I'm still hurting

It was four years ago. Four years ago.

I was in college. It was my senior year. I remember that I'd got to my Literature in Secondary Schools class at 7:30 that morning. Vicki Scaggs walked in and said, "Some planes hit the Twin Towers. I just heard it on the radio."

I thought, "Huh. That doesn't sound too good. That's too bad."

Class went on as usual. None of us suspected that while we were discussing the lesson plans we'd written for To Kill a Mockingbird, lifestyles were being changed for good. Forever. That we'd feel the waves of sadness and anger all the way in Nampa, Idaho.

At 9:00 I left my class from up by the rotunda in Wiley. I headed downstairs. I was passing Felter Lecture Hall, and there was a strange silence I wasn't used to. I glanced in the classroom through a door that was always closed during that class. The televisions were on and the class was filled. I saw. I SAW.

I stood in shock for a long time. I couldn't speak. I just watched, horrified. I remembered my first and second trips to NYC, and having not only seen them in real life, but having been inside one of the towers.

I e-mailed everybody I knew in New York, which thanks to my counselor stint at Camp Timber Tops, was not a small number. I got response after response back from my former campers. All of them were in 7th grade. It had been Amanda's first day of school, and she'd had to walk home in a chaotic city. Lindsey's best friend's dad had been a caterer who was in the building and died. Ari's neurosurgeon father and psychologist mother were volunteering all their time to help the efforts. I got so many questions back from them. Mostly from Amanda, the one who I would have expected the least reaction from. Maybe I was one of the few people who she could dump on, I don't know. I saw a lot of maturity in her from her previous e-mails to me.

It was four years ago. It's still hard for me to believe it happened. I've even been to Ground Zero since. I've read the messages on the fence surrounding it. I've seen the cross left from the building structure. I've shed my tears.

I know a lot of tragedy came from the event. I witnessed it. I also know a lot of good came from the event. I witnessed it. In a way I'm glad I lived with life I can recall before and after this date. It changed my thinking. It gave me new things to reflect upon. It changed my perspective about many things. It gave me a hope and made me stronger.

God bless America.

The title comes from the song "I'm Still Hurting" from The Last Five Years.