Kids and 9/11

I've never sheltered my kids from things.

Sure, I might not give them ALL the facts or go into gory details, but I do not sugar coat the harsh realities of life or make up alternative stories or endings for things that are simply true.

We talked to them honestly about their Mimi's cancer. We spoke frankly about the ravages of Hurricane Ike. Yes, they were living it, but there was devastation far beyond what they saw in our own backyard. We've discussed global tragedies such as the earthquake in Haiti and the tsunami in Japan. When we pass a homeless person on the street and the boys want to know why someone is pushing a full shopping cart on the sidewalks of downtown, we talk about.

Thus we arrive at the 10th anniversary of the attacks on the United States on Sept. 11, 2001.

Curt, now in 4th grade, has been talking about 9/11 in school.

And Curt, with his penchant for perseverative interests, has fixated on the events of 9/11.  In keeping with my parenting philosophy, we talk about it pretty freely.

He especially likes he fact he was "in my tummy" at the time of the attacks.

He asks me to repeat the story of that day endlessly, firing a barrage of questions off of his proverbial port bow.

The condensed version is that I had just arrived at work, as the features editor of The Beaumont Enterprise. The newsroom was almost empty that morning, as most reporters, and journalists in general, tend to keep later hours. So when the events of the day began to unfold, I was one of the only journalists in the building. Although it wasn't my usual beat, it was an all-hands-on-deck kind of day.  I was dispatched, via phone by the editor, to the federal building, several blocks away from the newspaper office.

I ran. Notebook clutched in one hand, belly in the other. I can even tell you what I had on that day: a black maternity skirt and periwinkle blue maternity top. With black sandals. It's hard to run when you're pregnant. It's even harder when you're pregnant, wearing heels, and in the Beaumont heat and humidity. Was I going to complain? NO. WAY. I arrived at the federal building and walked right in. And then they locked down. I pulled the pregnancy card to get them to let me out. Yep. I'm not ashamed. Back at the newspaper office, we watched as the Pentagon was attacked and the plane suspected  to be bound for the Whitehouse or Capital crashed in a Pennsylvania field. It was a LONG day in the newspaper world. Even longer for those who lived through the horror, including my friends Lisa (who worked in WTC 7) and Tricia, who worked in Manhattan.

But back to the kids. Curt has asked everything from how tall the Twin Towers were (1 WTC was 1,368 feet tall and 2 WTC was 1,362 feet) to when they were built (started in 1968 and completed in 1970 and 1972, respectively). He's wanted to know how many people died, whether there were security cameras in the building that captured footage of the day and why the structures were not rebuilt. He's asked how people died, how many emergency personnel helped and what the memorials were going to look like. 

He's watched all the videos on YouTube. He saw footage of people leaping out of windows. Not what I necessarily would have *wanted him to watch...but he did. And I was honest.  So was he. 

"It was a very scary and sad day," Curt says now. "Because two planes ran into the Twin Towers, one into the Pentagon and one crashed."

"The United States changed that day because three to four thousand people died and many got injured. The terrorists killed a lot of people and hurt many more."

"Some people had heart attacks and died because of that. Other people were sad because people they loved died."

"That's how the Afghanistan war began and it's still not over."

"And all of that is sad."

Yes.

Yes, Curt, it is.