Thread by @GPrime85

20 years ago, I was 16 in a High School located 15 miles away from ground zero, sitting in 2nd period History class. Our teacher flipped the channels of an old cathode ray TV to show us a some video on a VHS cassette, down to channel 3.

"Wait! What was that?!" I said.
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I'd seen something on channel 4: Smoke coming from one of the Twin Towers. The teacher went back. "What is this, a movie?" Our mouths hung open. Then the second plane hit. We couldn't believe what we were seeing. Maybe it was a replay.

"No, this is live!"

The classroom phone started ringing. All students were told to stay in their rooms on the PA. A few teachers ran through the halls.

The towers fell. We heard shouts up and down the hallway. Some kids started crying. We didn't believe what was happening. It was so close to home.

"X is calling her dad, he's not answering." We later learned he died. A lot of the kids in my school had parents who commuted and/or worked in the city, myself included.

School was quickly dismissed. I walked home, listening to my walkman. I remember Police sirens.

I sat in my bedroom over the next few days, flipping through every news channel nonstop. I needed to figure out who did it, and why. The term "plumes of smoke" was repeated every few minutes. Footage of George W reading a children's book to some kids, not getting up immediately.

Later, my friends and I drove along the NJ side of the Hudson River and watched the smoke/ash from Ground Zero. It wouldn't settle for days. The news had said if it would just rain, it might go away faster. I wondered if it would come across the river, if it was poisonous.

In the next few weeks, everyone I knew was in a panic. Some friends were convinced another attack was coming, and moved away.

Military recruiters came to my school. If I'd been two years older, I might have enlisted - though I didn't know who we were fighting, or why.

Not much of a story, but that's where I was when American history changed forever. If you were too young to remember 9/11 firsthand, take my word for it that America started killing itself slowly afterward.

We started trading too many of our freedoms so that we could feel safe.

I see it happening again with the COVID hysteria. If there's one lesson I'd want to communicate, it's this: Don't make important, life-changing decisions when you're afraid. Too often, the solution will add to the problem, and only make things worse.