When I heard

I was driving to my Philosophy class at Santiago Canyon College and listening to the Kevin & Bean show on KROQ. I was only half paying attention when I heard Ralph saying something about a plane crashing into the World Trade Center. I knew Kevin and Bean were on vacation, so I thought it was just a bit that Ralph was carrying on. After a few minutes, I started wondering if I’d been mistaken. I switched to a different station and heard the same story. I can’t explain how I felt. I was just numb. It didn’t seem real. When I got to school, the rumors were flying madly. The towers had fallen, the Empire State building had fallen, more planes were coming to Los Angeles, the White House had been hit, so on and so forth. What scared me more was that I couldn’t get in touch with Jason. He was supposed to be on his way to school, and therefore answering his cell phone. And people kept talking about how LA was the next place to get hit, so I was obviously thinking the worst. My professor talked with us about what was happening, and then let us go so we could watch the news. I went straight to work, since we had cable there. We all sat staring at the television in shock for the next few hours. Jason finally called me and told me his school was being locked down, and that he’d be home soon. My boss let us go home as well. I remember going home and holding on to him while we watched the news. It was so hard to believe what was happening. We’d just celebrated our first anniversary (of dating) the night before, and now we were watching people trying to save their own lives by jumping out the windows of a building that was about to come crashing down upon them.  Part of me was horrified by what was going on back east, and yet part of me was incredibly thankful that it wasn’t happening to me. I know that’s selfish and horrible, but it’s quite how I felt, and I can’t change that.