September 11, 2001, started as a normal Tuesday morning for me as a junior on the Christian Brothers University women's basketball team. I had 8:00 am Spanish class, and 11:00 am British Literature class with Dr. Pruitt. It was a beautiful day with blue skies. After Spanish, I walked over the computer lab to do some work on a paper. That's when I first heard the news that the first tower of the World Trade Center had been hit. I was in total shock. I walked back, rather ran back to my apartment in Avery where I found my teammates Heather Dirks, Jennifer Giager, and Stephanie Stewart glued to the television.
We watched in horror as the second tower was hit, as the first tower collapsed, and then the second tower collapsed. I watched as people jumped out of the buildings to certain death. Images like these will forever be engraved in my mind. For the first time in my life, it was as if time stood still. Feelings of disbelief, sadness, and horror soon gave way to feelings of anger. Anger that someone was evil enough to carry out such heinous acts on innocent people. The anger led to cravings for revenge against the terrorists.
I walked to my British Lit class where we talked about the events of the morning for about 20 minutes, and Dr. Pruitt let us out of class. We had a prayer vigil in the afternoon in the quad between the library and Nolan engineering building. It was somber, emotional, and eerily quiet.
That's the thing that sticks out to me the most about that tragic day--the quietness. CBU is in the path of Memphis International Airport and FedEx. Airplanes are heard and seen constantly overhead, but not this day. All planes had been grounded, and it was deafly silent on campus. I remember sitting on the concrete walkway in front of my apartment, apartment #7, and trying to wrap my head around the events and the emotions I was feeling. I sat with a notebook and wrote down anything and everything that came to my head. I can still see myself with my head laid back against the bricks, legs straight out in front of me looking up at the sky and just listening. I was listening, but all I heard was silence. There are times now when it is quiet and it reminds me of that day.
I talked with my mom on the phone, and she told me to get gas because there might be a shortage. It was one of the many fears that ran through the country. So, I went to the gas station at Highland and Southern to fill up. Usually I had a teammate with me at all times, but this trip I wanted to be alone.
I don't remember much about the rest of the night, but I remember continuing to watch coverage of the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the flight that crashed in Pennsylvania. It wasn't long before flights were heard again overhead, and we would go back to class the next day and be back to our everyday lives. Except that our every day lives would never be the same.
It's funny the things I do remember about that day. I remember how blue the sky was. I remember exactly where I sat in the computer lab that morning. I remember where I sat in class. I remember where I stood at the prayer vigil. I remember where I got gas. I remember how my apartment was arranged and how we were sitting to watch the news. I remember where and how I sat outside of apartment #7. I remember the silence. I remember the horror. But most importantly, I remember the people who lost their lives, the people who risked their lives for others, the families who lost loved ones, and a country who came together in the face of adversity.
Sarah Condra
Class of 2004
No comments:
Post a Comment