10 years ago today

Remembering 9/11/2001...

I was at work, just like any normal day.  I was heading into a meeting when one of my co-workers said, "a plane flew into a building in NYC."  I thought he meant like a crop duster or some small plane clipped a building.  I had no idea what was going on until after the meeting.  By that time we knew a little more.  We knew it was a terrorist attack and that the 1st tower was on fire.  We all ran down to the lobby of the building and were watching it on TV.  We saw the 2nd plane fly through the other tower and then we saw the towers collapse.  Those are images I will never forget.  There was a little chaos around our office because I was working at the Dallas Infomart at the time.  It was the largest information "hub" in the southwest and housed network operation centers for many large companies.  That, coupled with its proximity to downtown and the Dallas World Trade Center made it a high risk location for  a possible attack.  At this time we had no idea what to expect, as there were reports of several highjacked planes.  The decision came down that they were evacuating our building and moving my company's network operation center (not a small task).  We were all sent home for the day.  I remember walking to my car thinking, "Where do I go?  Where is it safe?"  I made several phone calls as I was leaving, to my parents, my roommate (Kourtny), one of my co-workers and a newly reunited friend (Chance).  I headed home and turned on the news.  I remember laying on our white leather couch just staring at the TV...shock, sadness and utter disbelief.  A couple of my co-workers came over and we just sat, glued to the news.  Kourtny came home a little while later (she worked at Children's Medical Center at the time and they were on alert for any local attacks or transfers from other states).  Chance finished a couple of appointments that he had scheduled and came over too.  He and I had reunited a few days earlier over lunch.  We spent the weekend together and had started hitting it off (even though my initial task was to set him and Kourtny up...oops:)  We all hung out and at about 9 o'clock decided to go to the Hurricane to watch Chance's roommate's band play.  We had mixed feelings about doing so, but we were all feeling pretty down and thought getting out might help.  Being out in public was weird.  It was like time had stopped.  The band was playing, but the news was on the TV's and it was too hard to look away.  The rest of the week is a blur, but I distinctly remember feeling proud to be an American and not wanting to spend another minute apart from Chance!  We have always kind of said 9/11/2001 was when we started dating.  It is a date we will never forget...for many reasons!  10 years later those images are still so vivid...my heart  goes out to those who lost loved ones and to all of the heros among us.  We will never forget!