Seven Years Ago Today

If all was right with the world, September 11th would be that day wedged between September 10th and September 12th. Instead, a brutal act of terrorism seven years ago changed September 11th into a day of pure horror.

Every year I think about what I was doing not just on September 11, 2001, but in the weeks before as terrorists finalized their plans for sheer devastation. My sophomore year of college started less than a month before 9/11. I had returned from a month-long stay in Spain at the end of July, so I would have still been buzzing with stories of my trip. The two weeks before 9/11 were packed with rehearsals for Fall Formal Recruitment, or what other campuses call Rush. Recruitment concluded on the evening of Sunday, September 9th, and my sisters and I were very excited about our new members. Monday, September 10th meant a return to classes, where we could all wear our Greek letters with pride.

Like most Americans, 9/11 started out as a normal day for me. It was a Tuesday, so there was none of the "Ugh, it's Monday" regret or "Yay! Friday" excitement. I got up, showered, did my normal grooming thing, and went to grab some breakfast before work. We had a cafe-like place on campus with a big television, and I saw all these people gathered around it. On the screen was footage of an airplane flying into a skyscraper. I've never been to NYC, but the building looked somewhat familar, so I asked a girl standing next to me, "Where is that?"

"The World Trade Center," She said.

"Oh." I replied. "So what tv show is this?"

"The news."

The news. As in, the news of what is actually happening in the real world. I was stunned. I grabbed breakfast (I think) and went to work. My boss wasn't in yet, but the professor with the office next door was, so I asked her if she knew anything about what was happening. She didn't. My boss came in, and she'd heard about everything on the radio.

At that point, I truly believed that it was an accident, just like all the other plane crashes I'd heard about. Then we heard that a second plane hit the WTC, and I knew right away that we were watching a deliberate and well-planned horror unfold.

We actually left the office and went to the cafe, where I watched the news with my co-workers and fellow students until it was time for my 11:00 class. We didn't really have class; we just watched the news. We had a student from China studying at Brenau that year who was also in my class. She was sitting a few seats away from me, and I'll never forget seeing her staring at the television in that dark room, tears slipping in a steady stream down her face.

The next shock came when I passed a television in the mail room and saw that the Pentagon had also been hit by a plane. I was raised believing in the Rapture and the Apocalypse, and at that moment I truly believed that the world was ending. I wondered when the next plane would fly into a building, and if Jesus would come for us all before it did. I could not imagine anything beyond that day.

Our Spanish professor actually held class, and we actually talked about things relating to the subject matter. It seemed like a futile gesture at the time, but now I'm grateful for that 75 minutes of ordinary life.

There was a lot of fear that another plane would hit. Many people I knew pointed out that Atlanta has several spots of interest to terrorists, the most notable being the Center for Disease Control. I was very happy to be living in Gainesville, where the most notable attraction is probably the chicken plant.

As we know, 9/11/01 ended, but the world did not. The next day, President Bush gave a speech that I watched in the tv room with my sorority sisters. I remember being impressed when he pointed out that not only American lives had been lost the day before, and I remember being disgusted when some of my sisters could only talk about what Hillary Clinton wore to the speech. I try to tell myself that they were avoiding thinking about the horror of the day before. I try, but it doesn't work. When Bush made the ultimatum speech to Iraq in 2003, I listened to it on the radio with my boss.

I remember hearing about people in the Middle East taking to the streets and cheering over the attacks. I thought, "Stop it! We don't hold parades when tragedy happens to you." The day after 9/11, a young woman in my history class asked plaintively, "Why do they hate us so much?" It's a question that haunts me.

Why do they hate us so much? How can one group hate another group enough to cause that much devastation? It never fails to strike me as surreal that while my sisters and I were sprinkling glitter on our recruitment banner and getting our skits just right, a group of men with more hate than the human heart should hold were making sure that every U.S. citizens would know true terror.

Now bumper stickers urge us to "Never Forget," and September 11th is Patriot Day. It's the day we ask ourselves "Why?" It's the day I wonder if and when we will catch the monster responsible. It's the day I join Americans and sympathizers around the world in remembering and praying, "Never again. Please, please never again."