Where Were You on September 11, 2001?

Where were you on September 11, 2001? TE Patch would like to hear from you. Were you in school back then? Were you on your way to work?  Everybody has a story and we'd like to share as many as possible this week. Leave a note in the comments section or send an email to the editor: Bob.Byrne@Patch.Com

Everyone has a story

I had just put my oldest child on the school bus to kindergarten on that sunsplashed, blue sky morning. It was a Tuesday and I was freelancing for Food Network in New York, writing from home in suburban Philadelphia two days a week and travelling up to Manhattan to edit video and sound three days a week.

September 11, 2001 was a "work from home" day and I took advantage of the glorious weather to take my two other preschool aged children on a walk before getting down to work that morning.

Just after 8:30 the cell phone rang. It was my brother, a clergyman in the Connecticut suburbs of New York calling to ask me if I was watching the news. No, not at the moment. A plane had just hit the World Trade Center. His wife's brother worked in the World Trade Center and they did not know whether he had gotten to work or not. At that moment it appeared to be a fluke, an accident, an unkown problem.

It turned out to be the start of a coordinated attack on the United States, the single deadliest attack on our shores ever. These days we sum it up in the simple phrase "Nine-Eleven". It was a horrific act of war, but not the act of any easily definable country, or bloc of nations. It was the work of an enemy unlike any attack the United States had ever seen. 

Parents rushed to pick up their children, not knowing if schools might be the next target of terrorists. Fortunately school children were safe. The aforementioned brother-in-law in New York who arrived at the subway station late, only to climb the stairs and see the first tower on fire, not knowing the fates of hundreds of co-worker and friends. He, like hundreds of thousands, evacuated lower Manhattan that morning on foot. Endless streams of frightened humanity heading uptown even as countless scores of first responders rushed into the heart of what would become known as Ground Zero.

It took more a week before anything got back to anything close to resembling "normal" in New York City. "Normal" was a "new normal" with the "have  you seen" and "searching for" flyers up on every wall and utlility pole that had a blank space all over Manhattan. When I was able to return to work in Manhattan late the following week, people were more polite, patient, gracious. People were kinder and far more respectful to the cops on the beat and the countless extra uniformed first responders in the train stations, subway stations and on the streets of Times Square. 

Meanwhile here in suburban Philadelphia and across the nation, symbols of unity were everywhere. Many neighbors who had rarely, if ever, reached out to neighbors made an effort to get to know one another, even if just a little.  Our widely diverse "melting pot" society became more united by a common, horrific, experience. American flags appeared everywhere, on everything.

September 11: The birthday of a "new normal" in America

Some normal aspects of daily life in September 2011 did not exist on September 11, 2001 in the United States. You could walk to the gate at the airport to see someone off or welcome an airline passenger home at the jetway door-even if you didn't have a ticket for a flight. You didn't pay a "security fee" on every airplane and Amtrak train ticket to support massive homeland security efforts. In fact, the Department of Homeland Security did not exist. Heavily armed soldiers in dark combat fatigues and bullet proof vests were not the norm at american transportation centers. You did not need a photo ID to get on a plane or an Amtrak train.  It was much harder for the government to listen in on phone calls or get personal information about you than it is today. Many first responders from different agencies, including many in Chester County could not talk to each other via two-way radios they way they can today.

Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda were not "household names" in most of the United States. 

Today most law enforcement officials, including those I've talked to right here in Tredyffrin and Easttown say the average american is safer than they were on September 10, 2001. The price of that safety (in both real dollar terms and personal liberties) is a much debated topic among politicians and voters.

The Post 9/11 Generations

We have an entire generation of elementary schoolers who were born right about the time of 9/11..or years after.

Most middle schoolers have no recollection of life in American before 9/11. Most high schoolers remember little about the day, unless they lost loved ones in the attacks. What most teenagers who remember the day can remember is remembered through the eyes of a young child. In other words they do not really know what it was to live in a society where 9/11 was not part of the nation's history.

Two weeks ago I met a woman in Tredyffrin who was sending her child off to freshman year in college. As we talked about the generational impact of 9/11 she mentioned that her daughter's birthday is September 11. Her child was turning 8 on September 11, 2001. The woman told me that her young daughter had felt as if her birthday had been forever ruined. The now young adult still feels the same way, ten years later.  It is just another example of how the attacks of 9/11 touched people's lives in ways that are seldom reported,  but no less important to individual life stories.

Today we have an entire generation of armed forces veterans who volunteered to serve the nation as a direct result of the attacks on 9/11.  

We also have an entire generation of first responders (a term seldom used in media reports before 9/11) who volunteered to serve after seeing and learning the stories of those who ran towards danger on September 11, 2001.

The more things change...

We are a long long way from the evening of Tuesday, September 11, 2001 when members of Congress appeared on the steps of the East Front of the U.S. Capitol en masse, in unison, and without regard to party. There they spontaneously broke into singing "God Bless America".  

It is a foundation of the country that we have vigorous and spirited political debate. It is what sets us apart from many nations around the globe, and what makes us a target of freedom-hating enemies. 

Perhaps the tenth anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001 would be a good time to dwell on the memory of a nation focused on the basics- of being better neighbors and lending a hand wherever needed.  

And, just as we did in the days following September 12, 2001, perhaps this is an opportunity to remember more than just those who died and who sacrificed so much on 9/11.

Perhaps this anniversary is also a time for saying thank you to our community volunteers a little more, and for taking them (and all that we have here) for granted a little less.

Join in the conversation about 9/11