It Was Just a Normal Day

It began as a day like any other. Mom and dad dragging us out of bed. A breakfast of waffles for the three of us. Dad loading us up in the car and then going to pick up our cousin. All of us stuck in the car listening to The Beach Boys, The Cars, or The Beatles (thanks, Dad!). My brothers, my cousin, and I were probably arguing about something silly (sorry, Dad!). We pulled up to the front doors of our elementary school. Always time-conscious, even at a young age, I looked at the clock--it was 7:46.

The four of us walked to our separate classes. My brothers to third grade, my cousin to fourth, and me to fifth. The attendance was taken, lunch money was collected, class began. By around 9AM, it was time for fifth grade to switch classes. As we walked outside to cross from one building to another, we were stopped by another teacher passing by. "The World Trade Center has been hit by a plane." "What?!?" asked my teacher in disbelief. We didn't exactly know what the World Trade Center was, but we knew that whatever had happened had been a big deal. 

Soon, all of the 4th, 5th, and 6th grade classes had gathered in the biggest room in the upper grade building and was watching the news on a television. We saw the footage of the planes aiming and hitting the buildings. We heard the words, "America is being attacked." We watched the videos of the buildings falling into a cloud of rubble. We saw the anxious faces of our teachers. We heard them whisper to one another and take turns going to call their loved ones about it. We didn't fully understand what was happening--we just knew it was bad. 

By the time we got home from school that day, it was all anyone could talk about. I remember asking my parents what was going on and them explaining it to us as best as they possibly could to children. Mom couldn't stop crying when she talked about it. Dad opted to watch the news over his usual Andy Griffith show reruns that evening. 

It's hard to believe that was 19 years ago this Friday. 19 years ago, the world as we knew it was flipped upside down and the War on Terrorism began. Perhaps as children we couldn't fully comprehend what was going on at the time. But like with all children, we most definitely understood it in time and could feel the weight of this new reality. We were scared and afraid. That fear we felt was very real. I remember the first time I got on a plane after that day, I was so nervous that we were all going to die in a crash. My mom had to explain that security was tighter and we would be okay--that was enough to get me on the plane. I remember walking in the mall in College Station and seeing two women in a hijab and grabbing my mom's hand and telling her I was scared. She had to explain to me that I couldn't blame this on one group of people--especially not those innocent people walking around the mall who believe differently than us.  I remember watching the news with my dad and asking him if there was going to be a war. He looked at me with a pained look--not wanting to lie, but not wanting to scare me. He simply said, "If there is, we will do what we need to do and we will be okay." 

Perhaps my generation often gets a bad reputation. Some days, we may deserve it. But I think most of my generation's issues stem from this one day--September 11, 2001. Fear is a very real emotion that can have lasting effects on a person. Being at an impressionable age, watching so many people die on national television, hearing of people trapped under the rubble begging for help, seeing pictures of utter destruction, hearing stories of people who were able to escape, and feeling afraid that we would be attacked again led many of us to live with a constant reality that security and safety did not truly exist. The new reality after 9/11 was that there would always be a threat to our safety and we could never plan for when the impossible would happen again. 

It was just a normal day...or at least, it was supposed to be. What it taught me, even at that young of an age, is you never know what is going to happen in each moment of each day. Not only will we never know what will happen, but we cannot be in control of it either. When bad things happen, things that remind us of how fragile and unfair life can be, all we can do is hold on to the things we know to be true--and that is our faith. We can be mad at God, we can cry, we can scream, kick, yell, spit out every cuss word we can think of, and feel like God doesn't care. But God does care--I believe God wept with the world when others used their free will and chose to kill others. God did not cause this--God was not in control of the deaths of so many people on that day. But I do believe God was sitting next to the passenger on the plane who had no loved one sitting with them as they prepared to die. I believe God was linked arm-in-arm with the first responders who went into the buildings to try to get people out. I believe God was with those people who were on the floors above where the plane hit, holding in his arms the victims who likely died by asphyxiation from the smoke of the fire below them. I believe God was standing behind the wife or husband who got the call that their loved one was missing and hadn't been found.