Question: What were you doing this day two years ago?

10 Sept 03 | Mr. Silverback

[Steely Tom]

I've tried hard to remember things about life in the USA just before 9-11. I remember that stem-cell research had been a big story that summer, along with Condit. The last thing I can remember being important (maybe the week before 9-11) was the subject of Oxycontin, and that druggies were stealing it and using it like heroin.

Tuesday morning was picture perfect here in Upstate New York. I remember that I awoke that day early, with a lot of energy. I was off to work well before my normal time. It was one of those mornings you wish every morning could be like (at the age of 46).

I was sitting at my desk writing pattern-recognition software for machine vision when a collegue came in and told me that an airplane had just hit the WTC. I went on-line to FreeRepublic immediately (of course), where there were a number of threads. I was so shocked I didn't know what to think; like so many others, I thought of the Empire State Building - B-24 incident. It was on FR that I saw the first speculations about terrorism. It was on FR that I got the news of the second impact, and the third, and the plane crash in rural PA.

After a while I went out for a drive in the car to listen to the radio away from my computer; I wanted to see the outside, I guess. It was while entering a traffic circle near my company that I heard that the first tower had fallen. That is when the icy hand first gripped my heart; before that (I confess) I had thought of it as an unusually big normal terrorist incident. I kept thinking about how I had heard (maybe here on FR) that 250,000 people pass through the WTC on a normal business day.

The last week or so has been an unbroken string of beautiful days, just like that day. Now when I feel the soft touch of the early September breeze, the warm glow of the late summer sun, see the deep blue of the pure sky, I think thoughts I never grew up with.

(steely)

[TexasRepublic]

I have no special recollection of September 10 - it was an ordinary day like any other, and like the 11th should have been. I was half-listening to the radio while dressing for work when I mentally made the connection between "airplane" and "building". I switched on the TV and was immediately anchored in front of it for several hours. The 2nd plane had not hit yet, but I already wondered if this was terrorism; the 2nd plane confirmed it. Arriving late at work, I told the building's management they should lower the flag to half-mast, which they quickly did.

[aimhigh]

I got up, showered and walked into our famiiy room. My daughter's first words were, "We're at war."

[Gringo1]

Struggling with a malfunctioning blower motor on a train.

Someone told me what was going on, and we pulled out a portable television and sat and watched the rest of the day.

[judicial meanz]

Working the second day of a back to back shift rotation.

[Stormyta]

September 11, I was on a plane leaving Pittsburgh for Florida and there was a delay --then we found out about the plane that went down close to the airport. So we were evacuated from the airport and my cousin drove from Canton,Ohio to get me. Spent 6 more days there before I could get a flight to Fort Myers. Everything was just surreal as no one in the airport knew what to do either and we all just milled around with no direction. One of the saddest days for America---I was too young to realize the effect of Dec. 7th on us.

[Timesink]

I only know I did these things because they were my routine; the day doesn't stick out, though it should. I'll bet there are a lot of Pearl Harbor survivors who remember vividly what they were doing on the night of 6 December.

I think there is a key reason as to why the final "day before" 9/11 doesn't stick in our minds as much as the day before Pearl Harbor does in our parents' and grandparents' minds: Because Pearl Harbor directly altered their personal lives forever. After 12/7/1941, the parents' sons were sent off to war. Many husbands went off to Europe and the Pacific as well, while the wives ended up working in offices and factories for the first time in their lives. There was rationing. Friends and family came home in pine boxes on a regular basis. Their day-to-day lives were turned upside down for four years after Pearl Harbor, and the majority of the American public had the overall courses of their lives changed forever. (I wouldn't even exist today if it weren't for WWII; my mother's parents met at a USO dance in the early 40s.)

After 9/11, however, for the vast majority of us, our own personal lives did not change at all. Remember when Bush gave his first big post-9/11 speech and his main instructions to the American people were "live your lives"? And how so many people compared that order to, in effect, do nothing, to the sacrifices Americans had to make during WWII?

That's pretty much what happened. Our political viewpoints may have hardened (or swung around 180 degrees in some cases), our fears of "what's out there" may be different now, but unless you or an immediate family member are in the Armed Forces, or you worked or lived in Lower Manhattan, your day-to-day existence is probably not one iota different now than it would have been had 9/11 never happened. (Yes, I know some people could make tortured arguments about how "the post-9/11 financial hit caused me to lose my job" or something like that, but proving a direct connection between the two events would be impossible in almost all such cases.)

I know my life is exactly the same now as it would have been without 9/11. Which is why I can't remember any specific events that occurred on 9/10. I suppose if I'd attended some great concert that night, gotten married, had a car accident, or some other event that I would inevitably have remembered anyway (none of which happened; it was just a regular generic day for me), I'd think of that occurrence in terms along the lines of "Oh yeah, that was the day before 9/11!" But would I think of it in terms of "the last day of the Old America," or "the day before Everything Changed"? No. Because nothing has really changed for most of us. Our feelings and opinions were altered by 9/11. Our EXISTENCES were not.

[Timesink]

What we were all doing, of course, was obsessing over shark attacks.

[discostu]

That's right that was shark attack summer (with fewer shark attacks than normal inspite of the press coverage that would convince you the sharks had gone mad), how could I forget.

[Arthalion]

I still remember exactly what I was doing on Sept 10. I was unemployed and spent the first half of the morning knocking on doors and looking for work. After exhausting my leads that day, my wife and I spent the first half of the afternoon planning the itinerary for our Maui vacation later that month (yeah, I know, unemployed guys shouldn't be going to Maui...but I could afford it). About 3PM that day I realized that my wallet was missing, and we quickly determined that I'd either dropped it or had it stolen while I was out that morning. Since I knew that I'd need an ID to board the flight, I hopped in my car and took a high-speed trip to San Francisco to visit the State Department office and pick up a passport (I could get a passport faster than a replacement license). It was 9PM before I got home and ate a late dinner, so I decided that I'd treat myself and sleep in the next morning.

The first plane hit the North Tower at 5:45AM Pacific. I didn't get to sleep in after all.

[playball0]

I climbed up the stairs from the "4" subway 5 minutes after the second plane hit. I watched in amazement for 15-20 minutes. I had a 9:30 AM meeting on the 97th floor in 1 WTC. I called the office. No one answered. I just turned around and took the subway home.

I turned on the tube 20 minutes before the first WTC building collapsed. My co-workers didn't survive. I was never paid for my consulting work that I had just started 9/10. It was the only time in my career that a consulting job actually blew up in front of me.

[Betty Jane]

September 10, 2001 was just an ordinary day. It was the third week of school, but the first Monday. My daughter had P.E.,which she hates, on Monday so I had to force her to wear sneakers. I'm the school secretary and we were getting ready for back-to-school night the next day. (needless to say it was cancelled.) I called my sister in D.C. that night to wish her happy birthday.

The following morning, I was driving to pick up the carpool kids when I heard about the first plane at about 6:55 mountain time. I had already gotten the kids when I heard of the second plane. My first thought was to turn around, which is what I should have done, but didn't. I told the kids they could only whisper for the 25 minute ride.

I got to work. The principal called a quick meeting before school started. He told us to act as normal as possible. Many people didn't know what happened. At 7:45, as the school doors unlocked, a parent called and told me about the Pentagon.

I spent a good part of the morning, calling kids down to the office to go home. I kept wishing I could go, too.

My husband had seen it all on t.v. He was getting ready for work when my D.C. working sister called him. She couldn't get a hold of my parents who were seeing a doctor on Long Island. The phones weren't working. Steve, my husband, called my Uncle's house where they were staying. They had already left for the appointment. (It was my mom's 5th year cancer free check-up)

He had no problem getting through. He spent the rest of the day acting as a message center for my L.I. relatives and my D.C. sister. They could all call Colorado, and he could call there, but they couldn't directly call each other.

Steve called me at about 8:30 and told me my parents were on Long Island and o.k. And that my sister was fine, she had called in sick that day. That was when it hit me how serious this was.(I hadn't seen any t.v.at that point) Everybody in my family was fine and I broke down. I took a break, went out to my car, listened to the radio and talked to my husband for about a half hour. I didn't get to see the pictures until after 6:00 that night.

[Dark Glasses and Corncob Pipe]

I remember getting steamed up during a mandatory sensitivity training session at the plant on the day before 9/11. Oh, the supposed horrors of making judgments based on what one observes. No more sensitivity training sessions since then. Instead, the emphasis has been on watching out for "suspicious characters"!

[Ronly Bonly Jones]

I was in Tuzla, Bosnia, on some free time. Had my home computer on. Was analyzing some legal cases freelance for a database for the GOP's redistricting effort. I Emailed my last batch to the DC HQ at 0000 hrs local time, 9/11/01 (6 PM EST, 9/10).

The next morning, while the rest of you all was still in bed, I went in and had a cigar. The translator for our office was giving them away for free--celebrating the birth of his daughter, Sarah, at 0400 that morning local time.

He recently wrote me. "No, nobody will ever forget HER birthday." No sir.

[Ronly Bonly Jones]

After 9/11, however, for the vast majority of us, our own personal lives did not change at all. >>

Not all of us. I didn't see my wife and family again (save for two visits) for almost two years.

[Archangelsk]

I was flying a lowly Cessna 172.

[FreeReign]

The week before, my brother had a knee operation. He had plenty of knee pain and had trouble bending his knee. Climbing and even DESCENDING stairs was something he had trouble doing.

I was talking to my brother the day before 9/11, on the phone. He was at home, he was recovering from the knee operation and he had the entire week off from work. My brother worked mid-level of the North Tower at WTC.

[GATOR NAVY]

Being in Japan, my Sept 11 was like your Sept 10. I had checked into my new command 2 weeks before and we were finally moving out of the base hotel into an off-base house. It was windy and rainy because we were catching the edge of a passing typhoon and we were worried the moving company might not show up.

They did show up (late) and we got everything inside. The cable wouldn't be hooked up until the next day, so all we had for TV was broadcast which we could barely pick up with an old set of rabbit ears. The picture was so poor I didn't even bother trying to watch.

A little after eight p.m. I was smoking on the front porch when my wife came out and said there had a been a plane crash in a New York building. I came in to see on the snowy screen the WTC on fire (it was ABC video with Japanese reporters doing voice over). My first thought was that it was a small plane-no professional pilot could have an accident like that. Then we watched the second plane hit and I told my wife "This is an attack".

[3catsanadog]

I was supposed to go to my classes at the community college that day but I had a cold and was very tired. The TV was on when I woke up around the time the Pentagon was hit (forget what time that was). After that happened the Fox News reporters stated "Let us repeat - 2 planes have hit the World Trade Center towers and one plane has just crashed into the Pentagon." Needless to say, I was glued to the TV the rest of the day and most of the next.

[3catsanadog]

Sh!t - Just read the post closely and realized you wanted what I was doing day before. Frankly, I have absolutely no idea. Just normal day to day stuff. I know I walked the dog 4 times.