Where were you on 9/11?
It’s strange to think about the time when my generation didn’t have a moment when the world changed. I can think back to before we did. My grandmother always used to tell she remembered exactly where she was when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. My mother can remember the Vietnam War. Every generation has their milestone or milestones that mark when they don’t feel the same anymore.
How lucky we were. How stupid I was because I wanted something to tell my grandkids, something so big that they wouldn't understood the world that came before it. And then on September 11, 2001, when I was in the eighth grade, it happened.
That year, we were the oldest in junior high, so we got to sit in the front of the chapel at my school. All the younger grades sat behind us in descending order. Every Tuesday—it happened on a Tuesday—we would file in to the chapel and listen to the sermon and the songs. It was usually short—about a half-hour—and non-denominational.
On that day, our headmaster came to speak to us at the podium. We didn’t usually pay much attention to her, but we did that day because the eighth graders in the first few pews could tell she was upset. She told us that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center in New York City.
All I think we felt there was confusion. I didn’t know much about New York City and I’d never heard of the World Trade Centers before. Early in the morning that day, nobody knew what had really happened and most people assumed that the commercial jet had veered off-course. We kept having our classes that day, but we didn’t do anything but watch the news. The façade that the first airliner had simply veered off-course was shattered when the second plane flew into the second tower. They sent us home early then because President Bush was being sent to the Strategic Air Command, not far from the school, and somebody was worried about that being attacked.
How strange that day was. I remember that. But I can’t remember anything much else. I remember a science classroom and a crying teacher, but I don’t know if it’s the right place or when that teacher really cried. I don’t remember how I got home that day. I don’t remember my mom’s reaction. I don’t know if we realized how completely the world would change for us then.
And I can’t remember the aftermath exactly, either, even though I wasn’t that young. I don’t remember the first time I heard “After 9/11…” I don’t know the first time I went into the airport and recognized that my family couldn’t see me to the gate anymore. I don’t remember what life in the United States was like when we felt like—or were told that, more accurately—our borders were so secure that nobody could ever touch us.
But I wish I could remember these things. I wonder if my grandma liked to tell me that story so much about Pearl Harbor because it was her one clear snapshot amidst the innumerable things that changed, things she couldn’t quite recognize.
I don’t know if we could categorize the ways our world has changed since 9/11. All I have is that moment I remember, however patched together and inaccurate: the last moment of then before our world of now.