Its weird. For the first several years after 9/11, I didn't think much of it. We'd all been through something horrific, but the best thing I could do was move on.
Then, in 2005, I watched the movie "Pearl Harbor". I was alone and it was during the day. The scene when the planes start attacking...the scene where a woman is putting clothes out on a clothesline on a gorgeous summer day, when suddenly a plane flies over head...
Well, something snapped.
It so perfectly captured the shock of that day. I am emotional but try very hard not to be over-dramatic. Yet, I found myself huddled in my closet, sobbing, and praying that God would get Bin Ladin.
9/11 is a mixed bag of emotions for me. I was there. But I wasn't in New York. I was in D.C.. But I wasn't IN the Pentagon. But I was close by. I was horrified, but not as horrified as the acquaintances and friends who had to recover the bodies.
I don't want this day to define me, but I am someone that needs to experience emotions in order to release them.
I want people who weren't there, or who may be too young, to know what it was like, but I feel like my experience was so periferal.
Do you see my quandary?
I wasn't going to write on this today because I had done it last year. Then, I looked back and realized that I hadn't started blogging until 9/15.
Crap.
Here we go. I'll never do this again, so enjoy.
9/11 in the D.C. Metro Area was a beautiful day. Sunny, clear skies, maybe 78 degrees. I was feeling really good that day. I'd just moved into an apartment on Army Navy Drive just a stone's throw (or, an unathletic girl's jog) from the Pentagon. It was called Army Navy Drive because our street emptied onto the Army/Navy sides of the Pentagon. My roomates and I felt so cool.
It was the perfect apartment, because it only took me about 5 minutes to get to work on Columbia Pike, which is a main artery into the Pentagon. The Pentagon, my home, and my work formed a lovely little triangle.
To live and work so close to the heart of America's power...lucky me!
I got to work and turned on the radio. I was annoyed. The DJs were going on and on about some plane hitting a building so I turned it off and made some calls. I then went to the break room to make some oatmeal. Our break room had floor-to-ceiling walls facing the Pentagon, which was nestled down a hill from us. We could just seen a thin line of the rooftop, as if it was hiding from us.
The news was on in the break room. People were talking casually as Matt Lauer and his airplane expert tried to make sense of this huge airplane that had hit the World Trade Center.
That moment.
When time stood still and it was as if America beat with one heart.
When we all watched the second plane hit.
Everything changed.
Such collective terror.
And then, terror upon terror for us in our little break room when someone yelled, "Oh my gosh! The Pentagon is on fire!"
We turned around, and there was a black column of smoke, it seemed to be a quarter mile wide, billowing up into the atmosphere. I shudder when I realize that, if our eyes had not been glued to the TV opposite the windows...we would've actually seen the plane hit.
Our building then shook. And, with that shake, everyone woke up. People started running around, grabbing coats and purses, muttering "I'm outta here." to their bosses and just leaving. I guess, when the plane hit, it did not explode on impact. Our building shook with the explosion several minutes later.
My boss wasn't going to let me leave, but I insisted.
I have to be honest...I was scared...and I knew that, unlike most people at my work, I was driving closer to the Pentagon to reach home...but somewhere in the back of my psyche, I knew this was my chance to live history. It wasn't my first thought, like a young reporter eager to get the scoop, it was an impression that I didn't recognize until later.
Out I go...into a new and terrifying world. The streets were jammed with cars. People are running, helter skelter.
Rumors flying that "they"...whoever the heck "they" were...had hit the State Building and the Capitol...which is where my roomates worked.
I worried for my uncle who works for DTRA and was often in meetings at the Pentagon.
Cell phones were dead. Phone lines were tied up. I can't remember, now, if it was from heavy use or if the gov't cut all signal.
I got to my apartments, but it was not safe.
Please remember...no one knew what was happening. No one knew that they'd "only" hit 3 targets, and that was it. All we knew was that there was smoke and ash and the smell of char and that America was under attack.
Air Force jets were flying very low over our apartments. This sent us into another terror. If you've ever heard a jet fly overheard (which was a common event in D.C.), it is already an overwhelming sound. But now, planes were weapons.
I was 22 years old. I didn't know where to go. Its a strange thing...experiencing and observing at the same time. I felt as if I was in a movie. People are running around screaming, planes are booming over head, and always that black column of smoke. I, for some reason, ran to the rental office and asked if there was a tornado shelter or a place to go. The employees were running to taxis.
They looked at me and said, "I don't know, its not our job now. We've been told to get out of here, its too dangerous."
And off they went.
I sat in my apartment. Well, really, I paced in my apartment. I knew my family was beside themselves in Michigan but could get no word to them. I honest to goodness thought at least 2 of my roomates were dead.
Pacing was driving me insane.
Then I looked out my window. Thousands of men and women in suits and military uniform were flooding down Army Navy. Right past my window. Like a big morbid parade.
It was hot outside. And everyone looked shell-shocked.
I grabbed all the snacks and water that I could and ran downstairs.
Going against the current of military personel, I started walking up Army Navy, handing out snacks and water. I asked why they were all being evacuated this way.
"The government has shut down all highways as a security measure...I have to walk 18 miles home."
Do you know how many people work in the pentagon? All walking home.
Amazingly, I recognized a man from my church. I brought him up to my apartment and, miraculously, he was able to get through on my phone to his wife and kids to say he was safe.
Another moment of comfort...seeing residents of Army Navy Drive lining the streets handing out water just like me. We were all in this together.
Slowly, roomates trickled in. I can't remember, but I guess they got home through the subway and side roads.
I remember Shawn and Linsday walking in wearing basketball shorts, T-shirts, and their high heels. They had quite a story.
The adrenaline wore off, and we were just girls trying to deal with our day. We huddled together and prayed.
Did you know that the Pentagon, when it was built, was made into a Pentagon shape because, if it had been a high rise, it would've been susceptible to attack?
Did you know that, in the years leading up to 9/11, the Department of Defense had started to re-inforce the Pentagon's structure to make it stronger.
They also decided to make it fire proof.
By 2001, it was incomplete, but the sides hit by the plane were finished.
Did you know that only a relatively small portion of the Pentagon was damaged. My friend was in an inner room on the side the plane hit. The floor rose up and everyone slid down toward the window, but there was no fire. They got out and evacuated with everyone to the middle of the Pentagon nicknamed, ironically, "Ground Zero". Shaken, bloody, my friend looked around. Many employees from the other side of the building had no idea what was going on or why they were evacuated.
Many people died at the Pentagon. But if God, in His Sovereignty, had not been with the construction of that building, or whispered into the ears of Generals when and where to start the re-inforcing of the Pentagon, the flames would've torn through that building. It would've been a World Trade Center.
Did you know that the Pentagon smoldered for weeks? My roomates and I would sometimes walk or drive to the hill beyond our home just to watch. There was always a group of people there.
I had to drive by it every day on my way to my new job...much further away from the city. I saw the huge iconic flag being placed over the side and the entire re-building process.
My roomates and I were zombies the evening of the attack. 9/12 was almost worse than 9/11. You get up and you must go to work. You must choose clothes. You must talk to people. I hated that day.
After about a week of doing nothing but watching the news, we woke up. We truly did move on. I still shed a little tear every morning as I drove past the Pentagon, but my soul recovered.
I met my husband just a week or two later. We are one of those cheesy "Post-9/11" couples. The events shook my husband up and realized he needed to get serious and find meaningful relationships.
Some things still make me cry. When I think of the principal of my brother's high school calling him out of class, and my brother crying as the man told him I was safe...I cry.
When I think of the ladies from my home church in Michigan, on vacation at a lake house, stopping to get on their knees and pray for me, I cry.
Its the love that makes me cry...not the evil.
I don't hate this day. I just don't know what to do with it. I didn't escape from the Pentagon as the flames licked at my heels. But I helped a man tell his kids he was okay. No one I knew died. But I thought they had for several hours. I was never in any real danger. But that's the jerky thing about Terror. Its the unknown. Its why this isn't just my story. Its the people who were at Disney World that day, wondering if they were a target. The folks in Detroit realizing that the car industry was an American symbol. Its the story of those poor people in Pennsylvania who I don't feel get nearly enough air time. Its all of us, thinking our soil and that great fortress we call the Pentagon were impenetrable.
I don't hate this day. And, if I was going to live through 9/11, I am well aware that, as small as my piece of the puzzle may be, at least I got to be there. Is that sick? That I feel honored to have been there? I'm not happy I was there...but very honored.
Now I really do want to move on. I want to, next year, be in a grocery store and think, "Huh. Its the 14th today! I didn't even realize 9/11 came and went!"
That would be victory.
Well said Sara. Thank you for sharing.
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