Like Erin, I was at college when it happened. I was hanging out in my bedroom, slacking off before my 12:30 class when my phone rang. It was my mom, wanting to know if I was watching the news. When I told her my television was off, she told me that a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center in New York. I forget if I thought it was a small plane or not, but I turned on the television...I think it was after the second plane had hit or just as it hit. I was in complete shock the rest of the day. I remember going to the library for some reason, and there was a television on with the channel turned to CNN or Fox News. My creative writing class was supposed to have a guest speaker that day, but class ended up being canceled when our speaker didn't show, obviously because she was affected by this. My evening class also wound up being cut short so that students could go to the auditorium to participate in a prayer vigil.
Afterwards I was scared. Not for myself, but for my brother and my cousin. I knew that the possibility that the US would go to war over this was great. My cousin was in the Marines, and I knew he would probably end up being shipped overseas. My brother had just turned eighteen, and I was worried that he would get drafted and something would happen to him.
Last year, on the Anniversary, my campus held another prayer vigil. A lot of students spoke, representing various organizations and cultures that were on campus, including non-Christian religions (even Wicca). There were a couple PowerPoint music montages honoring the people who died on that day. I thought it was a very nice ceremony. Not everyone thought so, because an alumnus of the college either attended or heard about the vigil, and he wrote a letter to the town and campus papers saying how he thought the college was moving away from its Christian roots by allowing non-Christian religions (and ideas, since gays were represented at the vigil) to be represented. The audacity and prejudice of this man shocked and sickened me. A couple students gave a nice rebuttal to his argument in the campus paper the following week. However, I don't think that this year there will be another vigil and I think that guy is partially to blame for it.
-Kim