September 11, 2001. We all remember this day that the twin towers fell. I was surprised to find in my photo albums I wrote my thoughts and where I was during this time. I was alone with my kids since Doug was away in Utah on an away rotation. He had been out there for two weeks already. This was the day I was suppose to fly out and meet him. (weird to think that) You can imagine how anxious I was to see him and then this all occurred. I saw it right as I was finishing up my morning news that I used to type up and summarize. Live... a plane crashing through the twin towers. I don't think I left my television set the entire day, it was definitely surreal. I did fly out about three days later to see him. I remember my kids and I on a plane with probably only 5 or 6 other people on the entire flight. It was an eerie time.
September 11, 1998, is ironically another scary day that took place in my life. My grandparents came out to visit me in New Orleans. It was raining quite a bit, and as you all know now it flood rather quickly. I didn't think anything of it, it was raining and I went ahead to take them to see the sites downtown. Doug was at school, however at the time I didn't know that he left early and already headed back home. Well, the rain wasn't letting up and the streets were becoming flooded with water. Many people like myself found ourselves driving on the neutral ground. (the ground in the middle of the road) I seriously began to panic. Wouldn't you? It was a new city to me and I didn't really know my way around all to well. I pulled into a parking garage on La Salle since all the streets going home were unsafe to drive down due to water. We ended up sitting in a hotel for a few hours. I used the pay phone a number of times trying to call my house hoping I would get an answer. (this was before cell phones) Taylor was 14-months at the time and was really pretty good considering the situation. I was the one who was a mess! Finally, after the water began to reseed a little and I made the decision we should just try to head home. This picture was actually taken in Amy's car on their drive home. We had our camera with us, but it was in the trunk and there was no way I was stopping for a picture. Now I wished I would have.
I found out they canceled classes at the medical school due to all the flooding. Doug had already left and gone home with Dave in his big white truck. No worries there!! They could go over huge puddles no problem so they were safe. He also thought I was too, little did he know we were in several inches of water driving home. I was supposed to be home not driving out in crazy weather. I think it took us over 2 hours to get home that day once we got back in the car and had to go a round about way home due to the flooding. Normally it would have been a 15 minute drive. The funny thing is my grandparents never visited after that traumatic experience. I don't think I drove out in many rainstorms after this occurrence for a while.
Today is my grandma's birthday. This is one of my favorite pictures of her and I. I have several, but I happened to find this one. I could probably write a novel about what a wonderful woman she is, but instead I thought I would pick some of my favorite highlights about her. As you can see in this picture we are matching. I have a number of pictures of us together like this.
-I loved going on annual August trips with my grandparents driving across the different states.
-Utah, All over AZ, New Mexico, Montana, Idaho, just to name a few.
-She always bought me my favorite Brachs candy.
-Would let me pick the hotel when traveling (and it had to have a swimming pool) Looking back they were pretty dumpy! Can you imagine letting an 8 year old pick your place to sleep?
-Saturday mall trips (I never left empty handed)
-Calling her at Talley everyday when she worked.
-Sunday dinners
-Homemade bread and sugar cookies
-Going to eat Mattas EVERY Friday night.
-Sleeping in my holly hobby room.
-Always buys traditional Hallmark cards and includes stickers. (still to this day she does this).
-The only person I know who cleans "freaky" like me. (I wonder where I got this from?)
-Goes out of her way to help others.
-Is the best grandma in the world!!
Happy Birthday Gram!
9 comments:
great post.
Can you believe it has already been five years? I was home, Greg had just gotten home and went to bed, when I turned the tv on and could hardly pull myself away from it all day. It was a day I will never ever forget. A day of feeling totally numb wondering if there was more waiting to happen.
Happy Birthday to your Grandma!
My dog (at my mom's house) had to be put to sleep today. I was very upset leaving work, and I was crying a little bit on the subway. (I live in NYC) Later in the night, I saw 3 or 4 people crying in the street. I wondered if they were crying about loved ones lost on 9/11 or something else. It was just a really bizarre day in general.
Jenny,
I LOVE that picture of you and your grandma! That should really be framed in your house!
I was on my way to work and I turned on NPR, I was trying to figure out what happened, nothing made any sense at first.
I remember you trying to get out of NOLA. When they finally did reschedule flights out of MSY didn't you still get delayed 3 hours? That's when they stopped letting people back to the gate with you, right? I felt so bad that you had to carry all that stuff by yourself, but you just knew where it all went. I think you missed Doug so badly that you would have walked to Utah. In fact, I think you considered driving there...
Five years, wow. I was sitting on the couch after working the night shift and watching mindless TV to help destress, my husband called me from work and told me to turn on the TV, I was in shock. Chicago went into a slight panic and barricaded all the federal buildings and closed the day trading. Our families were frantic, they had heard that Chicago was a target also and they couldn't get through to us until the next day.
How grateful I am for the sacrifice of so many, I enjoy many freedoms and am so blessed.
Just thinking of this day, the loss and the bravery of others makes me teary.
How frightening for you to be caught in the flooding city.
Jenny, we were supposed to fly on that morning too. We had been in Utah/Idaho, and were about to go to the airport when Ben's bro called, he was working in NYC at the time, we rushed to the airport to see if we could still make our flight. But of course it was cancelled. We ended up driving home to CA. It was really freaky being in the airport when every single screen read cancelled.
We were living with my parents in 2001 and I had turned on the radio and they were talking frantically about NYC and the first tower falling, I ended up turning on the tv and sitting there in a trance all day. My kids were 3 and almost 1 at the time and just floated around me that day as I watched in horror all the coverage. It was a terrible day.
Jenny, I remember you trying to fly out at that time. I felt so sad for you. Crazy how that seems almost like yesterday. I thought you were so brave to fly out when you did. Looking back, that was probably a very safe time to fly due to all the extra security. I found out about the towers driving home from Chanel's (just dropped Hayden off at Joy School). Dori and I went straight to Winn-Dixie to stock up on water and canned food. Don't think I turned off the TV for a solid week! So many memories and feelings surround that day.
PS - That was so nice of you to take Angie's daughter for her. What a pal you are! That is true friendship. I'm sure she had a much better time, thanks to you!
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