24 Years Later, Remembering 9/11

The remaining steel parts of the WTC

I remember September 11, 2001.

I was in Toronto at the time, taking a course in Corporate Communications at a local college.

Our class assignment that morning was to look up some information online and we kept getting news reports of a small plane that had crashed into the World Trade Tower.

The 9/11 Memorial and Museum in New York

So our instructor turned on the television and we were in shock seeing not a small plane, but a passenger plane crashed into the tower, smoke billowing from there. 

How could that have happened?

Then another plane was crashed into the other World Trade Tower. We were horrified and terrified.

I called my parents and told them to turn on the television. It was so surreal I could not explain it over the phone.

Then seeing the towers collapse... that was absolutely terrifying.

We were allowed to go home, too dazed to do anything. I went home and was glued to CNN for the rest of the day.

That night I remember being really really scared that maybe something would happen to us.

One of the two reflecting pools at the WTC site

In 2015 I visited the National September 11 Memorial and Museum in New York and it was so sad and depressing going through and seeing all the items that were collected, from the twisted metal from the World Trade Center, to the photographs of all the victims. It was heartbreaking listening to a retired fire chief recall what happened that day.

Today, 24 years after 9/11, the world has changed so much for the worse.

When we were younger, we always had the belief that the future was bright, it was going to be better, we would achieve peace thanks to greater understanding, acceptance of diversity and cooperation.

Instead it was gone the opposite direction.

We need greater compassion, understanding, and love for each other, not polarisation, fighting and ego. 

Hope is not enough.