A moment of Silence for 9/11

It almost slipped my mind that it was 9/11. I mean i'm sure i would have noticed the date sooner or later. But between the hurricane and Paul, my mind is running 100 miles an hour. As i dropped Hannah off at school, we all had a moment of silence to remember those lost in the attacks on the WTC. I can't believe it was 7 years ago! It still does seem like yesterday.

I remember exactly what i was doing at that moment. I was answering phones in front at Atlas24(my old job, pre-marriage). We all had to relieve the receptionist in front and i was up there giving her a bathroom break and the phone rings. One of the guys that worked in the mail room had called to ask if we heard about the plane crashing in NYC yet? I had no idea. Then moments later the meeting room a few steps away was full of employees with the T.V. on watching...and then ANOTHER plane hit. I was in shock. I was anxious to go back to my desk but the phones went crazy about the same time. EVERYONE was calling to see if we were watching T.V. Working at a travel agency, we have to be aware of things like this, because they immediately stopped all air traffic and our phones at the 24 hour service(a small entity of Navigant Intl.) would be hit hard with people stuck while traveling on business. I finally made it back to my desk and our whole room(we had 4 t.v.s so we could watch the weather, news and anything else we felt impt to business travel) was full of people. It was loud and our phones were going crazy. My boss was running around like a chicken with her head cut off trying to figure out what to do as home agents called asking what we should do. We ended up turning most people away for the first few hours as things settled down and we tried to figure out what we should do with all of these business travelers calling for help. Everyone wanted to get home right that minute. EVERYONE. BUT, no one wanted to fly...and of course they couldn't b/c all air traffic was stopped that day and a day or two following the attacks. We ended up booking car after car and people were willing to drive from where ever they were back home. Not to long after, the cars ran out and people were livid. I felt sorry for our agents at that time because there was nothing we could do for them...besides tell them to hang out. I remember very vividly, one guy called and decided to take a cab from where ever he was, back home. It was going to cost him up in the range of 1000 dollars, he did it anyway b/c he wanted to get home and there was no other way at that time.

Emotionally i was a wreck. Every once in a while we'd hear a story of a client that knew someone that died that day. It was soo sad and heartbreaking. What do you say to comfort someone in that situation. Day after day we'd hear stories of people that we worked with up north that knew someone, whether a family member or friend that didn't make it. It was such a tragedy!

Not to long after that i saw a special on all the pregnant women who lost their husbands on oprah! I still remember that like it was yesterday. It was so sad, i cried through the entire show.

Please pay your respects for those lost on 9/11/01, today. It's a sad day and no American will ever forget it.