Do you remember where you were on 9/11/01?

I worked third shift security at a hospital at the time, and was on my way home from my shift while I was listening to Bob and Tom on the radio. When I first turned it on, I thought they were just up to their usual antics, which I recall saying to myself this wasn't a very funny skit they were doing (as some of their stuff wasn't always hilarious) - but then I quickly realized that it wasn't a joke when the second hit. Next thing I remember was running into the house and turning on the TV and waking up my wife just as tower 1 began to crash down.

I had just dropped my then 4 year old off at pre-school. His first day. Beautiful morning, then took the baby to get a bagel and someone came running in and told everyone. I listened on the radio until I could pick up the 4 year old and then went home and watched on TV. My kids had no idea, I didn't let them see it, too young to understand. They played in the garden while I would pop inside to watch every now and then. The end of the innocence.

I was last minute cramming for my Calculus exam later that morning...I had the t.v. on for background and was just going over some last minute stuff for my exam. I remember being just completely dumbfounded and unsure of what had just happened...

I had about three hours until I had to be on campus for my exam and kept waiting for word that the University would be closed...I think everyone was so dumbfounded that business just went on as usual that morning. I arrived on campus for my exam and thankfully my professor had half a brain and at least cancelled the exam as nobody was in the right frame of mind for that...we all just sat around talking about what we had just seen. When class let out, the University finally cancelled all remaining classes that day...I was a bit surprised that it took them well into the afternoon to do so.

I was active duty US Air Force stationed over in Europe at Aviano Air Base (North of Venice ~ 40 miles or 80 Kilometers away). I will never forget that day. It was ~2:30pm our time (~8:30am Eastern) and we (many personnel I worked with) were outside on break. We've been working since 6am because we had about 5 miles of network cable to run - we had to set up comms for a new building.

We finished storing our gear and this young Airman came running outside saying the World Trade Center Tower got hit by a plane. At first we all thought what a horrible tragedy. We came inside to watch the news - soon thereafter we saw the second plane hit - it was then we knew we were under attack. Next came the Pentagon and then the Flight 93 crash - not knowing what else to do some prayed and some cried.

The rest of the day seemed to last for ever - being an ex-cop (US Air Force) I stayed at work for a long time. I got home around 9pm......and then cried, prayed and did what I could to comfort others.

I was in grade 9, but home sick and watching the news live.

It was INSANE.

As someone who was living in NYC at the time, it still sometimes amazes me that I can remember every detail of that day so clearly all these years later.

When the news broke that a plane had hit one of the towers, I was sitting on the couch of my Murray Hill apartment, eating an English muffin and watching Today. I had a job interview that morning (and another one scheduled for the afternoon). My first thought on seeing video of the gaping wound in the side of the Tower was that a small plane wouldn't have done that much damage. My second thought was of my friend who worked in the Trade Center. I'd met her there for lunch about a week before to celebrate her birthday. I sat glued to the news footage as there was an explosion from the second tower. Of course it became clear this was no accident. I remember meteorologist Janice Huff called into Today to point out that it was indeed another plane hitting the building. It was soon time to leave for my interview. It was right in the neighborhood. Madison in the 30s. I walked out into a clear, dry, sunny morning. One of those perfect September days. And walked the few blocks to my appointment. When I arrived, everyone in the office was sitting in a conference room tuned to CNN. The woman with whom I was meeting asked if I knew what was going on downtown. I told her I did and she said her husband worked near the WTC. We started the interview, although our minds were elsewhere. Someone barged into the room to announce that another plane had hit the Pentagon. We tried to continue in spite of the distractions. Suddenly we heard a collective gasp from the conference room. My interviewer grabbed me by the hand and we ran down the hall, only to discover the first tower had just collapsed. That was pretty much the end of my interview. It didn't matter. the job wasn't right for me. I walked home. The sky still blue, the air still clear...not a hint of the dust and smoke that would soon cast a pall over the city.

The rest of the day was somewhat surreal. I watched the fall of the second tower, learned about the plane down in Pennsylvania and wondered what the next target would be. My apartment was just a few blocks east of the Empire State Building and a few blocks south of Grand Central Station. Who could feel safe? I went outside to get away from the news footage. There were people walking uptown, traumatized, some covered in dust from the Towers. Others sat outside in cafes as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened. That evening we had dinner, as planned at Keene's Chophouse...meeting my sister-in-law's new boyfriend (now husband) for the first time. We were surrounded by stranded out-of-towners. It would be some time before normal air travel resumed. The only planes overhead were military fighter jets and helicopters. My own parents were stuck in Hawaii.

On Wednesday the 12th the wind changed direction and the smell of smoke blew uptown, leaving a layer of dust on our windows. That night our building was evacuated due to a bomb threat. We stood on the sidewalk with contraband cats (no pets allowed in our co-op) and wondered what to do. What would happen next? I had a few nightmares.

The next few days were heartbreaking, as the families of the missing plastered posters of their loved ones all over the city. Husbands, wives, sons and daughters, smiling in pictures copied at Kinkos and hung from every bus shelter and lamp post in the city. We got used to the sight of armed guards patrolling the streets and barricades outside nearby landmarks. And the purple bunting that draped the neighborhood firehouses.

When the streets of lower Manhattan finally reopened to the public, my husband and I headed downtown. The streets were sill coated in dust and covered in debris. Scraps of paper everywhere. Shop windows clouded in dirt. From my sister-in-law's office building about a block away from Ground Zero, we could get a full view of the scope of the devastation. Until then, I hadn't realized how large the "pit" actually was. The images on television couldn't capture the scale of it.

Early morning (I was on the west coast). Playing EverQuest and had something on the tv in the background when they cut to breaking news. I watched the plane fly into the second tower.

I'll never forget that morning.

I was (in Connecticut) sitting in the dentist's chair getting a root canal. My dentist was a fellow grad of the military college we attended and as Army buddies was giving me VIP treatment. As we watched, he said to me, "I think we're at a place we can stop for today. Meet me at the train station in 2 hours?" We gathered gear and as fate would have it, we were allowed into the area early the next day; both because of our professions after the Army. He, a dentist would be needed to help ID, and me as an EMS worker. I never went back and finished that root canal, and finally just had that tooth pulled. I couldn't bear to finish it, like that pain for 13 years was my penance in some weird way. This day is always so incredibly emotional for me and I think this is the first and last "share" I will participate in. God Bless America.

In the bike shop picking up my bike. Watched the towers come down with the owner. Neither of us could believe it. I still can't. This anniversary is even sadder because my sister passed away last week and I am feeling all losses even more. To all those who lost someone dear to you that day I am thinking of you and sending a prayer of healing for our world that things like this will end.

Senior year of high school, AP Physics class. The assistant principal came over the intercom and said something like "We've been attacked," while clearly sobbing. Our teacher turned on the TV in the room and we watched maybe 3 minutes, enough to see that the attack was in NYC and the twin towers were gone. Then she declared, "There's nothing we can do about that," turned the TV off and continued her lesson.

Now I'm an educator myself and that taught me a lesson in self-awareness.

I was at home working and had the tv on in my office. I went upstairs and had the kids go watch tv in my bedroom and turned on the living room tv and watched everything unfold with my husband. He is in law enforcement so he knew he'd be called into work so he got ready for work and within minutes he was called in early as was the whole police force.

I was driving to my job at a furniture/design store on that day and heard stuff on the radio that was very confusing because I was fresh out of college and therefore only half-awake in the mornings. When I got to work, my boss filled me in. I remember thinking he was truly a jerk because he was kind of laughing and joking about it all day while others were very upset. That night I made a really bad decision to spend the night with a guy I was only casually dating because you know, what if the world ended!? lol

I was working in an office building in Hartford, CT. my (now ex) husband was working from home and called to tell me the news, which I immediately shared with my co-workers. We all tried to get what we could from the internet, but most of the news sites were overloaded . . so I stayed on the line with my husband and relayed information to my co-workers. When the second tower was hit, and then the Pentagon, I told my husband I was coming home. He said "why?", I said "I work in a tower, I'm coming home. If this is the end of it all, I want to be with those that I love.".

We sat in silence watching the news until my 6 year old daughter came home from school. We did our best to explain it to her.

I was a bit worried about my dad and his wife, who both lived and worked in DC. After the fact my dad told me that his office in the Pentagon was close to where the plane hit. He had retired a few years before the attack.

I remember the eerie silence in the days afterwards, with no air traffic, how we had grown so accustomed to hearing the sound of planes, and when the sound was not there anymore.

What I remember even more clearly was the following year. I had just pulled into the parking garage when the news announcer on the radio called for the moment of silence in honor of those lost. And on the street below someone was playing the bagpipes. And it was a beautiful cloudless day, just as it had been the year before. And I began to sob, because the sense of loss was just so overwhelming, even though I had not personally lost anyone near and dear to me.