9/11 memories for the newspaper

I was 11 years old and sitting in the vet clinic on Maxwell Air Force base in Montgomery, Alabama.  With my mom and little sister by my side, I watched the TV in horror as an airplane crashed into one of the towers.  I had lived in New York a few years before and frequently saw the towers.  This didn’t seem real.  It was too much like a movie. Besides, why would something like this happen? I looked at the people around me and saw something I had never seen before.  What I saw that day were looks of pure fear.  Time stood still. I watched as tears rolled down shocked faces, and phones began ringing from the calls of loved ones.  Little did I know that this day would change our country, and change my life, forever.  The base was locked down. There was no way to get back home to my sisters and brother, which worried mom tremendously. About a week earlier my dad had deployed to Saudi Arabia, but we had no way of expecting something like this, that he would soon be so heavily involved in. There was much opportunity for worry.  We didn’t hear anything for weeks on end: no emails, no phone calls, nothing.  My life was wrapped around war, and could have been wrapped around fear.  Instead, through the horrific acts of terrorism, and knowing that my dad was in the middle of immense danger, I finally learned what it meant to trust God.