19: Personal

For some of us 9-11 is not just something that happened on a TV screen 19 years ago. For some of us it is personal because either you went through the events in NYC or DC yourself or your family and friends did.

My Dad worked in the Pentagon on 9-11. My Mom worked in DC on 9-11. I had friends in NYC on 9-11.

-I had been inside the Pentagon visiting my Dad at work and getting a new Military ID Card at the end of August 2001.

- On September 8, 2001 I was in Manhattan with a College friend who wanted to go to the Observation Deck in the WTC. Since I had been inside the WTC many times (because it was where my Mom's work had their NYC Offices and she would go there every few months and take me along) and because I was hungry (being College students we didn't have that much money so could either go inside the WTC or eat lunch) I told my friend "We can go up there anytime. Let's go get some Pizza instead."

Even though I was in College in MA that day and did not personally go through the hell that they did I still had to deal with the hours of not knowing what happened to them, not being able to contact them, etc.

I helped a friend (that I had met working at an overnight Summer Camp for the mentally and physically disabled in New York) who was in Manhattan on 9-11 get messages to her family back in Russia. She waited hours in line at a phone booth (since cell phones weren't working) and only had money on a calling card to call me and not Russia. She called me, told me what was going on and then I called her family in Russia (who only spoke Russian) and updated them. Hours later my friend would call me back and I told her what they said. I also found her a new hotel since the one she was staying at in Manhattan was inaccessible due to the smoke cloud and debris.