Where were you?

September 11, 2001

I was a student at Roanoke College. It was my sophomore year, but since I was a transfer (a bad choice that I don't care to talk about) I had to take a mainly freshman English writing class. I, of course, was running late and went to the computer lab to print out a paper or something. While it was printing, I got online and saw some headline somewhere about a plane crash in NYC. I think I then checked out cnn.com but it must have just happened and I think most people were assuming it was just a tragic accident. I took off to class and a few other people were talking about it in class but nobody really knew much yet. My professor let us go early and I headed back to my dorm.

Of course, we had our TV on the news channels all day and as the news of the other attacks were reported, I remember having a hard time believing that it was actually a terror attack. I just remember being in shock. However, I was so thankful that I didn't know anybody actually involved in any of the locations. My roommate and other people in our quad weren't so lucky. Since RC has lots and lots of people from the northern US, it seemed a lot of people were more directly affected. My roommate had lots of family who commuted in to NYC and worked at the World Trade Center. Luckily they all were unhurt, but she did know a few people who lost family and/or friends. The room next to us had a girl whose dad worked at the Pentagon and she couldn't reach him for quite awhile - but he was safe. Her roommate's brother had just gotten his pilot's license and was going up in flight for the first time that day. He was safe, too. Across the quad a girl's dad was one of the heads of security for President Bush. He was safe, too. And there were many others who personally knew people affected.

We had a prayer vigil that night and I remember just sitting around the quad with my friends and talking. It was a sad day and I just wanted to be at home with my family. I think I went home that next weekend - but I may have gone home the next day because they cancelled class for a day or two because so many of people needed to get home and check on their families.

I'm thankful that I still feel safe at my house, even though we all saw how vulnerable we can be 9 years ago. I'm thankul for the military men and women who protect this safety. And I'm thankful for their families who give up each day so they can protect me and my fmily. And I think we should all be thankful to those men and women on Flight 93 that were brave enough to protect us from what could have been a much worse attack on our country's government and capital. It's my prayer that Brenna will never know an attack of that magnitude in her lifetime.