Where Were You On 9/11?

As we reach the somber 10th anniversary of 9/11, many people are reflecting about where they were on that September morning.

I wrote about 9/11 today on Associated Content/Yahoo, only because I felt that I had something to say about the topic. see my articles by using the following link:
http://contributor.yahoo.com/user/466151/priscilla_benfield.html

Back to where I was on 9/11.

It is hard to believe that a decade has gone by since that day of national tragedy. Living in New Jersey, with a distant view of the Twin Towers, 9/11 happened in my own backyard so to speak.

At the time I was separated from my husband and was sharing custody of our children. It was a difficult time in my personal life and I was struggling to start over at 39 years of age.

I had been sick with a horrible virus the night of the 10th so after dropping my kindergartener off to school I had gotten back into bed.

About 35 minutes later my phone rang and my estranged husband told me to turn on the television that a plane had hit the World Trade Center.

I was stunned. I stayed on the phone with him, glued to the television as I witnessed the horror happening in New York City.

It was surreal. I felt frozen and couldn't take my eyes off of the television. Honestly, I did not know what to do. Should I go gather all my children from their respective schools? Would they be safer where they were? I didn't know what to do.

When the towers fell and the newscasters talked about survivors I knew that there would be few. How could anyone possibly survive such a disaster?

Later on that day as I spoke to my children, my middle school aged son asked me why this had happened. I felt helpless to explain to him why there were such evil people in the world. It was just unexplainable to me.

Although my son was aware that war and terrorism went on in the world it never happened here. Not in America. Not in our own backyard.

I was born in 1961 and as a child growing up I was too young to remember or understand the assassination of President Kennedy or Vietnam. My childhood was idealistic because I grew up without fear of war happening in the country I lived in.

My children now were different. They now learned that terrorism was something that could happen in this country because it just had. That made me angry and sad.

For months after 9/11 every plane that flew over head and seemed to be flying slowly or low made me stop and look. Living across from Staten Island and being able to see the fire still burning days after 9/11 brought the reality home to me.

I did not lose anyone I personally knew either in the city, Washington or that field in Pennsylvania where the final plane went down but it still touched me deeply.

These were regular people just living their lives when terrorists decided to attack us. You didn't need to know the victims to feel the loss.

We all felt that our world changed forever that September day.

Ten years later I have gotten used to the changes but as time goes by we must. I feel for the families to whom this anniversary brings sadness. I hope that they can heal from forever being tied to this tragic event.

I hope that we as a country have learned that we are not immune from terrorism and that our government is really doing its best to keep us safe. Hope is all I have left.