I was in my 5th grade Spanish class, a class I had hated. We were learning the days of the week or something trivial like that, and I had just been mocked for spelling "Wednesday" wrong when a teacher I didn't have burst into the class, said "Did you hear about the plane crash?" And tried in vain to bring it up on our three channel TV set in the classroom. It didn't work and she left in a flurry, maybe to tell others or maybe to just see it with her own eyes.
That was all I heard of it for a couple of hours, until my dad came and got me during gym class because the banks (I live in a bank city) had closed for the day and my mom wanted to have the family together during this time. I wasn't the first kid to be pulled out of school that day, and I know I wasn't the last. I'm thankful that none of my family were on flights or in the City or near the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania that day. I don't know how I would have handled it.
I remember a week later, annoyed by the reports of people still not found (I was a really inconsiderate and brainless child, who did not care for anything unless it was about me), I said aloud "Why are they still talking about this? It's been a week already!" I had never heard about terrorists before, but it would not be the last time. I was properly put in my place by all the kids in the car with me. I still feel guilt and remorse for what I said and how I felt about it then, being too stupid and naive to grasp exactly what happened. I cry watching the documentaries, seeing all these people dying or them talking about the people they had known who had died and seeing how much it affected them and affects us all.
Never forget.
snugduff
