I woke up on September 11, kissed Peter goodbye as
he left for work in Manhattan, and went to the gym
nearby in Brooklyn. As soon as I stepped onto the
treadmill, I watched on TV as news reports came in
about a plane hitting the first WT tower.
Everyone at the
gym seemed shocked, but we really thought it was some
sort of accident, and almost kind of funny.
Then, on TV, we watched as the second building was hit.
Everyone instantly seemed to know that we were involved
in something big and horrible.
I ran out of the gym and onto Flatbush Avenue,
where a crowd had gathered to look up at
the burning towers.
A group of men were talking loudly about how everyone should own a gun and keep it loaded.
A police car pulled up and shouted out to us that the
Pentagon had been hit as well.
I started to panic and ran home to call Peter.
I just wanted him home. I turned on the TV, and began to record every news cast being transmitted.
I finally got a hold of Peter
and he said he was going to walk home.
(His office is far enough north as to not be in danger).
I then called a friend of mine, Jon Santini, in NYU
housing near the WTC. This was after both plane crashes,
but before the buildings collapsed.
Jon was okay, and seemed very calm.
I hung up with him, and seconds later, I watched
on TV as the first tower collapsed.
I was so startled, and my biggest
concern was for the NYU students, like Jon, who lived nearby.
I grabbed my video camera and ran down Flatbush, just as
the second tower collapsed. I ran nearer and nearer to the
water, but all you could see now, where the towers had
once been, was clouds of smoke.
Every business in downtown Brooklyn had sent its
employees home, and the streets were packed with
people moving away from Manhattan.
The attitude was very polite and practical, but with a rising
sense of panic to contact others. Phones were only
working sporadically, and cell phones were not working
at all.
The lines for pay phones were 5-10 people deep.
I went to the hospital to try and give blood, and so many
people had come out that they were turning new donors
away.
I saw entire families and little children wearing paper masks, which seemed so very wrong.
I stopped into the grocery store, and people were buying gallons of water and other staples.
I went home after a few hours and began to try and call family.
My landlord ran frantically upstairs to tell us to close
our windows in case of a germ warfare attack.
Peter eventually managed to walk home, and I ran out
to meet him in the streets.
We both silently watched TV reports until we felt sick,
and then we just had to get out and went to the park.
The dust cloud was getting very thick in Brooklyn,
and bits of paper and ash were fluttering down. You
could see helicopeters and fighter planes up in the very
blue sky.
On our way home from the park, we saw a man
sitting alone on a park bench crying.
A woman stopped to ask him if he was okay,
and he said that his mother and sister both worked in the
towers, and that he had not heard from them yet.
My heart fell to the ground.
We went home, and answered emails and phone calls.
And then tried to sleep with the vision of the explosion
in our minds.
Today, September 12, is my 23rd birthday.
I walked down to the waterfront in Brooklyn and joined
thousands of others in watching the smoke rise up where
the two buildings stood 24 hours before.