Twenty plus 6-7 year old girls run around the my yard, celebrating my oldest child’s birthday.  They are happy, carefree, and oblivious to the absolute horror that occurred well before their birth, ten years ago on this day.  Back then, I worked in the Boston financial district, and as was my usual routine, I checked out Boston.com and CNN.com for the news before settling in for the day.  At first, I thought the plane hitting the WTC was just a stupid person in a Cessna.  I attended a short meeting, and came back to find out about the second plane hitting the WTC.  I also had an email from my mom – she was nervous because my sister, who was in grad school in NYC, had started a new internship that day and my mother wasn’t sure where she was.  Of course, at that point, the cell phones in NYC were no longer working.  Thankfully, we discovered hours later that my sister was safe far from ground zero.

Shortly after the second plane hit, we were informed that the financial district was being evacuated.  I raced to South Station to catch the commuter rail – many of the trains were waiting to fill up before taking off so I was in for a long wait.  I got one of the last seats, and pulled out my trusty Sony FM portable radio with headphones – my pre-iPod form of entertainment on the train.  With those headphones in my ears, I listened to Howard Stern in NYC (well before his satellite radio days) and heard about the attack on the Pentagon.  I also heard about the buildings collapsing.  Strangers tapped my shoulders asking for updates, as I was one of the few with a radio.

At home I was glued to the news coverage all day.  Everyone, from Howard Stern to the news anchors were just as horrified as me and my commuting colleagues on the train.  We were scared.  It wasn’t until the next day that I learned about those that I knew who lost their lives. Cora Holland, my friend’s mom, who was on one of the planes.  Karleton Fyfe, a former coworker who’d recently taken a new job was also on that plane.  Peter West, the dad of my husband’s friend who I had just had a lengthy conversation with the weekend prior at a Labor Day BBQ, was in one of the towers.  All people, like you and me, who went through their regular routine and died for it.

I look back at those running, happy girls.  I am so grateful to those who have sacrificed so much to keep our country safe since then.  To keep those little girls dancing and happy.  And, to me, a writer, it’s hard to find the words to express that gratitude.  So I’ll simply say thank you.

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