A much deeper story

The kids have always been aware to certain degrees about the horror that rocked our country eleven years ago today; one day before my daughter's third birthday. My husband and I fought hard to shield her in order to continue the excitement of her soon-to-be-birthday, but it was really tough. My girl has always had an amazing intuition/wisdom - even at three - and she knew something was wrong.

To her - bad guys crashed into a building. The End.

Ironically, the day after my son's first birthday that same year, the United States declared war on Afghanistan.

Two somber birthday celebrations in our house that year.

I remember my husband was downstairs making his breakfast on September 11th, while I was upstairs getting myself ready for the day, kids still asleep in their rooms, before my hubby burst into the bathroom rambling something about the World Trade Center - a plane had flown into it.

My first thought was, "Oh, that is so sad." and continued getting ready; not even questioning that it was a plane littered with terrorists, but rather a plane with a "freak accident" type-of-situation.

I joined my husband downstairs just as the news footage was showing the plane crashing into the building. But then there was confusion on the screen - and my husband and I both looked at each other in shock and kept questioning one another -

"Was that a replay?" 
"That was a replay, right?"
"They got footage of the plane .... "
"Wait ... that was a second plane?"
"Wait ... how many planes ..."
"What are they showing us?"
"What's happening?"

Shock. We stopped talking. Silence. We could not believe the reality of what we were seeing, hearing, and the news reports coming through.

Eventually we had to snap out of our viewing of the television and get our precious children from their bedrooms, feed them breakfast, and continue "normal" in our very chaotic and confused world.

I am not sure why I continued my day as planned. I had a dental appointment, and it was arranged that my sister-in-law would watch my two children while I was away. I remember leaving them with my sister-in-law during the time when we knew for certain what was really happening, what had happened. At the time of seeing her, the United States had already grounded all aircraft. We live close enough to the International Airport to have flight patterns high above, subconsciously hearing planes in flight, knowing they are there. Now, it was eerily quiet with nothing in the sky.

I sat in the dentist chair with the National News playing on every television in the entire building, nobody talking, but life continuing as "normal".  I drove home and it seemed like every car that passed was just void. As if we all knew what the other was thinking, but nobody was saying it, screaming it, crying it. Just moving. Numb.

The rest of the day, and nights, for weeks were spent tucking the kids to bed early enough to watch the news in silence, and without tiny, innocent eyes included in the room. It was one of those dis-belief moments when you could not turn away from it, but you did not really want to live it, see it, accept it.

Today both of my children are at an age where their classes talked about September 11, 2001. My daughter watched a documentary from CNN - a more graphic view than what she had ever witnessed prior, or heard prior. But it was needed - it was the right time. My son was shown a different video, more age appropriate for his grade, but he hasn't talked to the length that my daughter has this evening.

I think this year she really got it - it was not just a bad guy crashing into a building. It was a much deeper story.