I had a different post written and scheduled to publish today, but then I noticed what the date was. I thought about writing something new, but decided to just
re-post this one from a decade ago. All of the comments on that post are gone because we were using a different commenting platform called Haloscan at the time, and they went defunct in 2009. So, if you'd like to share your memories, we would love to read them. When I re-read this post I realize how grateful I am that I wrote it because, seriously, I could never remember these details or write this again. What a day that was.

On
September 11, 2001 Roger and I woke in a cabin in Sierra City, Ca. The
phone was ringing in our room. It was the first full day of our
vacation. We had left Santa Cruz on Sunday afternoon September 9th and
driven 250 miles to Truckee, Ca where we spent the night, and the
morning drove the back roads to Sierra City. Our plan was to get there
some time on the 10th, maybe do an afternoon hike, but to start our
hiking vacation in the beautiful
Lake Basin
on the 11th. Our cabin had a full kitchen and bath, a TV with
satellite, a telephone. We didn't have cell phones or a laptop.
Primitive by 21st century standards. I had given our travel plans to my
mother and my sister. They always know where we are, and we talk
everyday no matter what. So even though we planned to be essentially out
of touch, we were not out of reach.
The phone rang in
our cabin at 7:00 in the morning. I couldn't believe it. Who would
possibly call us so early? I picked up the phone with trepidation. It
was my sister. She said, "Turn the TV on."
I said, "Are you kidding. It's 7:00 in the morning. No. You have to tell me why first."
She said, "Turn the TV. You have to see what's going on."
I said, "You have to tell me why first, Lynn. You're totally scaring me."
She said, "Planes hit the World Trade Center in NY. Turn on the TV. You have to watch this."
I said, "Oh my god."
I
hung up, while Roger fiddled around with the satellite TV and found the
news. We turned it on just in time to see the first building fall.
This
was the first morning of our vacation. We didn't know whether to stay
in Sierra City or drive home immediately. We kept the TV on and thought
about it for a while. We made our tea and toast and watched the second
building fall. We both said out loud in that cabin, "Osama bin Laden."
We knew right away. We did not say, Saddam Hussein. We knew right away.
We
decided that we should at least hike that morning and think about what
to do while we were out on the trails. We hiked around between 6,000 and
8,000 feet. We cried at alpine lakes. We wondered about our loved ones
who worked in NYC (who we later learned were in the throngs of people
who walked across the Brooklyn Bridge that day). Our original plan had
been to stay until some time late on Friday, but this disaster took all
the joy out of our steps.
We stayed all day Wednesday
and took a longer and more challenging hike in the high country, but
felt hollow and detached from the moment. We decided to pack our car and
head home on Thursday morning. We needed to be with our families and
our neighbors. We listened to NPR all the way home. We arrived and found
our nearest and dearest neighbors, we stood in the middle of the street
for a long time talking with them. We repeated every story, every
rumor, every fear, every hope.
We knew then that some
aspect of our nation's innocence had been taken, but what we hadn't
expected was how the Bush administration would steal everything else.
And here we are.
Where were you that day, and how do you feel about it all now?