Who Knew?

My own personal September 11, 2001, actually began in July when I went to the doctor with what I thought was a bladder or UT infection. This proved not to be the case, and a quick round of tests revealed a cyst on my left ovary. The doctors assured me that it looked benign, but surgery would be necessary to remove it. We set the date – September 11. I took a month’s leave of absence from work, beginning September 10. On the 11^th, I woke up and began to get ready to leave for the hospital, a bit apprehensive, of course. It was not long before we were due to leave that the phone rang and my aunt told us to turn on the radio (we don’t have a TV). Our radio doesn’t pick up well at our house, but what we could hear was stomach-churningly clear – our nation was under attack. I tried to pull up the news on the internet, but the suddenly heavy site traffic prevented us from accessing any news sites quickly (our dial-up connection didn’t help matters).

At the time, experts were predicting a need for massive donations of blood and reporting that some hospitals were already postponing elective surgeries to free up their supplies in case it was needed to ship to NY. My aunt is a nurse and she suggested we call ahead to make sure my surgery was still scheduled. We did, it was, we started for Mobile and were glued to the radio the entire trip south. Reports were starting to come in about the Pentagon, about a possible fourth plane, about possible car bombs in the Capitol. This was not exactly what I would have wished for if asked how to be distracted from my own surgical misgivings.

Of course, the TVs in the hospital waiting room were all showing the same thing (every TV in the country was showing the same thing). The stories and pictures were more and more heartbreaking as the morning went on. Even as minutes passed and there were no new reports of “incidents,” the fear that more attacks were waiting in the wings kept everyone on the edge of their seats – literally and figuratively. Speculation on “why” and “who” and “where next” was the conversation of the day. Only my impending surgery could drag my thoughts away from NY, DC, & PA – and only NY, DC, & PA could drag my thoughts away from surgery. Neither thought process was a calming one.
As my family waited in the waiting room and later visited me in the hospital, my mom kept a journal of all who came to visit or called. In the back of that journal, my nephew Gavin drew some pictures of what he saw on the waiting room TVs that day. The above is one - the WTC with hearts.

My surgery did go well, and the cyst did prove as benign as the doctors had believed. Thus, as I lay in recovery, waiting to go to my room, the conversation turned again to NY, DC, & PA and, more immediately for my family, whether the National Guard would be activated. My father was at the time a member of the 225^th Area Support Group, stationed at Ft. Whiting in Mobile. Even after I came home, we lived in dread of the next phone call being the one that would call him to war.

Instead, on October 4^th, we got the call that my grandmother, my dad’s mom, had been in a car accident. By the time we got to the scene, she had died. Only a matter of days earlier, she and my mom’s mom had both been at the house at the same time, checking on my recovery. That image, of the two of them sitting together on our couch, is one of my most treasured memories. It was one thing I held on to the tightest as we stumbled our way through the week that followed her death. I still have the flowers and ribbon from the bouquet she brought, preserved and safely tucked away. 

In late August of 2002, as the first anniversary of 9/11 approached, I wrote the following piece. It may not be my most eloquent effort, but it is still one of my most heartfelt. God Bless the USA!

October 2000
Who knew by next Halloween the bogeyman would have a face, and the “superheroes” our children would impersonate would be firemen, police officers, and paramedics – hometown heroes, not the Hollywood version?

November 2000
Who knew next Veterans Day we would have so many more veterans, or that their ranks would now include emergency personnel and the common working man?

Who knew by next Thanksgiving we would have so much more to be thankful for?

December 2000
Who knew by the next Pearl Harbor Day, there would be another “day that will live in infamy?”

Who knew by next Christmas our wish lists would be so much simpler; and that “peace on earth, goodwill to men” would be a prayer, a plea, and not just another phrase in a song?

January 2001
Who knew that this first year of a fresh new millennium would end in war, or that this year would redefine us as Americans and as individuals?

February 2001
Who knew by next Valentine’s Day we would have so many more broken hearts?

March 2001
Who knew that by next St. Patrick’s Day, we would not just all be Irish, but we would all be American, united as rarely before, wearing not just green, but red, white, and blue?

April 2001
Who knew by next April 19, another hole would be torn in the heart of America?

Who knew by next Easter, we would cling more tightly to the hope of the Resurrection?

May 2001
Who knew by next Mothers Day, we would have lost so many mothers, and have so many more mothers raising children alone?

Who knew by next Memorial Day  there would be so much and so many more to remember?

June 2001
Who knew by next Flag Day we would treasure our flag and the freedoms it represents so much more, or that so many would already have a flag displayed – on their house, on their lawn, on their car?

Who knew by next Fathers Day, we would have lost so many fathers, and have so many more fathers raising children alone?

July 2001
Who knew by next July Fourth, we would have another anniversary we could invoke by just the date; that watching a plane take off or land or just fly over could be as patriotic an act as waving the flag; or that going to work could be our own act of defiance?

August 2001
Who knew that family vacations would be so much more significant and that going back to school could be such a precious freedom?

September 2001
Who knew by next Labor Day the working man would be on the front lines of homeland defense, or that going to work could be just as perilous as going to war?

Sunrise, September 11 – who knew?