I was very young when 9/11 occurred. To me, it could have happened yesterday. I was five years old on that fateful day. I had just begun first grade and my mother was my teacher. I remember we were doing math when my mother received a call. It was my father. She got very quiet after answering the phone. When she hung up she started crying. I was worried and I went up to her and said; “Mommy, what’s wrong?” She answered; “Some very bad people crashed a plane into a building in New York City.” At that time, the only building I knew in New York was the Empire State Building, so I asked if it was that one. My mom said no and went to talk to another teacher.

We went on throughout the day doing normal things I remember my mom saying “Oh god.” When she heard about the second plane and the subsequent crashes into the Pentagon and the field in Pennsylvania. A lot of kids were picked ip early. I remember teachers crying ad me still not understanding why. While I may not have understood it then, I do now. Watching footage of the attack makes me cry. I cannot imagine what it would have been like if I had been old enough to understand what was going on when it actually happened. “I just thank my lucky stars to be living here today, because the flag still stands for freedom, and they can’t take that away.”