Tribute Remembering 9/11, 20 Years Later

[Overcast]

I wasn't personally affected nor did I know anyone that was, but it makes my insides physically ache whenever I think about what happened. I'm not much of a city boy and barely know shit about different areas of the city, but I identify as a New Yorker and it felt like an attack on all of us. I was in my freshman year of high school in the bottom-floor cafeteria. Some kid a year or two older than me came barreling down the stairs (could hear him running down the stairwell) and he pops around the doorway and says something like "A plane just hit the Trade Center in the City." We spent the rest of the morning listening to the news over the PA - for whatever reason they thought it was a good idea to put on Howard Stern? I knew he was a shock jock so I figured it was some stupid prank..until I realized it wasn't. Other than that I don't have much recollection of how the day went. I'm pretty sure we were let out not long after we had some more concrete information. It was a weird way to have 9/11 broke to us, for sure. At least for me.

New York City is the best city in the world and I've always loved growing up with it as basically my backyard. I've always loved the chaos of the city and how many stories are packed in to the smallest areas, the smallest shops and food stands. There's just so much..everything. All the culture, all the history, being a major hub of the world. And I can pop down there in 40 minutes and melt away into the hustle and bustle. It's such a beautiful feeling just being there to experience it all.

 

[bluesXwinXtheXcup]

I wasn't personally affected nor did I know anyone that was, but it makes my insides physically ache whenever I think about what happened. I'm not much of a city boy and barely know shit about different areas of the city, but I identify as a New Yorker and it felt like an attack on all of us. I was in my freshman year of high school in the bottom-floor cafeteria. Some kid a year or two older than me came barreling down the stairs (could hear him running down the stairwell) and he pops around the doorway and says something like "A plane just hit the Trade Center in the City." We spent the rest of the morning listening to the news over the PA - for whatever reason they thought it was a good idea to put on Howard Stern? I knew he was a shock jock so I figured it was some stupid prank..until I realized it wasn't. Other than that I don't have much recollection of how the day went. I'm pretty sure we were let out not long after we had some more concrete information. It was a weird way to have 9/11 broke to us, for sure. At least for me.

New York City is the best city in the world and I've always loved growing up with it as basically my backyard. I've always loved the chaos of the city and how many stories are packed in to the smallest areas, the smallest shops and food stands. There's just so much..everything. All the culture, all the history, being a major hub of the world. And I can pop down there in 40 minutes and melt away into the hustle and bustle. It's such a beautiful feeling just being there to experience it all.

The City is magical to me as well.

I've been around the world many times, lived outside Tokyo, but NYC takes the cake.

I lived in the East Village at a NYU dorm for the summer of '94 I think.. East 8th St. and Broadway. Webster Hall was kicking

I remember throwing a penny off the outdoor observation deck of the WTC that summer. I felt horrible as soon as i did it.. Thought someone might die.

 

[Kane One]

I was in third grade and remember seeing smoke out of my classroom window. Then eventually I got home and found out. Thankfully I don’t know anyone who was there or even in the city with any horror story.

My mom, however, had OCD and suffered from bi-polar depression, so 9/11 and all the 24 hour news definitely got her into the deep end of that. She f***ing lost her mind.

 

[Hunter Gathers]

This was the first year in 20 years that I felt like I didn't have some form of PTSD (I've posted my story about thinking my dad was dead for most of the day and all and then picking him up on the Garden State Parkway covered in ash).

I purposefully tried to avoid a lot of the 9/11 remembrances and shows and such this year to try and avoid a lot of the typical pain I go through. But I felt quite calm this year. First time in 20.

Also, I felt that the English playing the National Anthem today during the changing of the guard was absolutely beautiful.

 

[HockeyBasedNYC]

I was 22 years old living in Teaneck NJ at the time, so close enough to see the smoke from literally anywhere, for what was weeks, months.

Watching it all unfold on TV like many people, still to this very day, was a surreal experience. I hate using that word “surreal”, but it really was. It was almost like some crazy doomsday movie unfolding before your eyes.

A lot of people mention how beautiful the weather was that morning and it was. Clear. No humidity. Absolutely gorgeous deep, blue sky.

Then the chaos ensued, but at first it was complete confusion. No one knew what the hell was going on. Everyone thought it was a twin prop plane or something. Pilot error. Why would we have any reason to think otherwise? Unfortunately that innocence was ripped from American minds forever.

Once the second plane hit, and many of us saw that occur in real time, that’s when the shock of it all became so jarringly present. I remember just gasping and not being able to process what I had just seen. It was almost not real. It couldn’t have been. All of those people.

Then the Pentagon. That’s when the fear became real. It was palpable and disturbing. We were under attack. That’s when everyone stopped what they were doing, closed up and headed to a safe place. I was in my first class of the day in my second year of college but was dismissed early.

Panic set in, and the thoughts of the whereabouts of friends and family became the fixation.

Meanwhile, my future wife who I hadn’t met yet was working down at the Glenpointe hotel and would see bus after bus dropping people off from the city later that day. She said almost everyone walked out like zombies covered in dust and soot, with blank expressions on their faces. That’s when it really struck her that it was truly real.

I knew multiple people who were there during and after and others who experienced loss. I am grateful I did not know anyone who perished that day, though I did lose an uncle too soon who was a Port Authority policeman.

He was a great man. He had to dive into an ambulance as the north tower collapsed and made it out, but his work in and around the rubble over the coming weeks exposed him to cancer causing chemicals, like many of his brethren.

There are countless stories of heroes. Everyday people helping one another. One that sticks out is the boy with the red bandana. He was a young guy, a hockey player from Nyack I believe and he saved person after person, going up and down one of the towers until it fell.

There’s one other thing that I’ll never forget.

For weeks after the attack I found myself in multiple situations where cars just began honking and waving American flags out of their windows. Random people, random places, spontaneously. I’ve never felt so proud to be an American. I could only imagine what it was like days after WW2, but I’m sure it was very similar. You could feel it. Even though we were all hurting we were all on the same team and lifting each others spirits up. To experience that was truly special. It’s sad we are existing in a country so far removed from that right now.

And then the lights came on. Those spotlights to honor those who perished that day. It gives me goosebumps just seeing them. I’ll always take a moment to stare at them hitting the ceiling of the clouds. Remembering that day.

May God protect this country and provide solace for all the family members affected on 9/11. We will never forget.

 

[blueshirtbolt]

To give you an idea of how far this tragedy could reach, I live in Ireland. My cousin and her husband worked for Fiduciary Trust Company in South tower, above the impact zone. My cousin had to take her daughter to see a doctor that morning and her husband slept in. They were lucky but a lot of their friends were not. I didn't lose anyone that day but still feel sick thinking about it.

 

[HFBS]

Not sure if I've ever told the story here but I've told it on a few board sites. Won't go into the whole thing. I saw the planes hit the buildings while stuck on the Manhattan Bridge and was waiting for another plane to come and hit the bridge. We had just moved from the Empire State Building to Times Square or I couldn't have even gotten into the office. Nothing but rumors that day. More planes coming, bombs and machine gunners in Times Square. F-15's buzzing our office, us thinking it was more hijacked planes. Knew people in the buildings. Used to go up to my friend's office on the WTC 97th floor when we were out on Saturday nights. Could reach out and touch the Statue of Liberty. Had another friend on the 90th floor of the South Tower who followed his co-worker down the stairs after the first plane hit the North Tower even though he had no clue what was going on. As they were walking down the stairs the second plane hit right above them. His co-workers who waited for the elevators never made it out. He got out without a scratch. I left the firm and left working in Manhattan soon after. Always loved war movies etc. and found out that day the difference between hearing stories and being there.

 

[Zub]

People meming and making fun of it over all the internet is disgusting.

 

[SnowblindNYR]

I consider myself lucky to not have much of a story about that day, but I still remember it vividly.

I was in 7th grade, and although my hometown is only 30 miles N/W of Manhattan, to a kid growing up tucked away in a mountainous, rural region of North Jersey, the City felt like another planet.

During what was probably my 3rd class of the day, our teacher rolled out a TV stand from the corner of the room, and simply put on the news. I could tell it was not good news, but I had no frame of reference for the gravity of it.

Both my parents were working, so my mom had our neighbor’s mom scoop up her daughter, my sister, and myself, immediately—and when I say “immediately,” I mean it literally. I remember walking out of class, through the school, and into her minivan; all the other kids were still in class.

I’ll always love my moms for that…for being that protective. It seemed like an overreaction to me, but what 7th grader is going to complain about getting out early, riding a VIP Ford Windstar no less?

The thing was, although I felt a million miles away from the City, in reality it was incredibly close. The main road in and out of my town was a long, winding drive uphill, from the top of which you could see the entire skyline of Manhattan with incomprehensible clarity (the road was and is still called “Skyline Drive”.) I’ve driven up and down that road a thousand times in my life, and every time after 9/11, I’ve tried to imagine what the skyline would have looked like on that day.

Several years later, I’d be spending all of my young-adulthood going to college around lower Manhattan. I used to wander around the Empire State Building staring up, wondering how it was possible I could see this object, this man-made creation from so far away. I went to a concert by the South Street Seaport during fall of freshman year, and we took a path around the site first, and all I remember being there was…nothing.

Where ever I am in life, Manhattan will always be The City to me. It treated me so kindly, showed me everything about life. I fell in love with it the moment I was first shot out of the Lincoln Tunnel into blinding light, and felt air hit my lungs that was unlike anywhere else.

My heart goes out to anyone who was living there at the time, had any attachment to NYC, or was simply old enough to really feel what was happening. I still struggle to imagine what it must have been like, and how the City managed to survive it.

My dad and lots of parents picked up their kids from school that day too in Brooklyn.

 

[KirkAlbuquerque]

I was in the 8th grade and heard the news on the radio on the bus to school. The first plane hit and the DJs said that a "small plane" had hit the WTC and made it sound like a weird accident. 15 minutes later they said another plane hit and that it was definitely a terrorist attack. I pictured Hans Gruber and his crew bc that was what I knew terrorists as at the time lol.

I remember only hearing rumors during the day , the teachers didn't tell us what was going on, lots of kids got picked up early but my parents didn't come and get me, I was pretty pissed about that lol. On the bus home some kids were saying they heard that the towers completely collapsed and hundreds of people were dead.

My dad worked in midtown, my cousins were both in school in Manhattan as well. My older cousin witnessed people jumping from the towers. They all met up together and headed to my aunt's in the Bronx.

After school me and a bunch of my friends got together and talked about what we heard/saw on TV. It was very surreal, even though I was old enough to sort of get what was going on it still didn't really hit me like it would have if I was older.

 

[Synergy27]

I slept through the whole thing. I was in college and spent most nights playing hockey until about 3AM after the rink closed for the night.

I remember waking up to Howard Stern on my radio alarm clock and being immediately freaked out because he shouldn’t have been on the radio that late in the morning. Turned on the TV and it was all over already.

I was living in my grandparent’s basement at the time, and I remember running upstairs in a slight panic and being very angry at them for not waking me up or otherwise letting me know. I also vividly remember the view of downtown Manhattan from the NJ bayshore that day.

Can’t believe this was twenty years and a completely different world ago.

 

[NYR]

I was scheduled to work in tower #1 that day and it just so happened that I was going to lose my time off if I didn't take it so I decided to take the day off.
When I woke up and turned on the TV, I seen the 2nd plane hit.
Crazy shit.
I was actually in route a half hour before the first garage bombing attempt.
Anyway, I lost 4 childhood friends plus another due to breathing in all that shit trying to save people on 9/11.
Not sure I'll ever get over it..

 

[NYR]

People meming and making fun of it over all the internet is disgusting.

Too walk a mile in someone else's shoes..

 

[Siddi]

I was scheduled to work in tower #1 that day and it just so happened that I was going to lose my time off if I didn't take it so I decided to take the day off.
When I woke up and turned on the TV, I seen the 2nd plane hit.
Crazy shit.
I was actually in route a half hour before the first garage bombing attempt.
Anyway, I lost 4 childhood friends plus another due to breathing in all that shit trying to save people on 9/11.
Not sure I'll ever get over it.
This thread actually made me cry and I've maybe done that 3 times in my life..

 

[RosensRug]

I always find these stories interesting thanks for sharing everyone.

Watched that documentary that national geographic put together this year and found that very emotional/powerful. Especially given that there was a lot of footage from inside the towers after the planes hit. One thing that stuck with me in a strange sense is just how much worse it could have been had they hit the towers in the afternoon. It took upwards of 5 hours to get people out during the 93 bombing (which i never realized) due to how small the staircases were. If those buildings were 100% when the planes struck lord only knows how much worse it would have been.