9/11 and the Day After

Back in the day, I traveled frequently for work, but I happened to be home luckily on this day. I got many calls and emails concerned that I was flying somewhere, was I home, was I safe. It was all so surreal seeing what was happening on the news, and I felt so helpless being on the other side of the country. How could this be happening? With such a rush of emotion, confusion and energy pent up wanting to do something, I cleaned my apartment up and down - I don't know, this was my way of dealing with it all.

The next day, I had a business flight to catch from the San Francisco Bay Area to Philadelphia. Being young and defiant, I wanted to take that flight to show that 'they' couldn't keep us down, that 'they' couldn't change us, that 'they' couldn't get away with this. I packed my bags and went to the airport...of course, many people had canceled their flight plans and the airports were quite empty. I rolled my bag forward looking around making my observations, felt unbelivably sad and bewildered, but I kept moving.

I noticed many people in the airport were wearing clothes with the American flag displayed across. We were sad, but people were actually slowly smiling and nodding at each other in acknowledgement because we had a shared experience but we all chose to keep going. I also remember as we boarded and exited our flights, people stopped to sincerely thank the pilots and flight attendants for taking care of us and making sure we arrived at our destinations safely.

I remember 9/11, I remember the day after too - it will all never be forgotten. Peace and prayers to all affected.