9.11.01

I was 13. Two weeks from 14, and in the 8th grade. Mrs. Hudgins' Algreba class, to be exact.

We knew something was up because teachers kept coming to our door and whispering to Mrs. Hudgins, and there seemed to be some debate over whether or not to turn on the classroom television.

I didn't even know what the World Trade Centers were, to be honest, but apparently a plane had crashed into one of them. A fluke accident, probably. "Terrorism" wasn't a word I was familiar with in middle school.

As I walked into the Gifted Ed. room for my next class, Mrs. Zimmer had the television on-- I don't know if this was a rogue decision on her part or if had finally been decided that the students should be informed. As I put my mesh backpack down, I watched as a plane flew into a tower, and I asked Mrs. Zimmer if this was a replay of what had happened earlier. When she told me that, no, this was live, my 'fluke accident' theory was shot.

I was blissfully unaware that anyone wouldn't like America; we were America, after all. I can even remember thinking proudly that we'd never been on the losing end of a war-- we rocked out that whole Revolution thing, and it seems we were a critical part of those world wars. So who would attack us?... and why?

So when the commentators on the news started postulating this idea that we had been attacked by terrorists, the terrorists got just what they had aimed for-- I was terrified. In my eighth grade mind, I imagined foreigners parachuting into Guntersville, bombs dropping on TVA, and a new regime setting up in DC. In fact, we had a minor earthquake a few days later and it occurred to me for a moment that Suddam Hussein must have just landed and set up shop here in Marshall County.

Ten years later, I still don't board a plane without wondering if I'll ever land, and not because the idea of a multi-ton vehicle flying through the air just boggles my mind to pieces.

So what I've seen on the news, on yard signs, and on Twitter and Facebook all day-- We Will Never Forget-- is true. Ten years later, it's as clear in my almost-24 mind as it was when I was just almost-14. And I suspect when I'm old and withered and almost-34, I still will not have forgotten exactly what was I doing when Terror crashed into America.