Writing about September 11th seems tacky. I can't think of much to say that has any value and I sure don't wanna force anything. I wasn't personally affected by it so, in a shallow sense, it didn't really upset me.
I was also in 8th grade at the time and didn't quite understand the impact. My class happened to be on a team-building field trip in the woods somewhere when I heard. None of us really knew what the World Trade Center was. We just carried on with our business.
Then on the way home we noticed a lack of traffic and all the flags were at half mast. When we got back to school they had the building on lockdown (apparently because, after the Twin Towers and Pentagon, the terrorists were likely targeteting my grammar school). Then we watched the news footage of the plane crashing over and over. Still, we didn't quite grasp what it meant. That city scape might as well have been a foreign country for all I knew.
But the more I watched the more I realized what was happening. Seeing people run through the streets with looks of true panic on their face was just chilling. I had never before seen the face of someone who believed they were about to die. That day I saw dozens.
The fear slowly made its way into me and I realized just how scared I was once I got home. I had been listening to music on my headphones when I heard a loud, low rumbling. It was getting louder and I could feel vibrations in the ground. My heart stopped and I ran to the window expecting to see a passenger jet barreling into my house. It was a schoolbus.
I can hardly believe it's been 8 years. It feels like half that. This is going to be one of those things that children 20 years from now just don't understand or care about. I'm not sure if I'm jealous or sorry for them.
I'm sorry but I don't know where that photo is from. I found it online
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