Memories of 9/11

September 11, 2001 was already a weird, tense day before the doomed planes ever left the ground. For me it was, anyway. After 20 years of staying home to school my children and keep my home, I was headed out to find a job. All summer my husband had been getting sicker and sicker, and no matter how many doctors I took him to, nobody could figure out what was going on. After a summer of trying to spend all my time taking care of him and preparing myself for whatever we might be about to face, I finally knew I had to go to work. I was sick myself, at the thought of leaving him alone and untended, but if I could bring some money in, it would at least be one less worry for him. (It would be another year before we got the diagnosis of encephalitis and two years before he could even begin to think about returning to work).

So I went to one interview, along with a little orientation. I tried to pay attention, but I was thinking of my husband, and also of my robust grandfather, who'd been taken suddenly ill the day before. Finally it was time to head to my second interview at an attorney's office. It was a bit of a drive, so I turned the radio to the Christian station and set out. But the Christian station seemed to be doing some sort of skit or something out of the ordinary. They played a little music, then broke in and said a plane had hit the World Trade Tower. Then shortly after that, they spoke of a second plane. I thought they were doing a take off on "War of the Worlds," possibly trying to show people what it would be like if the end of the world came and they weren't spiritually ready, and I was quite indignant. It seemed irresponsible to frighten people that way. I was looking out the window at everyone going about life as usual, nobody seeming distressed in any way. When the third interruption came on, saying a plane had hit the Pentagon, I'd had it.

Then it suddenly occurred to me that if I changed the channel, I could find out if there was any thing to it. I adjusted the dial, fully expecting the other channels to be calmly playing music. But of course that wasn't the case, and I tried to absorb the reports I was now hearing on every channel I hit. By the time I reached the attorney's office, I was shaking. I watched a lady walking her dog, a man doing landscaping work in the median, cars coming and going. Finally, I dialed my cell phone to see what my husband had heard. He'd been trying to relax and was unaware of anything happening. I told him to turn on the t.v. because we were under attack. He couldn't imagine what I could mean, but he flipped on the t.v. and in a very subdued voice, said "Oh, no," and I knew it was true. I told him I'd be home as soon as I could, and it was then he told me he'd just gotten a call that my grandfather had died that morning.

I went in to the interview with eyes full of tears and a head so muddled I couldn't even remember my social security number, flubbed a test I was given, and stumbled through the interview. Finally I could head home. But on the way, I passed the Red Cross office and decided to go in and donate blood. It was a madhouse, and for the first time I could see footage on the little t.v. in the waiting room. After way too long for my nerves, I was called in, but my blood pressure was so high by then that they wouldn't let me give blood after all. I headed home and in to the arms of my husband and sons.

I got a phone call letting me know I had gotten the first job, at an insurance adjuster's office, and I would begin the next day, so I just had to put everything going on in my life in to little compartments in my head and learn a new job to support my family. I didn't really have time to process anything. No one in the family could fly to Grandpa's funeral, or even have flowers sent, due to the planes all being grounded. But I was comforted by a picture in my head of my Grandpa, bustling about in Heaven greeting all the new arrivals that had died on 9/11 in the World Trade Center, the planes and the Pentagon, the way he greeted folks at church, with a smile, a handshake, and a warm, friendly word.