I was in my fifth year teaching high school Spanish. My son had just begun third grade.

It was first period still, Spanish III. My sophomores. The custodian came to my classroom, frantic, and said turn on the television.

I don’t have one.

Go to my room.

I can’t leave my students.

I’ll stay here.

I went. I watched as the second tower was hit.

And then, they seemed to implode. No crumbling. Just there one second, gone the next. Dust and ash.

Along with so many souls that day and as a result of that day.

For some reason, we had a fire drill. I stood a little apart from my students to call my son’s school. (I had a cell phone! It was my first one. How fortunate we were. Are.) I needed to confirm that they were staying open. They were. But, my son watched as so many frightened parents picked up their children as he remained behind, wondering why his Mommy didn’t come early to get him. It broke my heart when he told me that. I hated that I was keeping someone else’s children safe and secure while my own felt, albeit briefly I’m sure it felt like forever, abandoned.

I called my husband who was in India at the time. I wished him home and close and not two plane rides away.

I tried to call his brother who worked in the area of the World Trade Center.

All systems are busy. Please try your call again later.

I called my mother.

All systems are busy. Please try your call again later.

We went back to class. We didn’t even try to continue as if nothing had happened. I actually have no memory of how we got through the rest of the school day. There were a lot of tears. Although no one’s parents were lost that day, many were left wondering for hours.

Some students went home, but most stayed. We, the faculty and staff, stayed with them. We talked a lot. We hugged a lot.

The next day and for months to come, there were so many stories about how lucky my mom/dad/husband/sister/brother/wife/ uncle/cousin/neighbor/friend/friend of a friend was that she/he missed the train/bus and arrived to mayhem, black smoke and no place of work.

Or, left home late and got stuck in traffic and watched from some highway across the river as his/her place of work became a cloud of black smoke.

Or, did manage to escape and then found themselves covered in soot and surrounded by hysteria as people tried to run away from the epicenter of death.

There but for the grace of God.

Never forget became a rallying cry that immediately made me wonder if that is the same mantra of all peoples around the world subjected to foreign bombs and bullets.

It was my last year teaching full time.

At the end of the school year, a teacher shot a bullet through his head.

I resigned my full time position and became a part time teacher.

The following year, a student hung himself.

The year after that, a student took enough drugs to satisfy a roomful of addicts.

My tenth year as a Spanish teacher was my last. After crying every day to and from school, I turned my focus to the administrative side of foreign language test and curriculum development, particularly for various arms of the US government: defense, foreign service and Peace Corps.

Use your words.

It is only as I write this that I see the thread that links these events and a series of my life decisions to that September day.

I was not yet alive on September 11, 2001. The post-9/11 world is the only world I know.

Over a year after one of the most horriffic, life-altering events in American history, I was born into a world very different from that of the pre-9/11 generations. What used to be a world of trust and safety is now full of suspicion, fear, and supposed dangers. I can hardly believe my parents' and other adults' stories of exploring outside as kids with no parental supervision, easily crossing country borders, and boarding a plane without utmost security. I was born into a world where terrorism is normal, bomb threats and shootings are much too common, and discrimination continues despite all our seeming progress.

I was also born into a world that is increasingly divided. They say that 9/11 increased patriotism, but the years that followed tore us in half. The America I grew up in seems to be divided by color: red or blue. These two colors are constantly pitted against each other as if they aren't both part of our identity, both part of that red, white and blue flag that we say stands for unity and freedom, that flag that we once united under after those skyscrapers fell. September 11, 2001, was a terrible day, but as terrible times should, it brought people together for a common cause. Now, terrible events only seem to push us farther apart from one another as we argue over who's fault it was and how we should respond.

Because of 9/11, I live in a more fearful world than the one that existed before that day, and despite 9/11, I live in a more divided world than the one that existed following that day.

And so very unfortunately, that's the only world I know.

We were just starting our day in fourth grade. Me and my cousin went to the same school, in the same grade, in the same class. we were watching the "morning announcements" and then all of a sudden they were gone. We heard the crackle of the intercom, and they made an announcement I can't recall now. My then uncle came to pick us up from school. My Grandma grabbed my brothers.

I remember my auntie crying and the news playing on and on and on...

The first tower...

The second tower...

The field...

I remember sitting at the little breakfast bar in her home, with my cousin. We didn't fully understand what was happening but constantly heard the word "attacked". I remember being scared. I remember people scared they were going to attack our capital building.

I remember going back to school, and the xenophobia our best friend faced because her dad was from Iran. I remember a teacher telling her that her dad was a terrorist. And I remember the rest of us not understanding why everyone was treating her so badly.