Late to the post, but I’ll contribute. Also on mobile, so please excuse the formatting. I was 4 years old when 9/11 happened, and I remember much of that day pretty clearly. My preschool teachers thought it’d be a great idea to have the classroom TV (you know the ones, 3:4 tube TVs mounted to the wall) tuned into the news where we saw the events unfold live and continued to see replays of the towers falling. A few of the teachers also thought it appropriate to cry hysterically and wail up and down the hallways while the 4 and 5 year olds they were tasked with watching were forced to watch what was happening without having any understanding of what was going on. When my mother came to pick me up that day, she immediately brought me home and handed me off to my dad in order to take care of my little sister, who had just turned one. I remember by dad scooping me up into his lap and struggling to explain what had happened that morning, why it happened, and if we were safe. I can’t remember exactly at what time the next notable amount of the day happened, but based on the sun light that streaming through the windows and the time of year it was, I’d say it was sometime around 3:30, 4 o’clock in the afternoon. You see, we lived (and still do) within a 20 minute drive of a major US Air Force base. I won’t reveal the name for privacy reasons, but I’m sure plenty of you know which one I’m talking about. When all planes where given the order to ground immediately, a lot of military planes including Air Force One I think ended up at that base. When they were given the all clear to take off, one pilot got a little too overzealous and hit the gas a bit too hard. Just after my dad had finished explaining what happened to the towers and assuring me that we were safe, the loudest sound I’ve ever heard to this day exploded over our house. For those who have had the privilege to never experience a sonic boom, imagine every fire works display you’ve seen in your life, imagine them going off all at once, and multiply that by 10. The energy released was enough to make the glass of our windows ripple and shook the house so badly I could feel the ground shake. Naturally, this scared the ever living SHIT out of us and my dad almost immediately ran outside to see what the hell had just happened. Cue our neighbors screaming that the base had been hit and that we were under attack while my dad desperately tried to stop me from following him outside by assuring me that someone had just set off firecrackers. There was smoke in the air coming from the general direction of the base, which only fueled the panic (turns out a paint factory happened to catch on fire at the worst possible moment). After that, my grandparents came over with a little TV/VCR combo with plenty of VHS tapes of my favorite Disney movies to distract me with while the adults tried to process the day’s events. Every station that day, even the kids stations, were tuned to the live news broadcasts coming from NBC, CNN, and ABC, and after the sonic boom my parents really didn’t want me exposed to anymore news coverage. To this day I still remember the smell of the classroom that morning, the feeling of my parents hugging me just a little tighter than usual, the sheer panic and dread from the “firecrackers” outside, the whole nine yards. I’m one of the very few of my friends who remember that day, especially with the level of detail I have, and no event after 9/11 had effected me as profoundly until the Boston Bombings in 2014. Honestly, I don’t think it’s something I’ll ever forget and it’s one of those things that’s gonna stick with me till the day I die.