One of a million stories

Five years and I still cry remembering it. I told myself not to think about it, but how can you not? I think about how much I hurt and can't even imagine what it's like for those that were directly affected. The only thing that comforted me that day was just as I was falling to sleep, I had this vision of thousands of spots of life being welcomed into heaven.

I was at home, eating cereal and talking on the phone. I was thinking about how DS was 14mos that day. I was sad DH was at work. He had just gotten back from his yearly AT for the Army Reserves. He'd flown into Dulles on the 9th, had the 10th off and the 11th had to go back to work. He was a Federal police officer at the time, working HQ at a gov't building.

I wandered into the living room, where the news was on. It had just happened and the sound was down. I told my friend, "Hey some kind of plane just hit a building." Neither of us knew what was going on, and we watched in horror as what seemed to be an accident became a certain act of terrorism. We watched the second plane fly into the WTC. Fear set in. What made it burrow into my heart was when the Washington correspondent in the Pentegon reported a boom and shaking.

Suddenly, they could be anywhere. My husband was in the DC area. As a cop, he'd be one of the last to leave the building. I hung up on my friend and frantically called my husband. He told me they were busy working on dealing with the situation. His parting words were, "If anything happens, know I love you."

Frantically I tried to find someone to reach out to, so I wasn't alone. I called my SIL in WA, they were still asleep and hadn't heard the news. We cried and were scared together. I had to answer call waiting, MIL then FIL, people calling to see if we were ok. I had no info, I watched the news hoping for no news about the building my husband was in. Suddenly the phones went dead. No calls could get in or out. The TV was my only link.

I finally went to my friend's house and we waited out the day together. Her cell was kind of working (our town had no cell tower). I tried to call my husband again, got one person then the connection cut. I remember sitting on her green lawn on that beuatiful morning and crying. I can't remember anything else TBH. It's like I blocked it out.

It's just one of millions of stories of that day, but it still amazes me how the shadows of those feelings can come back so strong. My husband didn't want to go to work today. I can't even imagine what he relives when he thinks of that day. Sadly, we don't talk about it much. We didn't even on that day. I vaguely remember him coming home and just hugging, and he handed me an angel statue. Maybe it was the next day? It was all a blur.