9/11 + 10

I remember that Tuesday because my wife went to a seminar in Boston so I had to put my kids on the school bus.  That meant I was commuting to work when I heard on the radio that a "small plane" had hit one of the World Trade Center towers.  But once I got to work, where everybody was plugged into the Internet, the full extent of the disaster was evident.  Of course, nobody could concentrate on their jobs, and by mid-morning our jerkoff boss (I'm no longer employed there) was urging everybody to get back to work.  Stunning.  I remember that both my cubemate and I wanted to say something: me, because my father was working in midtown Manhattan and my co-worker because he had a brother-in-law at the Pentagon.  We left for an early lunch at a restaurant with a television over the bar.

But by lunchtime the Towers were rubble and there was nothing left to do but try to figure out "what just happened?"  One thing I remember for the remainder of the day was that every television station - even MTV and the Weather Channel - were showing either special coverage or were feeding in network news on the day's events.  The attack on the Towers were the most evident attack of the day and only later would video of the Pentagon attack come to light.  Then something had happened in Shanksville, Pennsylvania - what was that all about?  The rest of the day was a blur, grasping for bits of information and watching awful replays of destruction.

There's one other thing I vividly remember from ten years ago.  We went to church on the following Sunday and it was somber affair.  But after the pastor's (rewritten) sermon and the benediction, the organist played "God Bless America" and I almost cried.