9 years later . . . I was thirteen years old

I was thirteen years old and my dad worked in Stamford as a Producer. I was sitting in my science class in middle school when the loudspeaker came on. It told us that a plane had run into one of the Twin Towers in New York City.

I didn't know what that meant. Two nights prior I had watched the Sandra Bullock movie "The Net" where a computer malfunction (manipulation) made a plane lose its navigational systems. That is the only reason I could imagine for something like this to have happened? I thought about how lucky I was that my family was all safely at home or working at the time.

It was only a period or so later that the second loudspeaker announcement came on to tell us that a second plane, had struck the second tower. . . I had friends in New York. I had family nearby. Friends, with family who worked there. Moms, Dads, relatives, loved ones. My dad?
I remembered backtracking to the morning; my dad was going into the city that day to work on a production edit only a few blocks from the Trade Center.

I don't even remember raising my hand, but I ended up in the office calling home to my mom, checking in on my dad. My mom was crying but as always starts a bad conversation with "everything's okay. . . but"
But what?!

My dad had gotten service somewhere in a shop and called out to my mom to let her know he was okay, but that the towers, had both fallen. My school had not let us have the televisions on in the classes, so I was the first student in the school to know, they were gone.

My teacher didn't believe me. My classmates, didn't know what to say, we didn't really understand. I know I didn't understand. In many ways, I still do not.

One of the students in my school was not as lucky as I was. Her dad worked in the second tower. The effects of 9/11 hit New York, Stamford, and other towns in the surrounding area like nothing I have ever seen before, and probably (HOPEFULLY) will never see again. Some parts of the country were so removed from the situation until the war began.

But that day, I will never, ever forget. The televisions played the same footage over and over again. I had a lesson that afternoon that my mom insisted I go to because "I needed to keep looking forward." Really, I think that she needed to still drive me to keep her mind off of my dad being stuck on the bridges there. By the time we got home, he was there waiting for us. We were safe, together. We watched as everything from that day on, changed; Both in our city and in our country. But that day, those hours, what I though of most in that period of time, was how thankful I was to have my family and the ones who love me by my side.

Cherish every day with the ones you love, and reach out a hand to those by your side that you may have not known the day before.