for anyone to be aware of what had just happened. I took my subway to work in mid-town Manhattan and when I entered my office building it was just dawning on everyone what was going on and we all tried to glean any news we could from radio or T.V. and calling anyone we knew.

When I returned home later that day the entire neighborhood was covered with a thin later of ash.

I was a senior in high school in Kansas City. We were sitting in math, and another teacher came to the door and motioned for my teacher to come out to the hallway. They talked for a few minutes, then my teacher came back in and told us one of the towers had been hit by a plane. At that point, we thought it was an accident, and he continued with the last few minutes of class. My class after that was current events, so we spent that class watching the live footage on the news, and saw the second tower collapse. We all were just stunned into shock and silence. It was weird to know that we were watching something that would be remembered forever; something that was changing everything. It's rare that you witness something that you know will impact history-even as it's happening. They didn't cancel classes, but nothing much got done that day. It was so surreal to see the terror and watch it happening. I feel for all of the victims families, and it's something that drives me to pay attention to politics and issues going on everywhere.

I was home on Thompson Street, up unusually early. The towers were the view from my ground-floor doorstep. I had just returned from Ireland and was unpacking; the video camera caught much of it.
As the morning unfolded I put my little TV facing out of the window so we could all follow the news reports and understand what was happening before our eyes. Cell phones started to fail - I was handing my cordless phone to whoever needed it. That's one reason I'll never give up my land line. And then the following days of sirens combined with eerie silence, the ashes settling on our building and the unforgettable smell of burning.

awoke to my apt on fulton st. shaking, thought it was a pipe explosion, ran from the falling buildings, only went back once to pick up my belongings. was very fortunate to have no one I know lost.

I was getting ready for work in my apartment in Cobble Hill. They were talking about the "accident" on the radio, and I could smell the smoke starting to spread while I walked to the subway. It wasn't until I was well underground, though, that word started to circulate through the subway car about what had happened. I learned about the Pentagon crash in the elevator of my office building. Soon after I got to my desk, we heard about the third plane, and started to piece things together.

My building (which is landmarked and in Rock Ctr) was evacuated immediately. The entire art department left the building together, and walked to another location further downtown that had cable TV access so we could figure out what to do next. Phones weren't working; I had to call over and over again to tell my parents I was OK. Those of us who lived in Brooklyn started walking south, planning to cross the Bklyn Bridge. By the time we got there, it was too terrifying to cross -- nobody knew what was happening, everyone was scared, people were crying and looking up and walking in all different directions.

So we went over the Williamsburg Bridge instead. Hasids were waiting with water bottles for us on the other side -- it was such an open act of compassion, those water bottles. Everyone felt it. Marty Markowitz was there, too, welcoming us all back to Brooklyn.

It was a long, quiet walk back to Cobble Hill. I walked along the promenade, where people were sitting and watching and wondering if they really shouldn't leave and get somewhere "safe". It was scary. It's hard to remember that now, but we were all scared that something else was going to happen.

I was in my sophmore year of college and had decided to skip my first class of the day. I got ready for my second class w/out turning on the television and then my boyfriend (now husband) calls and sounding VERY relieved, tells me not to go anywhere b/c there is something major going on. I turn on the TV just in time to see the second plane hit. I was in shock that NY was under attack. I always felt so far removed from war. It was always something I saw on TV and in movies but never in my own backyard.

I then remembered that my boyfriend was supposed to be at a meeting that day at Windows on the World but the client cancelled the day before. I was sooo relieved that neither one of us was in that chaos. My relief didn't last very long b/c my brother was working at the United Nations and no one was sure whether they would be attacked as well. It was absolute torture waiting for him to come home.

The loss of so many lives, the grieving families and friends, the shattering of the idea that we live in a safe bubble far from danger--all of it was too much. After watching people jump to their death on TV, I try not to watch any 9/11 media coverage AT ALL. It's just too sad...

I was living in Williamsburg Brooklyn and had just woken up- my upstairs neighbor came running downstairs right after the first plane hit, screaming 'turn on your tv' and we (my roomates and myself) did. We ran up to our roof and saw that there were people on rooftops all over the neighborhood- we watched the second plane hit then the first tower went down. there was a collective 'NOOOO' from us and our neighbors on the rooftops. It was so surreal- the smell, the silence, the ash everywhere- for the next few days, the streets were empty except for peopled gathered in hushed groups on corners comforting each other against the hundreds of missing posters everywhere. So sad.

I was leaving for work and noticed was a ridiculously nice day it was and how I wished I didn't have to go to work. Once at work, we all met for our morning dept meeting in a conference room that has a direct view of the towers. We watched the whole thing happen right before our eyes. Tower one and Tower two. It was like a movie. Because we were located in a landmark bldg we were sealed off immediately and told not to go anywhere until the national guard arrived. Finally, we were escorted to the street after the second tower was completely down.

The streets were filled with people. There was no way to get home on buses or trains. Either you walked home or went to friends' homes nearby. Me and a few others went to a bar instead and drank the rest of the day while sooty business came in, joined us.

I walked out of my apartment in Brooklyn Heights a little after 9am thinking, "This is the most perfect day, how gorgeous". I walked to work in downtown Brooklyn. When I got to my desk my co-worker said, "Look at this, a little plane hit the World Trade Center". He showed me a photo on the internet. We both thought it was a little plane like the one people use to learn how to fly. Soon we learned what it really was and the whole office was in a panic. I was able to talk to my parents on the phone and I reassured them I was OK and inside.

After I left work I walked to the Promenade a few blocks away and there was paper and smoke everywhere. There were people walking around like zombies, not believing any of it. You couldn't see anything from across the river, just smoke and ash. In all honesty, the magnitude of the event didn't really register with me until I went home, turned on the tv and saw the people hanging out of the broken windows of the buildings. I was on the phone with my mother sobbing and feeling so awful for those poor people, the camera caught the horror on their faces. The next few days were like sleepwalking.

It was during the middle of the night here in Australia. My hubby and I feel asleep with the TV on (normally we have the timer on). I woke up and thought a movie was playing, then I woke up totally and realised it wasn't a movie. We stayed awake all night and morning........I still cry every 9/11 for all those lost innocent people. RIP.

Reading the other comments brought me back to 9/11/2001, actually back to 9/10/2001. Everything was possible that night. I left my office on Vandam Street in the far West Village and went to Yankee Stadium. The Red Sox were in town and me and a few blokes had great seats; but it was raining hard. The game was eventually rained out and we went to Queens to a Indian place near someone's apartment, then to Brooklyn to a bar, and eventually to Williamsburg to sleep. We made 4 out of 5 boroughs! I do remember later in the evening when the rains subsided that there were SO MANY people out that night; more than usual, I thought, and everyone was having a blast.

The next morning was gorgeous. I was late for work and hung over, and got off the subway at Spring & Canal. Coming up from above ground facing north, I noticed people poring out of a building there, all pointing and looking south. So I wheeled around and saw the hole in the tower. But from that vantage point, it's hard to judge: The Towers were so huge, and I said to myself "probably a Cessna hit it, what a tragedy" after someone told me that a plane had hit the tower. Then the second plane hit as I was buying coffee and all hell broke loose. I was on the street with tens of thousands of others-my office mates and I were at Greenwich and Canal, and someone remarked that there's so much debris flying off the building; I knew otherwise but wouldn't, I couldn't verbalize the horror of what I was witnessing. When the first Tower came down, it was like a million people screaming at once. It was then that we started to hike uptown, and then that I witnessed the city folk coming together to help each other: We passed cars with doors ajar and radios blasting 1010 WINS dozens of people crowded around, listening to reportage from a chopper over the Towers; restaurants and bodegas were handing out water and drinks; scores of people were embracing, too scared to look south. I was one of them.

Stepping off the M34 bus I heard dispatch direct all buses to avoid downtown due to an incident. I didn't even know city buses had radios, having never heard one go off before.

Gloom and shock were on everyone's face when I stepped into my office. So much so, I was affraid to ask anyone what was wrong, for fear they would crumble right before my eyes. I quietly crawled into my cubicle and called my Dad in Queens. He saw it all on TV and was experiencing a diabetic episode from the stress. I shifted into survival mode and headed for the exits when my boss intercepted me, braced me by placing his two hands on my shoulders and told me the Pentagon was just hit. War.

I caught another M34 bus thinking I'd go to my apt. on the UES first and then take the subway home to Dad. When we passed 7th Ave., I looked south knowing what I'd see, but still totally unprepared for it. Tears came down as I thought about and prayed for the thousands of people I knew were gone.

NYC shut down. I wasn't able to get off the island that day. Friends came to my apt. for a brief respite before treking home further uptown. My Dad was okay and all of my friends accounted for. Thank you God, thank you.

i was at work already, corner of canal right by the holland tunnel; about 20 blocks from wtc. was a photo studio with floor to ceiling windows on the top floor (8th). we heard a tremendous boom and looked out the window to see the plane hitting the bldg. then went up to the roof in time to see the 2nd plane hit. we were all freaking out, and left the building to find chaos on the streets. everyone was in a daze...

was in the street when both towers fell, people were literally screaming and running; it was surreal.
went to a coworker's apt in the village and watched the news. then walked to port authority to see if i could get a bus home. of course it was closed. people were lined up outside, just sitting on the curbs in shock. i went to a nearby bar and spent the afternoon there. when the news announced penn station was open, i walked there and got a train to nj. it was nowhere near my house, and i had no money by the time i got back to nj.
a nice cab driver gave me a ride home for free.

my job was closed for a week afterward. and when i returned, we could see the gaping hole that was the towers from our window. very eerie. and every day i walked past a trailer that was serving food to the 9/11 clean-up crew.

I worked at night at that time and when I awoke I turned on my TV while I'm eating and at that time I didn't have cable so it was all blurry. The reason it was blurry because the towers were providing me with a signal at that time. Then I finally got a channel and I couldn't believe my eyes. I really felt like it was the end of the world then felt horrified thinking my Mom just flew out 2 days before to Los Angeles in the morning. I called her immediately and told her to turn on her television. From where I lived driving past you always could see the WTC.Now it's empty.

I was working in the US Senate watching everything unfold on CNN. A news scroll appeared on the bottom saying smoke was spotted at the Pentagon. The next scroll said that the White House was being evacuated. The following scroll said the Capitol Building was being evacuated. At that point my coworkers and I realized that we should get the hell out too (technically we don't work in the Capitol Building). We gathered outside as loud booms went off all around us and the news was reporting car bombs going off across DC; it turned out to be the sonic booms of planes from Andrews Airforce Base. Such chaos. I walked home and watched the Pentagon burn from my apartment.

at home watching ER in bed in the morning, in the UK. they took off all shows for the news and saw the 2nd plane hit.

Last thing I remember before leaving my UES apartment on 9/11 was Katie Couric on Today Show saying "what a beautiful fall day it was in Manhattan." Arrived at work in Midtown (prob last subway before system shut down) to find nothing in office working--phones or computers. Office-mates nowhere to be found, co-workers crying told me to go up to cafeteria on top floor - 50th. Stared at smoking gaping hole in one Tower, smoke rising from other (our building which had views of the Towers). Watched for don't know how long in disbelief, went back down to office on 42nd FL. Was talking to someone, when heard "OMG" ran into partner's windowed office to see tower fall. Somebody uttered, "That's it, the financial center's gone." I remember the long walk home from Midtown to UES being absolutely silent, except for radios. Car doors open, stores--all playing the same radio news. Uptown it was clear blue sky, turn around to face downtown and it was black smoke.

I had taken visiting family to the WTC Observation Deck two days before. A few days after everything happened, I was cleaning my room and found the Xmas ornament I'd purchased (I collect them from where I travel)--it's a pewter ornament of the two towers surrounded by clouds.

At home in the Village, about 2 miles away. My partner had left for work a bit early and I was still in the midst of my morning routine when he rushed back into the apartment. First reports were, of course, that a small private plane had crashed into one of the Towers. It seemed unfortunate, but minor. I hadn’t been outside yet, and grasped nothing. TV was still carefully speculating. I remember that ½ hour or so as a kind of somnolent bliss. By the time I made it onto the street, where the Trade Centers rose behind the Washington Square arch, we’d been hit again and there was no more doubt.

Most coverage always mentions what a beautiful day it was. If you were here, you know that the perfect temperature, the over-saturated cerulean sky, the neon greens and late summer blossoms, the faint sounds and complete soundlessness felt utterly surreal, out of any context. We heard birds, and wind in trees. People were gathering, but quiet. Only a young woman with a stroller cried. When I went over to her, and she just sobbed “All those people,” and kept walking. Later, we stood at a corner offering bottles of water, blankets, quarters for the phone to the long march of blanched, ash-covered survivors heading north. But there were few takers. A car, radio on and all doors open became the street boom box. The stench, the missing posters, and the rage were still days away. The next morning I wanted a flag.

This American tragedy has been cynically co-opted as a political brand for far too long. How the very people who failed, on every conceivable level, to avoid or ameliorate it claim to “own” the issue of national security is beyond me. Bin Laden and Al-zawahiri? Still out there, likely being readied as an October Surprise for voters. I love my country, and the men and women who struggled and died helping it – on September 11th and since. But I am ashamed of the last 7 blundering, manipulative, venal and bloody years.

Asleep in San Francisco.

The alarm was set to NPR as it was every morning.

I typically snooze a couple of times before I actually wake up. I was taking in the real time account of the tragedy subconsciously not really processing it.

When it finally sunk in, I flipped on the little tv right next to the bed and saw a jet slam into a tower. My wife and I just lay there in shock.

I later headed to work in a daze. I was helping to open a restaurant at the time and when I got there we all just sat there not knowing what to do. What do you do?

I was just walking into my 2nd period practical law class in high school. The weird thing is that I was in the same classroom that my mom was in when she found out that Kennedy was shot.

I was asleep in the Midwest, and my aunt called to tell me what was happening. I lived blocks away from the Capitol Building in Madison - all of downtown was silent and empty.

I sat watching CNN for days, then got a call that a high school friend in the Air Force was being sent overseas. I cried for days.

I was riding in a taxi crossing and the cabbie had an all news radio station playing. They announced a plane had hit the WTC but provided no details. I just assumed it was a small plane and felt kind of bad.
During the day, I learned the full extent of the horror.
I remember watching the news on TV with my wife that night, how we clung to each other and cried.
I'm choking up now thinking about it.

sleeping peacefully in NJ because I had asked for Tuesdays off that past Friday. I woke up, turned on the radio, heard Tom Brokow speaking about 'the horror and devestation' and heard people screaming and cursing. the cursing was what prompted me to go to the TV. This was after the attack, and after the buildings fell. I remember kinda seeing my life flash before my eyes---I worked in 5 World Trade at the time and at first didn't know the chain of events---I thought everyone I worked with was dead and that I would have been dead too had I been at work. I know this doesn't compare to many other expierences, and thankfully, everyone at my place of work got out alive cause we were in the concourse on the first floor. Even so, it most def. was a harrowing expeirence to be in that area or in the city at all.

There is still a huge hole in the sky, and in hearts that will never be filled.

Strangely, about a week before it happened, my sister was telling me that a friend of hers remarked that she had a very bad feeling about September 11th. Her friend had an unshakeable feeling of worry about her friends and family, but couldn't quite pinpoint why.

I had forgotten all about this when my sister called me that morning. I was asleep, and turned on the TV. My first reaction was denial - I automatically assumed that it must have been just a bad fire in one of the towers, and that everything would be OK. When I saw the second plane hit, then I knew. I happened to turn on the radio a few minutes later, and heard preliminary reports (later incorrect, of course) that there were hijacked planes headed toward DC, Seattle and LA. I just remember feeling so overwhelmed.

btw, sonnet, did you see Countdown with Keith Olbermann last night? He had an excellent commentary that you can still watch on the MSNBC website.

Correction : obviously, and unfortunately, there WERE planes headed for DC.

I was at work in midtown law firm, when one of my coworkers got a IM from a friend in NYU that a plane hit the WTC. We checked online news and the latest update just said a small plane had hit one of the Towers. We wondered if San Gennaro's would be cancelled. We kept working, occasionally refreshing the news page until we found out that another plane hit. The attorneys quickly set up the TVs in the conference room, and we all watched in shock at what was happening on the south end of the island.

Everyone knew someone in the WTC area, including myself - my sister was working at the World Financial Center across the street from WTC at the time, and I didn't know if she was ok. I remember IMing with my brother working in NJ, explaining where our sister might be. I remember all the attorneys closing their doors, crying, frantically calling everyone they knew downtown, trying to make sure they were okay.

By the time I had heard from my sister, it was well after 1 PM. She ran out of her building when the first plane hit. She saw the jumpers. The second plane flew over her. But she made it to the Flatiron section to her boyfriend's (now husband) job. I walked down to meet them, with so many others in the streets empty of cars. One lone SUV, with odd flags, went speeding up Madison, the occupants cheering & beeping their horn. To this day I wonder what that was about... My coworkers and I passed a young girl, about 12, crying, trying to collect change to call her parents, who had told her that they would come to pick her up, but hadn't arrived yet. Our cell phones useless, we gave her enough money to take a cab in case her parents couldn't get there.

I finally got to hug my sister.

Since we both lived in NJ, and all access to our town was shut down, we went to her boyfriend's apartment in Brooklyn. A commute that should have taken 30 minutes took over 5 hours. We tried to eat at a restaurant, but they refused to turn off the news of the nightmare my sister had seen firsthand, so we went to Mambo Italiano's for possibly the most indulgent meal we have ever eaten - I can't even remember most of the dishes we ordered - lobster ravioli was one of them! Everyone in the restaurant was sharing their stories with each other, celebrating life in a time of death, much like a post-wake meal. We went home and slept with the sheets covering our faces, to block out the smell of the burning rubble and bodies a couple of miles away.

My friend, working near the Brooklyn Bridge, and her coworkers had been quarantined in their building's basement in the dark for hours on 9/11, as they heard and felt the buildings collapsed. I met her nearly every day after work in the weeks that followed, to help her deal with the shock. I will never forget the smell that lingered for weeks downtown... the ash covering everything... the unbelievable site of rubble as one exited the Fulton St. station... the way that everyone seemed to start smoking and eating a lot more - god knows I had a bubble tea every time I went downtown!

life slowly went back to normal. but it will never be quite the same.

i caught a glimpse of news anchors and the first tower, and thought...this isn't real, this must be for a movie. then the phone calls started..."oh my god, turn on the TV...oh no, tony said the second tower's been hit". at that point, i faced the TV and just stared. call waiting interrupted, and it was my brother from London. "what the F is going on? i'm stuck inside a convention hall, and no one's cell phone is working...no TVs, is the US being attacked?" i held the land phone next to the TV speaker, and hoped that he could make out the grim voices. i lost his call, so it made it even more surreal...return phone call from my brother: "i'm the only one who seems to be able to get through...here's a phone number,i need you to call this guy's mother; she lives in DC. he needs to know she's okay because he can't reach her." finally got through to her...i don't even know this woman, but she calmed me. told me she had a yoga studio, and then, unbelievably, told me she would be in florida in february for a yoga conference...my first thought was: "are you nuts, the world is ending! second thought: "yes, life will go on." the sequence of calls is a blur now, but between call waitings, i was attempting to reach my son's school. he was one of 30 kids who left for Rome, out of Logan, the previous day. 2 phones for 30 american students who were out enjoying their first day in italy, oblivious to the events because of the language barrier, and jet lag. finally reached him after many attempts, and held a cell phone (which i used to contact his dad) up to the land phone receiver so he could talk to his dad...crazy, but it worked. no 3-way call possible otherwise.

just finished my first workout at my "new" gym, on the West Side Hwy. I walked home noting how absolutely perfect the weather was (I now call these perfect days 911 days) Went inside and put the radio on; the radio immedaitely went off the air (antenna on WTC) so i flipped on TV to see the giant hole in the first tower hit. I grabbed my camera and radio and went outside in the west village. I recall that when the second plane hit, from my vantage point I saw only the large fireball, and I was so curious about how the fire in the first tower had ignited the second. Then I heard about the second plane. Surreal. In the days following we were a car free zone (below 14th street). People were walking around and sitting at cafes. It was uncomfortable to feel that you were "enjoying" a beautiful day, given the loss of life. I felt guilty for being alive and outside. I called my mother to ask how, after Pearl Harbor, they were able to "enjoy" a day. She said they "just did it."

It was my very first day of college. My parents had dropped me off in Savannah, GA and flew home to DC the day before (Sept. 10).

I was asleep and my boyfriend from back home called and told me to turn on the TV. I went into the room of some random person down the hall and watched tv with them for a couple hours. I saw the second plane hit on tv.

My family was in Maryland 25 miles outside of DC and my sister was in NYC. I couldn't get a hold of my family until the next day - all the phones were overloaded.

My college orientation group leader told us not to talk about it.. too political. I was so angry because many of us couldn't reach our families and she was so detached that it was just a political matter to her.

That afternoon - someone played Bob Marley "No Woman No Cry" on the loudspeakers in the courtyard of the dorms. Everyone came outside and just stood there and listened. That song is forever associated with Sept. 11 for me.

I had just started film school one week earlier in Los Angeles. I remember waking up to the sound of my roommates watching tv, around 7am (10 EST), and wondering what was going on. When they told me what happened and I looked at it, I immediately thought of my aunt who works next to the towers. I called my grandmother on the east coast and she told me that, all they had was a phone call from my aunt to her husband to say that she was in the tower and something happened and she'll try to call him later.

Then I found out that one plane went down in DC, where I went to college and had lots of friends still there so I tried to get info about that.

After watching and waiting, they said that all planes had been grounded but, there was one plane that they could not locate, Flight 93, and then we heard that it went down in PA, where I grew up and where 95% of my family still lived.

It was so emotional.

As I took the bus to school, the one thing I will never forget is how quite it was. No one knew what to say.

When I got to school. We discussed what was going on and what we thought would happen next. As I sat there thinking that my aunt could be dead, I thought to myself of how many innocent people would die for this and of course I wanted the ones responsible to be brought to justice but, I knew it would not end that easily.

We were dismissed shortly after.

It was not until almost 5pm EST that my aunt made it home, covered in soot and debris.

The one thing I hear from so many in NY before the attack is that it was such a beautiful day.

I was a block away when the second plane hit. I remember not really being able to comprehend what was going on. There was a lot of confusion and panic.

I went back to work when they opened the streets the following monday. The dust, the smoke, the smell I'll never forget, the tanks, machine guns, the people numbly trying to go back to work.

I had just arrived in London for a study abroad program two days earlier. When I saw the news, I shook my American roommate awake, not knowing that her father worked in one of the towers. Thankfully, he was late to work that morning and survived. She didn't find out until the day after.

The British were SO amazing to us during that time. If someone heard my accent, they would stop talking and just hug me. Most restaurants hosted a "Thanksgiving dinner" that November for Americans. Everywhere we went, there was such an outpouring of love from the British people. I'll never forget that.

I was teaching at UIUC then. I didn't have a television, and for some reason I wasn't listening to the radio on the way in to school, so I got to school and taught my first class, completely oblivious.

At the end of the class, which I noticed was only about half full, some students came up to me and said, "Haven't you heard? They've crashed a plane into the White House." (Obviously a bit of miscommunication there, but it was still early.) At that point I said the one thing I've ever said in front of a student that I wished I could take back the moment I said it ... I said, "Did they get him?" (meaning George Bush. *cringe* )

I spent the rest of the day listening to the radio and constantly refreshing CNN and MSNBC websites trying to keep up with what was happening. I was in a relatively tall building on campus, and I heard low-flying planes around me, which was unusual since the radio was saying all air traffic had been grounded. I later found out that military planes were guarding the airspace over the university because it hosted a supercomputing center, or something like that.

londonverve: thank you, I did see KO's special comment. I've been eternally gratefully for continuing to track the facts MSM ignores.

I was a junior in high school. The sophomores were taking their standardized tests, so juniors and seniors had permission to skip the first half of the day, and I did. I remember waking up to find my mom glued to the TV, and just as I began to process what she was watching the second plane hit. It was surreal. I went to school for the second half, and I distinctly remember my English teacher turning on the television and watching as Bush was told the news. Later that day some Muslim students at my school were harassed in the halls.

I also remember when the first bombs were dropped on Iraq. I was working in my school's library, and the librarian turned on the television so we could watch the war start. That was almost as upsetting to watch.

I was heading to a philosophy class on Long Island, running late, so I didn't watch any news or TV in the AM beforehand. I remember looking forward to rugby practice later that day, since it was so gorgeous out. Before class started, another student said that she had heard in her car that a plane had hit the first tower, but the prof said something like, "well, we can discuss that after we cover... (Plato?).

I feel like they let us out from class early, before the towers fell but after the second plane hit. So many kids who went to my school were from the city or their parents worked there. A TV was set up in the student union, where I met up with a friend. She was afraid because she couldn't reach her parents on her cell, and both of them worked in Manhattan. We went to another teammate's dorm room, where four of our teammates were sitting on the couch in the common room, crying. We watched the second tower fall in disbelief.

Later that day we met out on our practice field, the sun still shining away, as if the world hadn't turned upside down. Our coach canceled practice for the next few days, and all games that weekend were canceled out of respect for the tragedy. But we wanted to be there together, anyway, to comfort each other. My friend's family was okay, but many others were not as fortunate.

I live in Philadelphia but was in Boston visiting my sister. On the morning of 9/11, the day I was to return home, she was driving me to Logan Airport when we got the call to turn around. I didn't understand how something in NYC would prevent me from flying home to Philadelphia. We didn't fully understand it for quite a while.

We returned to my sister's house where we sat numbly watching the news. My parents had panicked thinking I was on a plane home.

As it was, it took me almost a week to find a way home. The airlines were closed, trains weren't running through NYC and there were no rental cars to be found. Through sheer luck we found strangers who needed a car returned to Philadelphia. I was able to drive the borrowed car home and return it to it's owners.

you guys reminded me of something. i too remember when i stepped out of my apartment building that morning on the way to work remarking what an absolutely beautiful day it was. and that didn't happen often. every time someone else recalls the beauty of that morning i feel a most bizarre comraderie.

At home, getting ready for my first "real job" at a tim horton's. My grandfather had come down for the day to do something with my dad, and all plans were forgotten. I was awoken by a barrage of IMs on my own computer, Woke up and watched it on my own tv, went out to the prof.

Work was dead that night, and we should've just closed. Nobody on the highways, nobody on the roads at all. Dawn was surreal.

Driving to get coffee listening to Mancow screaming on the radio as usual. Talking about planes flying into a building. I didn't think anything of it, as he was always screaming about something.. I turned the channel. Got coffee. Got home, jumped in the shower... And, that "planes" and "building" resonated... So, I turned on the tv.

Antwerp Belgium, mid-vacation-trip between amsterdam and paris, doing a touristy visit to some diamond-cutting shop... They had a TV on behind the jewelry counter focused on the first tower fire with a furious scroll going by. We were thinking, "wow what an accident, I wonder how everyone's reacting back home in the states." Within a minute the second tower was hit and it was like being in a spaceship looking back at the earth where you left everything you love.
The shop proprietor got tired of us standing there and knew it was hurting business, so he shut off the tv. We hustled to an electronics store for newsfeed but there was little new to hear. The train to our hotel in Brussels seemed to take years, and panic completely distorted my view of europe as if everyone was either in on it or didn't care. Thank goodness for cyber cafes. Getting home from Paris took more than forever.

I was still asleep when someone entered my room to tell me the Trade Towers were attacked and that my Sister was on the phone. I thought they were making a horrible bad joke and very angrily told them it was NOT funny. They said they were not joking and to turn on the t.v. (I was living in N.J. at the time, just 5 miles from the Lincoln Tunnel into NYC). I watched and cried all day long, and for days to come. We could smell the smoke from there and from a certain area on a NJ highway could see it as well. I also know a woman who worked on one of the floors who chose not to go into work that day--everyone she knew for years in her office are no longer with us. Elect John McCain the Hawk for President or else we will get a Socialist anti-war know-nothing who wants to "negotiate" with the terrorists!!

I was at work when my husband called and he saw the second place hit live, just horrible.

As a new citizen I will Never forget - God Bless the USA!

I was at work. At the time I was a contract/consultant employee to IBM, working on the help desk at their now closed Melville facility. It was nightmarish. I remember feeling woozy and panicky and nauseous. All I wanted to do was go home, but we had to stay at work. Someone had to answer the help desk calls. Sadly, I say that without exaggeration. At least one caller made a statement to the effect that this was a bad day and all, but business still needs to get done. I think it was because he had to wait on hold a few seconds.

I wrote a blog post about my memories from that day. At the time I was a student at NYU.

I was living in Boston at the time and was already at work that morning when a coworker came in and said she'd heard on NPR about an airplane crashing into one of the towers. We went downstairs to the Tweeter electronics store on Boylston in time to see the second plane hit. The whole place was silent except for a woman outside who went into hysterics.

Later that day my office sent out an email saying that people could leave early if they really, really felt upset - implying that some people would fake it for a free afternoon. That's when I knew I worked for jerks.

I was having breakfast with my dad in his rental condo near the UN. He was visiting me in NYC for the first time since I had moved here years before. My mother had passed away and it was a long time before he was able to summon the energy to come. He had driven all the way from Chicago with my mom's dog for company. I was planning to take the afternoon off and walk to the WTC to pick up half-priced tickets for a matinee at the "Hot Tix" booth inside the North tower.

My boyfriend, a journalist, called to say something had happened at the Towers and that he was headed there from our apt in the Village. I walked the few blocks to work, noting the firetrucks streaking by - the first reponders, many of whom never returned. At work we all watched simultaneously from our windows and on tv as the second plane hit. Friends called from all over the country to check on our safety.

I brought a few friends who were stranded on Manhattan back to my dad's place to wait it out until the trains were running. That evening, he and I walked the empty streets, breathing the heavy air, watching the flaming sunset, hoping that somehow the people on the "Missing" flyers could be found safe in some air pocket. No one realized then that the heat of the plane fuel melted forged steel. I made my way home to the Village, past roadblocks and checkpoints that allowed only residents through. My boyfriend was reeling from what he had witnessed and had to report; we just held each other and talked through the night.

Because the bridges and tunnels would remain closed for another week, my dad stayed in New York for some time after 9-11. I think, after losing my mother, that he was almost glad to have been here with me during this traumatic time. There wasn't anything he could do, but at least he knew I was safe and that the city was lifting itself up in response to this great tragedy.

Heather leaf- you're totally right about the weather, it was the same type of day in Boston. Even now bright, cloudless fall days instantly remind me of 9/11.

I was a junior at the University of MN and I was driving to class and I heard about it on the radio and didn't believe it.

When I got to class my professor told us all what had happened and that the University was closing for the rest of the day. No one wanted to go home so someone pulled a tv out into a main area in the building we were in and we watched it all happen on the news.

My dad was supposed to have a meeting with a client in Manhattan that afternoon and I am very thankful that earlier he had decided to fly out that morning instead of the day before, so he was in MN when it happened.

I was in art class, Junior year of high school. When my class was on it's best behavior, our treat was to listen to the radio. The class was calm that morning, so she turned on the radio and on every station it was just talking. She turned it up and for whatever reason, the kids in class started joking about what had happened. I remember her exact words "class, this isn't funny, this is SERIOUS." I stayed my usual quiet self, but I felt like screaming at everyone else. It went on until she finally turned the radio off. I watched the news on tv in my next class and watched the second plane hit. It was so surreal, and I couldn't stop wishing all those people that were covered in debris running made it out alive.

I was a senior at Duke, riding a bus from an early morning art review for my thesis, heading back to my apartment. I was listening to a radio that the bus driver had on and thought that it was a weird story that the radio station was playing, not a real event.
When I got back to my apartment and turned on the TV, I saw that it was real. I watched for a few minutes and ran to my next class, but my professor had already canceled it. The student that were there just sat around and talk about what had happened; a couple of the people had family in Manhattan and were freaking out, trying to call them and see if everyone was ok.

I spent the summer at home since I was laid off in May. On 9/11 I was up early and preparing for a job interview. My mom called and told me to turn on the TV. I saw the plane shaped hole in the bldg and listened to the eye witness accounts. Some said it was an explosion, others said it was a plane. I couldn't figure out which. But I remember thinking who would be so stupid as to drive a plane into a bldg? Who gave this guy a license to fly! Idiot!! My phone started ringing off the hook, My Aunt, My Cousin and Mom. When the second plane hit I was wathcing the TV with my Aunt on the phone and I screamed out loud and started freaking out. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. My Aunt was yelling what happened, what! I told her and she cried. I watched at the events unfolded in horror. When the first tower fell, I started crying again and praying. When the second tower fell I was shocked into silence.

Later I left the house to go see my Mom, she was freaking out and wanted all of us to be together. I remember the F16 fighter jets flying overhead, sonic boom and everything. I remember realizing I was in a war zone.

University dorm room in Canada. My Nova Scotian boyfriend called me and informed that "the Pentagon had been bombed". I laughed at him. "No one bombs the US" I said. Then I got in my car and drove to his house to watch his TV. As I waited at a stoplight I noticed all of the occupants of the cars around me were staring at me quietly. I had Washington plates on my car. Everyone watched as I parked on the street and got out of the car and went into his house. His Canadian roommates just stared at me as I went over the TV and sat on the floor to watch. When I saw the twin towers collapse I started to cry, and everyone just stared, and said nothing.

I wanted to drive home and be with my parents but the borders were closed, so the other American students and I all gathered and stayed with each other. The Canadian students didn't know what to say, so they stayed silent.

i was a senior in high school and in the building early because i was putting up signs advertising an upcoming school event. my parents called me and told me to get to a tv. i spent the morning in the library watching the tragedy unfold, unable to move or tear myself away for hours. i eventually got it together enough to go home and spent the rest of the day with my family in our living room watching news reports.

I was starting my first day of class at college in Boston. I was walking down the dorm hallway from the bathroom to my room after my shower and heard the news BLASTING from one of the suites down the hall. I remember thinking "jesus people, must you listen to the new so LOUDLY?! It's just news."
But being the curious person I am, I turned on my TV to figure out what was so news-worthy that it had to be listened to that loudly. And as soon as I turned on the TV, I saw a replay of the first plane hitting. The shot was so close-up that I didn't think it was real and I remember thinking "whoa, that's cool." And then I slowly realized that this wasn't the entertainment portion of the news... and I saw the second plane hit. I don't think I've ever been more confused as I was at that moment.

I continued getting ready (can't be late on the first day of class!), unable to fully comprehend what was going on and went downstairs to the dining hall, and the silence in there was deafening. I had already been at school for about a week, and this was mostly definitely NOT a quite school. But that day, everything was eerily quite. Even walking outside on to the crowded and bustling streets of Boston it was all so silent. Classes and events were all canceled that day... and all anyone could do was either sit together, in silence, or cry... it was... beyond words.

I got to class and the professor and a few students were gathered in the hall with a little CB radio. I heard "America is under attack," "World Trade Center," and "Planes." I rushed back to my apt. and actually fell off my bike half way home due to trying to ride fast, call my mom, and watch the sky all at the same time. I was in California but of course didn't know anything at that point. Came home, sat down in front of the news, and didn't move for the next 13 hours. I remember they played no commercials. The people jumping were the worst. All that footage is ingrained in my head.

From that very first day I remember hearing Bush speak. I remember the doom I felt when he said "hunt you down." I felt he was using our fear and anger to justify rash, reactionary decisions, when he could have used those critical first days to calm and fortify the country instead of whip us up into a state of panic.

I think most NY'ers in the city that day will always remember how beautiful the sky was - I, and many people I know, also refer to perfectly warm, cloudless days as 9/11 weather.

All the way uptown in Washington Heights, where I had moved just a few months before. Hadn't turned on the radio that morning, and didn't have TV at the time, so I had no idea what was happening when I left my apt to vote in the NY primary a little before 10. Was wandering around the polling place looking for someone who spoke English (out-of-towners: Wash Heights is mostly Dominican), when a woman suddenly burst into tears. Several people were trying to comfort her, then someone turned to me and said, "her son works in the WTC." That made no sense to me, and then to add to the confusion, I heard someone else talking about plane crashes, plural. At that point I decided to go home and find out more about what was going on. As I came out of the building, I saw police swarming the subway entrances and closing them off with yellow tape, so I knew that something bad was happening. At home I listened to the radio reports for a while, and then tried to call family and friends, but I couldn't get through. Sometime later my ex-husband got a call through to me and I asked him to call my parents to let them know I was out of harm's way. Didn't see the actual footage until much later when I ventured out again to a local pub, and watched the TV in numb horror while surrounded by some very drunk people. I thought I had never felt so alone until later when I was listening to the radio again - at that point that were reporting every minor rumor - and the announcer said that a truck full of explosives had been stopped on the GW bridge, which is 10 blocks from my apartment. I was so scared and so sad, and still couldn't get through to anyone. It was long night for so many people.

I worked in Canada's Privy Council Office, and that day was our long-anticipated staff retreat.

It was an amazingly beautiful day -- the kind that makes your heart ache.

My husband was at home, because he was locked out by a striking union.

A colleague picked me up, and as we drove to the estate at Meech Lake, we chatted and so did not have the radio on. Office business started soon after we arrived, but I noticed a colleague, the one who dealt with the emergency preparedness file, kept taking calls on her cell. She called the Assistant Secretary over, and he bolted soon after. We were waiting for the Clerk of the Privy Council to show up, as he was to spend the day with us. Needless to say, he never came -- he spent the day with the Prime Minister instead.

We eventually found out what happened, by around 10 or 10:30 or so, and huddled around the guards' little black & white tv. The directors made us go through with the retreat, but called it a day around 3. I'll never forget sitting on a rock overlooking Meech Lake, the sun dancing on the water, the scent of the pines, talking to my friend Larry. It was surreal.

We drove home on deserted streets; I have never seen Ottawa so empty and quiet. The Department of Defence was behind barricades manned by police.

When I came home, my husband filled me in on everything we had missed. Had it been a regular work day, we wouldn't have missed anything, as we each had a tv on our desks in order to monitor news.

The next few months were spent dealing with the aftermath... the airlines analyst barely emerged from her office even on weekends, when her husband would bring her 2 little girls to visit.

Ironically, we had been in New York just days before. The weather had been the same -- clear blue skies, sunny with a light breeze. Our last evening, we sat on a bench on the Brooklyn Promenade, staring at the skyline, and musing how difficult it would be to preserve the WTC towers from an architectural conservation perspective. We sat there for hours, watching the sun set on the twin towers. As we drove out of town on yet another unbelievably beautiful day, we got stuck in traffic downtown right in front of a firehouse, and our last memories of that vacation are of watching the firemen playing with neighborhood kids.

I was asleep in my US History class, the irony has never ceased to amaze me. I was yelled at to wake up by my teacher right before another Social Studies teachers came in and told us a plane had accidentally hit the WTC. Nothing else, just that peice of triva.

Later we got all the details and I begged the school to let me call my mom to pick me up. My father had left that morning for the Pentagon, my older brother worked downtown, I needed to make sure they were okay. They refused to release us until the 3:30 bell. I got home via the bus at 4:00 to an answering machine with four messages. 1) My father explain that he was on lockdown at a military base in Herndon 2) my brother was at a co-worker's apartment on the UWS 3)his eight months pregnant wife was doing fine in Jersey. The fourth message was from my mother asking if she should get a pizza or Chinese for dinner. This message actually calmed me down the most, it was a reminder that all was okay in my family regardless of what was happening outside.

I was at Citicorp Center in midtown, shopping in B&N before work. Came outside and everyone was in the street on Lex looking and pointing downtown.

Got to the office (right next to Grand Central) and sat with everyone glued to radios. Absolute silence reined all day from everyone. It was the eerie-est (sp?) day on the planet. Only the phones rang with people checking up on each other. I got calls as far away as India from the relatives of my one of my associates.

It was the day the world changed for every single New Yorker.

I was living in LIC and the stench and fall-out lasted for weeks. People cried in public for months. We passed all the pictures and descriptions of the missing in Grand Central and other public fora for months and months. There were impromptu shrines everywhere, tied to lampposts, in lobbies, on street corners...

There were bomb scares galore the next day and I remember evacuating the building at least three times. There were masses of people, mostly office workers, in the streets, on Lex and all crosstreets as far as the eye could see. it was like a scene from War of the Worlds or something - BUT IT WAS REAL. It was a very scary time.

In the aftermath, my co-worker never went back to her Manhattan studio. She volunteered her time and energy to help downtown. Shortly thereafter she quit the firm and went back to school to become a nurse.

God bless her, all the workers & families, all the lost and missing. May the humans who did this horrendous thing somehow, someday realize the error of their ways.

As someone else above said there will always be a hole in the sky there and a bottomless well of sorrow here in NYC.

And, we will NEVER forget.

It was my junior year of college. A bunch of us were set to fly out to London for a semester abroad. There were 3 flights taking off from the mid-west to LaGuardia and Newark. Thank goodness the flights were all canceled before anyone in the group left.
I was on the 2nd flight, therefore I had just gotten out of the shower and turned on the TV. I remember being struck with numbness & just wanting to go to London. I

t was so selfish in retrospect. I didn't really fathom how much if affected me until we landed in the UK a week later. The world had gotten smaller for me but I also felt alone in such a foreign place. It helped learn how to cope with feelings up front instead of burying them.

I always wondered when my generation would have its "Kennedy" moment. Unfortunately, this horrific event and loss of life was it.

I keep them all & their families in my thoughts & prayers.

I was in college at FSU, in a pottery class that started at 7:30 am, went until after 10:30 and was in this really weird classroom that was outside and sort of under one of the other buildings. We were listening to Pink Floyd CD’s and never turned on the news. When the class was over we all walked outside together and they had closed the University, but nobody had come to the classroom to tell us (and we were all cell-phone-less hippies). We all walked to the union in the center of campus and it was totally silent but hundreds of people were standing in groups around the TVs mounted on the walls. One girl was sitting on the ground sobbing, but I think for the most part everybody was in shock. After we figured out what was going on we drove across town (it was completely deserted, and the radio kept saying since we were a state capitol we were a likely target) and stood in line for four hours to give blood. I spent the rest of the day sitting with my grandfather and his dog watching TV. It was the only time I ever saw him cry, and I made him meatloaf and blueberry pie for dinner. I had Pink Floyd in my head all day.

I was a sophomore at the University of Michigan... I was in class when the planes hit, and by the time I heard anything had happened both towers had already fallen. I lived in my sorority house at the time with several girls from New York who were in hysterics because they couldn't reach their relatives. I remember thinking how thankful I was that my family lives in a small town (Blacksburg, VA).

Fast forward five and half years and you can imagine how odd it was on April 16th, 2007 to be crying on a busy street in NYC, for something that happened in that small town...

i was asleep in San Francisco when my dad (who lived in Barcelona) called and woke me up. Sept. 11th is the National Day of Catalonia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diada) so when my dad asked if i had heard what had happened, i thought something was going on in Barcelona with the Catalan separatists. i was so sleepy! i was just like, "dad, can we talk about this later?" he just said, "turn on your television and call me after you've had coffee."

i turned on the TV and wished i could go back to sleep, rewind the whole morning and start over.

So many people posting were students... my roommate's mom called at 6am to tell us, and we watched the news, and I called my family... I went to class but the professor canceled it, so we all just talked about what was happening... I remember preparing in case San Francisco was targeted, and then later my uncle who lives in a small town said he didn't understand why anyone in California was affected by it, and I couldn't believe that he wasn't frightened or saddened...

I too woke up in the UES of NYC to the radio/alarm clock talking about airplanes and the WTC. I sat straight up in bed and turned on the TV and called my parents in CA (they wake up really early) and they were watching already. The first plane had hit and no one knew what had happened, I remembered my mom saying that this couldn't be a mistake. As weird as it sounds I continued getting ready for work as I couldn't be late. I took a cab down 5th Avenue to 57th Street and the radio said that the Pentagon had been hit. The cab driver and I talked about not understanding what was happening.
A caller called the radio station and was crying and talking about her view of the WTC and how she had watched the second plane hit, as she was talking she started screaming, "Oh my god, the building is falling". I watched it fall as I drove downtown on 5th Ave. All down fifth avenue people were frozen, staring at the smoking buildings.
When I got to 57th street 15 people were lined up at a pay phone and I recounted to them what had happened, and they crowded around the cab to listen.
I went to work (at retail store) where one early customer was freaking out because he wanted to buy socks and we were trying to evacuate. We had to walk to our corporate office so that we could make sure everyone was accounted for. I walked into the lobby and thought about going up to a high floor and decided to stay outside.
I took a bunch of my staff home with me to 93rd street, because they couldn't get home. It took 4 hours to walk the 40 blocks with thousands of others in the heat and the silence. I ordered them pizza, and it took hours to come. I felt alone and wished I could go home to be with my family in CA, but then I realized that CA wasn't necessarily safe either. The next day the SF Bridge had a bomb threat. It was scary to feel that there was no where to go to feel safe.

What I remember most about the weekend following it was that I was on the bus and a woman got on with a dollar bill (the bus takes change or a metro card only) and when the driver told her get change she broke down crying about friends she had just lost. Everyone sprang to their feet to give her their card to use. New Yorkers were forever united by a horrible September day.

It was my second week of Journalism School in Vancouver. When I woke up, as always I turned on the television news just after the first plane hit. We watched the second plane hit on live TV.

On my way to school, I listened to the ABC news feed being broadcast on our local news station. I heard the towers fall on live radio.

Then, as the day went on and American airspace was shut down we watched plane after plane circle over the city and eventually land at Vancouver International Airport. Our city became the destination for thousands of passengers who had hoped to land in the US that day.

I remember being so frightened by how many planes were in the sky that day....and worried about who was on them.

I was in my second grade classroom in the Bronx. I went to the teachers' lounge to use the bathroom and found members of the faculty crying and someone was playing a radio very loudly. I asked what happened. When they told me, I felt a sharp chill followed by a sensation of being punched in the stomach. I will never forget the principal of my school and the way he conducted himself that day. He personally visited each grade and told each one exactly what happened, however, he also told each grade in a different manner so that each child in every grade will be able to understand what he was trying to explain. In the second grade, he gathered all 85 students and sat them on the floor. He sat on the floor with them. He warned them that he was about to tell them something that may be scary. He told them that there's no need to worry because in school we are safe. He then told them bluntly what happened. Some children asked questions: Who did this? Why? Were people hurt? etc. Dealing with those innocent children while not far away, such horror was unfolding was both sickening and rewarding.

Once I got home and smelled the stench in the air...it all became real. School was cancelled the next day. The Yankees didn't play again for about 6 weeks. Saturday Night Live would be halted. The fires would continue to smolder for days....Posters of the missing were everywhere. At a certain point, you knew this person on the page was never returning home yet the hope of the family and friends of this individual was plastered on the walls around you. New Yorkers were suddenly divided into 2 groups: those who held hope for the return of their loved ones and those who thought that hope to be naiively conceived, but dared not say so......

I grew up in NJ, and at the time I was married and living in California. We had just been to NJ the previous week for a quick trip with no time to get into NYC. Driving from the airport and looking at the skyline i said, "well there's the twin towers, unfortunately that's all we'll see of New York this time". On 9/11 we were getting ready for work and (ex) husband's mother called and told us to turn on the news. It didn't seem real.

I went in to work, listening to the news the entire time. Our clients were on the phone from all over the country talking about it, but no one at the office seemed that upset, which was upsetting to me. Eventually I went home.

My first thought was for my cousin who was a fire fighter in jersey. I felt so helpless being so far away. Called his wife and my mom to find out if he was sent in to the city-he wasn't and ended up spending several months on recovery crew. Little did we know that another cousin was there. She and her best friend worked in jersey but for a company based in the WTC. They had gone in to the city for a meeting that day. They never made it out.

I kind of missed it. I was 22 and working at a health food store in Fargo. That morning as I was getting ready I had the radio on..I heard the dj's talking in low, sad voices but was running late and not focusing. I got to work where a co worker informed me. She didn't really know any details. Our boss was a bipolar psycho and refused to let us listen to the radio or watch tv. People would come in the store and for the most part it was a normal day. I didn't have tv at home so I didn't see any of it. The next day I went out to Red Lobster with my ex and his mama. That was when I saw the horror that it was..To this day I'm wracked with guilt that I didn't or couldn't do anything. No one I knew was affected. In Fargo, no one seemed to really care. I don't live there anymore.

I wasn't working and was staying with my family in a small farm near Notus Idaho. My mom was up watching CNN and I caught the end of the first flight news and then saw the plane crashing into the second tower. It was so eery like it was a movie...it couldn't be real! Got online and watched the news all day and were pretty much in a daze. We were very upset and felt moved and patriotic. Sadly the past 7 years have not been very great for our nation.

I was settling into a new job at a Boston architectural firm on 9/11. My predecessor died on flight 11. He was flying out of Logan airport on a business trip. I was literally sitting at his desk, with his notes and files all around me. It was a very surreal experience.

Our office closed around noon. I remember the beautiful blue sky and how quiet the city was. No planes in the sky, no cars on the street, and nobody was talking. It was as if time had stopped.

i was a freshman at william and mary on 9/11. i had just gotten out of my earliest class, really bewildered, and was heading to the student center to grab breakfast and go back to my dorm room when i walked into the basement tv lounge. cnn was on the big screen, and i couldn't understand why there were so many people, and why they were playing some movie already, that early in the morning.

it took a couple of minutes for me to realize what i was watching, and then the towers went down, and i realized i was looking at new york, and when it was followed by coverage of the pentagon, i burst into tears. my brother worked at morgan stanley near times square, but i knew that morgan stanley had wtc offices and i was so frightened when i couldn't reach him via cell that he was there for a meeting or something. my godmother worked for DoD, and had worked in the pentagon until just right before 9/11, but i didn't know her office had moved. i was frantically calling both of them and my parents trying to figure out if anyone knew what was going on, and couldn't reach anyone at all until 10 that night, so i was basically sitting in my dorm surrounded by all of these hallmates i had only known for a couple of weeks.

i was so relieved when i found out they were both all right.

I was at Tallahassee Community College on my way to Ms. Wimberly's Humanities class. Right before I got there, a classmate stopped me and said class was canceled, something about a plane flying into the WTC and terrorist attack. I thought this was probably some accident blown out of proportion, and didn't understand why they were canceling class for that. I walked back to my car and called my mom. She said planes had hit the WTC and to get to a TV. I drove to my boyfriends house because he had a big screen. Me, his roommates, and our friends just gathered around the TV all day.

I distinctly remember watching as the towers collapsed. I was thinking "why are they doing that? why are they demolishing the building? there are people inside! It was confusion." All I could was cry.

I remember watching Peter Jennings. I will always associate Peter Jennings with 9/11. I felt like he was my window to NY. I remember his character, his calmness, like he was saying, "Hang in there. We will get through this."

I've never felt so helpless in my entire life or so American

I was driving in to work and Mancow, a popular radio talk show host, said that the towers had been hit. I turned it off in disgust because I thought he was just doing another one of his tasteless jokes. I said to myself "He should be fired for that." I felt intense anger towards Mancow even for joking about it. Then Eric & Kathy, another popular morning show, said the towers had been hit and I knew it was for real. I ran into work and told my coworkers to pull up a news site. None of them knew yet and they thought I was making it up. I'll never forget the derisive look on my coworkers face when I told her the building fell..she acted like I was disgusting for saying it and said "I highly doubt that." I was the only one paying attention to the news feed. Everyone else wanted to keep working like it hadn't happened and joked about going home early. My mom was working in the Sears Tower and they were evacuated.

OH and I put an American flag on my desk the next day and was told to take it down because it might 'offend'. I refused.

I can't even remember. All I can remember is the news footage. The whole thing was devastating.

I was in my 2nd week on a new job. I'd been nervous all morning because my direct supervisor (who's birthday is 9/11) was going to be off for at least a week to drive to Missouri to attend her beloved grandmother's funeral.

I was trying to remember everything I was supposed to do when someone came thru the room saying that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. Those few of us working the early shift (6AM California time) gathered together to watch the news on the internet in complete horror. It didn't seem like it could possibly be real.

An hour later, the company president arrived, consoled those of us who were in tears and took us outside where we all watched as he raised the flag, then lowered it to half mast. He asked for a moment of silence, then led us in a prayer for all the souls that were lost, fortitude for the rescuers, and strength for those who faced the loss of their loved ones. He offered to let anyone go home who wanted to. I stayed. We had very few phone calls that day, and the calls we did get were somber and to the point.

Later that evening, as my son (14 at the time) and I were watching the events, he looked at me and said, "Mom, there's going to be a lot of kids who won't have their mom's and dad's anymore - what's going to happen to them?" I tried to explain that they'd go live with relatives, or foster care if they didn't have any other family. He then said, "I could sleep on the couch, and we could put bunk beds in my bedroom and some of them could come live with us. You're a great mom and I'd be ok with sharing you." To this day, I can't think about that without crying.

i was about to turn the corner, at 17th street and 6th avenue, there was a clear view of the wtc from there. the first plane had just crashed into the north tower,and a man on his cell phone told me a small plane had hit the building,seeing the size of the gash in the building and the amount of smoke pouring out i knew it couldn't be just be a small plane, had an sinking feeling and rushed to the store i operate... i kept the store open until 2 pm, because all the staff but myself lives out of manhattan and the subways and buses had shut down.
later, walking home with hundreds of other new yorkers in a state i can't even put into words, as air force jets flew overhead i still could not fully understand what had happened that day.

On the phone with my mother -- she called me screaming that the towers were on fire. Then, I watched them fall on tv. At 183rd St., it looked like a movie very far away -- but didn't feel like it when the city got very quiet, the bridges shut down and the f-14s were flying overhead. I've never felt so trapped in my life. this day always sneaks up on me; the last two years, i've been teaching in my college classroom and trying not to go back to those emotions. i don't i ever really processed it; now, every year that 9/11 comes around, i feel a little closer to coming to terms with it.

Oh, and had to take my family down there when they visited. didn't realize it was so tough until I burst into tears at the gashes of buildings.

On a bus approaching the NJ Turnpike...a guy at the back of the bus talking on his cell suddenly announced to all the passengers "Oh my God, a plane flew into one of the Twin Towers!!" Nobody believed him...they all thought he was crazy until we got on the highway and you could see.... All I could think about was my cousin and my best friend both worked there and I hoped that they would be okay. The bus dropped everyone off at a random street and I ran the rest of the way to my job. I worked in Jersey City on the waterfront directly across the river from the towers. I felt I couldn't go back home....there had to be something I could do to help. When I arrived my building was the only one not fully evacuated....other people volunteered to stay and help. I saw one guy with his face all bloody carried off a boat and into an ambulance.... I went into my building...nobody could work...they just stared out the windows... I did too for a while but then couldn't sit and watch the horror across the water...I needed to do something. A bunch of us ran all over our building emptying soda & snack machines...grabbing towels, tables...anything we could use in the lobby for any survivors coming across the water. We had so much hope...it was all we could do. Our Telecom dept set up an emergency phone center for anyone coming from NY to call anywhere they wanted. At that job we always had free bagels, coffee, fruit & coffee every Tuesday...when 9/11 occurred...we brought all that down to the lobby too. In the middle of all that I was somehow able to call my aunt...whose daughter was supposed to be on the 72nd floor. I told her "If you hear from Lisa, just tell her to get on a boat that goes to the Colgate pier in Jersey City. I'll be there waiting for her." Someone told me that would give false hope but I had to I don't know why.
Then all we could do was wait and watch as the smoke covered Manhattan after both towers went down.
Little by little boats began to emerge from the smoke blanketed water....and dust covered people filled up the pier where triage units were set up. I held a crying dust covered baby in my arms for a few hours waiting to see if my cousin would arrive....I don't know what happened to the baby's mother. I never did see her. Suddenly there was my cousin Lisa....she ran to me, we hugged, cried and I'm still amazed she got out.

Thank you so much for writing that, Eddie Pages. I didn't need to read anyone else's comment because yours said it all. Just beautifully.

I was at work 49th/8th. Walked home. Had to cross the police line at Houston St to get to my apt in Little Italy. At first couldn't find any ID to show the policeman to prove I lived there, so he couldn't let me past. Started crying while searching my purse for my ID and then the policeman started crying too. I found my id and he let me go past, he was happy for me that I found it. Like a number of the posts above... what I remember most clearly is the color of the blue, blue sky, the smell that lingered for months, the missing posters everywhere. Never forget. R.I.P.

OH and I put an American flag on my desk the next day and was told to take it down because it might 'offend'. I refused.

posted by amiencc on 2008-09-11 22:47:07
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How can that even be?!! I am glad you stood your ground, well done Amiencc!

little flower, i'm haunted by your story about the baby!

Haunted...

My manager wanted to be sensitive to the large Muslim community we have here in south suburban Chicago...but I figured if someone was offended by the flag then I didn't want them in my office anyway. I told her it was offensive not to acknowledge the 3000 innocent people and express our solidarity.

I also wore a flag pin every day through the one-year anniversary and have acknowledged the anniversary every year since. That was the only time I ever had anyone complain. Strange, huh?

me too, *heather leaf*

i still wonder...
someone saved that baby and brought her across the water...wish i had found out some more and that i could know for sure the baby turned out alright
that company where i worked doesn't even exist anymore.
:-/