An Anecdotal Life

The World Stopped Turning

"Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day?" -- Alan Jackson

         It was a day that would begin with a terrible fear and end in a singular contentment. September 11, 2001. I was not the only one affect and I will not be the last to write about that day. It was not unique to me in any way, and so I, as others have and do and will, must talk about the shared experience to feel once again part of something whole.

         I was walking on campus between classes when I first heard the dim buzz of conversation among the other students. Every so often, one word would rise above the others.

         "...plane..."

         "...New York..."

         "...dead..."

         For those fifteen minutes between classes, reality was suspended. I believed that there had been a plane crash, but it meant nothing. The undercurrent of fear that had been slipping in and out between those words didn't touch me, but swirled around, waiting for me to look up from my thoughts of art history exams and nitpicky professors.

         And when I did, it took hold of my face, looked me in the eye, and did not let go.

         It must have struck me at the moment as a sign of the times, for what I remember more than the message was the messenger. A girl across the auditorium I had just entered, one whose face I can't remember, stood and spoke above the others.

         "I saw it. I just saw it on my cell phone--the news. Someone has attacked New York and Washington."

         I should have felt the ice along my spine then, but I didn't. I stared stupidly at the girl and her cell phone, amazed that she could get the news in such a manner. It was a new luxury then, not one often seen.

         The professor entered then, and we fell silent. He climbed the steps onto the dais with painful deliberation. His face, usually a picture of cheerful cynicism, was ashen and blank. He had nothing in his hands--no notebook, no lesson plan, not even a roll sheet. He was not there to teach.

         I felt the ice.

         He spoke. He told us of the attacks, all of them, and of the suspicion of terrorism. He told us that we were safe, but we didn't believe it. Even as I sat there, teeth clenched, fingers digging into the arms of my chair, eyes wide and bright with fear, he was calm. He gave us something to cling to in those few moments of jarring unfamiliarity, before we fully understood.

         He asked us if we wanted to talk about it, but nobody spoke. We were all bright young idealists who had never conceived that something like this could happen in our lifetimes. What could we talk about?

         We were dismissed and told to go home. We live in an significant port city on the Gulf of Mexico where precautions had to be taken. They wanted us in our homes, not in their way. I stepped from the building with the others, disoriented and caught up in the teasing swirl of fear that danced about in the air.

         Overhead, military helicopters clacked noisily as they hovered and swooped and patrolled. Police cars passed in droves, surrounding the school or speeding on toward the nearby airport. We were being protected, and still I was afraid. I was afraid because my father was one of the protectors, and who would protect him?

         A friend of mine from India caught my elbow and pulled me out of the way of the crowds pouring from the building. His name was Sunil, and he was tall. I felt comforted to see him standing over me.

         Still too disoriented to guide myself, Sunil took me with him to the University Center. There, a crowd of students gathered about a large television, seeing for themselves what was happening. The news showed it over and over again, telling the same story every couple of minutes, but nobody moved. I had to stand on my tiptoes to see, and once I saw, I stopped breathing.

         And then I ran.

         I must have had a dim awareness of the cell phone in my pocket, for I answered it as I stumbled out the doors of the University Center toward my car. It was a friend of mine in Wisconsin; she was safe and she loved me, she said. I cried harder, forcing myself to slow down for safety's sake.

         Once the phone was in my hand, a trickle of reason ran its course through my brain. I knew people in those areas which had been attacked, yet my first thoughts were not of them. Ashamed, I began dialing.

         When the first man answered my call, I stumbled and fell to my knees. The small lunch cooler I'd been carrying fell next to me, breaking open and spilling its contents. I sobbed, grasping blindly for my things, trying to make my friend understand.

         "David, we've been attacked," I cried. David and his brother, Dan, had been sleeping until I called.

         "I don't understand, what are you talking about? Are you okay?"

         "No!" I screamed. "No, they attacked the World Trade Center, they have planes. How could this happen?!"

         "Casey, calm down, tell me what happened."

         "Turn on the television."

         "What channel?"

         "It doesn't matter." I stopped collecting my belongings and covered my face. "It doesn't matter."

         He passed the phone to his brother, who had woken up in the meantime. He told Dan that something was wrong, that I was distraught and that he had to see what was going on. Dan took over damage control while David turned on the television.

         "Hey, babe, what's--"

         And then he stopped. And he knew.

         "Oh, God."

         I felt every death that day. The good people and the bad ones. The mothers and fathers and children, the grandparents, the people who had no one. They passed through me on their way to wherever it was they were going. They touched me. They told me that this was life, and it was precious. They made me feel it, and I did...in my heart, in my bones, in my soul.

         I thought of Mike.

         He was a man I'd known for three years off and on, a friend--my best friend--and more, at times. At other times, I forgot and I let him slip away. At that moment, though I had not spoken to him in some time, he became everything.

         He was in Pennsylvania, but I couldn't get a hold of him by phone. I was helpless to contact the one person in the world that I needed to connect with most. I knew real fear then: the hollowness that comes with not knowing.

         But then time stopped, and I felt whole. The uncertainty and the nervousness that had plagued my thoughts of Mike in the past were washed away on that day. People had been killed, but I was not one of them. Life had been destroyed, but it was not mine.

         I finally knew love, and though it came to me on the wings of death, I knew that I'd been given a gift.


         I was at peace.