always remember...

Growing up it seemed like the "old people" always had an event in history where they remembered exactly where they were and what they were doing in that moment. I never thought that I would feel like part of history that way, until 9/11/01.

I was in my second year of college (first year at KU) and living in Oliver Hall. I was sleepily getting ready to walk out the door for my early morning class when my phone rang.  It was my mom, she knew better than to call me that early. She said "turn on the TV," in a very urgent tone. Still half asleep, I fumbled for the remote and turned on the TV.  All I saw was a couple of tall buildings with some smoke coming out of the windows. In that moment, I was too focused on getting to class on time that I rushed off the phone and out the door without actually realizing what was going on.  When I got to class, only a couple of people had heard anything about the event.  At that time, we all just thought it was a simple airplane accident and one girl even said "yeah, I heard 5 people died." Even though that would be a tragedy in itself, it wasn't startling enough to worry about that early in the morning and we proceeded on with class.  Little did we know the true terror that was unfolding. The moment I returned to the dorm, I knew something wasn't right.  What was normally a loud and crazy building with people buzzing about everywhere, was now eerily quiet.  As a walked back to my room I passed room after room filled with my dorm mates silently crowded around their TVs, some crying, but most with jaws open in shock. I remember returning to my room, turning on the TV and just starring at the screen for what seemed like hours. 

The next few weeks around the dorm were the same, people crowded in rooms starring at TV screens and crying on each others shoulders.  Thats when I realized that I have become a part of history, that I will always remember exactly where I was, exactly what I was doing in this moment....