My September 11th post

Good afternoon,

Today is a somber day for Americans, to say the least. September 11th, 2001 is the "where were you when...?" moment of Americans of my generation. The reason I feel like talking about this moment on my blog is appropriate is because thinking about it makes me think of a time in my life when I was sure that I was invincible. Here's the story...

I had just turned 23 about two weeks prior to that fateful day. My boyfriend of about five years proposed to me just before guests started arriving for my birthday party. My career was taking off, we were looking forward to standing up in the wedding of our two best friends and I was healthy. And all of that changed in one morning.

I was at work, rolling in a few minutes later than planned as usual. A coworker told me that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. We were puzzled, trying to figure out how a pilot could make such a fatal error. Since I was the Internal Audit Manager of a call center, part of my job involved monitoring phone calls. Every call that I monitored in the next few minutes involved a customer from a different part of the country talking about the plane crash. As the thought of terrorism was forming throughout our nation, I called my fiance, who was at home to tell him to turn on the TV.  We spoke for a few minutes, trying to make sense of what was happening. It was then that he went silent and suddenly said, "Oh my God. A second plane crashed into the other tower." We sat in silence for a moment. I don't remember what we said next, but I eventually got off the phone to try and find a radio in the office (we didn't have internet access back then).  This was the first day in my life that I truly understood how precious life can be.

I suppose that feeling probably faded over the next year as I planned my wedding and finally celebrated my wedding day, followed by a wonderful honeymoon and then the purchase of our first home. Of course, I've received numerous reminders of my new understanding in the years since due to my illness.

So today, I try to recommit myself to remembering just how precious life truly is. Not because I should, but because it really is.  My ancestors came from the Netherlands, Germany, Poland and Austria (as well my Native American relatives who were always here) to give me the life I was blessed with, and many fought to protect my freedom they so strongly believed in.

Never forget.
God bless
-S