9/11...where were you?

I was attending Southewestern Bible College in Phoenix at the time. I got up that morning and came out of my bedroom to find my three roommates (who all had early classes) standing around the TV. One of them said, "There's been an attack in New York. They think it's terrorists." And we all stood there, frozen, as more news started coming in and they kept replaying that scene of plane hitting the World Trade Center. It was so surreal. "Terrorist" was a term I wasn't familiar with at the time. It was just incomprehensible that someone would do that on purpose. To US--America!! Even in those first moments, you knew that life in the United States would never be the same again.
Classes were cancelled, we found out, and the student body assembled in the gym to pray. There was a lot of crying and sadness. I'm sure plenty of people were scared, too. It was just so horrifying, imagining what the people in the towers went through in those final moments. Just normal people, who'd gone to work that day expecting just another ordinary day, or who kissed their loved one good-bye, saying, "See you tonight." The devastation, the chaos...it was awful. All of it was so awful. And to think that it wasn't an accident, that someone had meant to do it...well, I think we all grew up a little that day.
My friend Dan and I got a cup of coffee afterward and marveled at what was happening and how it changed everything. We were definitely still in shock. It was a very strange day. I remember checking in with my loved ones, just to hear their voices and tell them I loved them. My mom was the first to say, "Do you realize that today is 9-1-1? Isn't that spooky?" And as we learned more about the chain of events that morning--the other planes, the body count--it just got more and more...weird. Like a movie. It was hard to wrap your brain around it all. Yet, too, you were mad as hell at whoever had done it. You wanted them to answer for what they did to us.
It's still hard for me to believe that it happened, right here in my own country. It rocked our world, didn't it? Those that died, the heroes, the families who lost loved ones...we will never forget. May we never forget.