September 11, 2001

At 8:00 am this morning, my mother woke me up. She sat down on my bed and gently said "Darling, I think this is something you would want to know. This morning, terrorists high-jacked four commercial airlines and flew two of them into the World Trade Center and one into the Pentagon." For a few brief moments, I thought I was still dreaming - at times I still do.

I got up and went to our family room and sat down to watch the news, still not really comprehending what was happening. My father said to me, "I had hoped that in your life time, you would never have seen America attacked." For two hours, I sat staring at the news just trying to understand - and I do not think I ever will. I saw the coverage of the World Trade Center collapsing, and I will forever remember a quick interview with one young man, all he could really say was "This is Armageddon man . . ." I will forever remember the people running for their lives. Watching the news was like watching some movie - it was not real, it could not be real.

Every channel I have seen has headlines of "Terrorism Hits America" and "Attack on America" - phrases that will stay with me all my life. Watching the news, seeing the numbers go up, seeing the time lines - all of it is surreal, it is like watching an active war zone and not really seeing it at all.

What made it become real to me, at 10:00/10:30 am, downtown Anchorage Alaska was evacuated and they originally did not report as to why. I grabbed a phone and called my friends who go to school not to far from that area; I could not get a hold of them. Turns out, everything was fine and the students at that school did not even know about the evacuation.

I have spoken to a lot of my friends and we all have the same worries - first in our minds are our friends who are in the military, it does seem very childish but some of us are just out of high school, we are still young and our friends are important to us. Everyone I know is in disbelief, no one really believed that this could happen. One of my friends said all she could think about were the children who went to school this morning, who were evacuated and were waiting for parents to come for them - and who never were picked up and won't be.

Today has been compared to Pearl Harbor; America has been attacked and no one believes it. But as in Pearl Harbor, America will rise. I have seen the people of this nation pull together, even in their shock, to help those who have been hurt so horribly. Other nations have come to stand by our side, to show that this was not only an attack against America, but against the free world.

I have no idea what tomorrow will bring. I have not the slightest idea what the future is. Some people have told me today that "This means War" and they fear that this might be the beginning of WW III. I hope beyond hope that they are wrong.