Remembering

I feel like I should post something to mark the tenth anniversary of 9/11.  I have no story to tell, no actual connection to anything that happened on that day.  I, like most Americans, just watched in horror on the television while events unfolded.  I held my loved ones a little tighter and felt that awful thing in the pit of my stomach.......vulnerability.  Something I had never felt before. 

When the first tower fell I was just getting to work. We were trying to figure out what was going on, but had all the little ones there so had to keep it under control.  The teachers took turns going into the kitchen where the TV was on.  I walked in to check on things just in time to watch the second tower collapse.  Like many others my mind couldn't even comprehend what it was seeing.  My boss started crying, keening "the people, my God, the people" over and over again, and I couldn't understand what she meant.  I just stood there staring at it, in shock and disbelief.  That people were inside those towers was too much overload I guess.  It started to sink in, but I couldn't lose it, I had children to return to.  Little ones who certainly couldn't grasp what was going on, and at that age shouldn't have to.

Upon returning to the classroom I let Lisa, who was my assistant then, go and watch for a bit.  When she came back we were standing talking up front away from the children playing, and heard a loud noise approaching the building.  We both looked toward the window with terror on our faces. (basement so we couldn't see)  It was just the huge lawnmower, the drivable kind, that the college uses to cut the lawn.  Silly, and stupid, and absolutely terrifying in that moment.  We both breathed a sigh of relief and then moved on with the day.  So many others were unable to do the same.

Something else comes to mind, something that happened a few days later.  The kids were building block towers (four year olds) and one of them was crashing a toy plane into them.  I lost it.  "I never, EVER, want to see you playing that game again!  Do you understand me???"  Then I walked out quickly before the tears started.  I know I came back and we talked about it, but I can't remember what I said to them.  Something more appropriate I'm sure.

What I took away from that time was not the vulnerability, although I felt it for a long time.  It was the true sense of "one nation" that came over all of us shortly after the attacks.  When we look back and remember, as we should, I hope that we recall that part of it too. 

God Bless America