Every generation has its “Where were you…” moment. The JFK assassination; the attack on Pearl Harbor. Moments that define us as a nation and as a people. Today, on the ten year anniversary of the September 11th attacks, Moxy has asked its writers to share their “Where were you” moment–so here are their stories. And please, feel free to help us remember that day by adding your story in the comments.

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The morning of September 11th, 2001 I was walking back from my early photography class, and as I walked over the bridge from main campus to the dorms, a friend shouted across the walkway that a plane had just been flown into the World Trade Center. In the hours that followed I would find out that my sister, who worked in midtown, was okay but would need to walk home over the 59th Street bridge just to get out of Manhattan, [and] that as New York families went, we were among the lucky ones. 

In the weeks that followed I watched the concert for NYC, I went to the concert for DC and I drove home from college and saw a new, somber skyline back home in New York… but even 10 years later, part of me still feels like I don’t have the right to talk about it, because we were okay. - Kim Coughlin

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I was a freshman in high school on September 11. I remember our headmaster giving everyone the news over the PA system and our World History class sitting in shocked silence as the teacher stopped talking and turned on the news. We watched the second plane hit the towers. Most of that morning was a blur, but because I grew up in a suburb of New York, what I remember most was a guidance counselor coming into our classroom to take various students into their office, to give them news of a family member’s death. It sickly reminded me of movies set in World War II where wives would get notified of a telegram and not even need to read it to know the news. Our town lost a lot of people that day and after a friend of mine had to leave class because she lost an uncle, I remember trying to desperately get in touch with my dad and leaving school early, because I couldn’t bare to watch the news over and over in each class. But what else were we going to do? We lived near the water and a few friends got on a boat to watch the smoke from Long Island Sound. Needless to say, I didn’t go with. - Marian Schembari

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I entered my third period English class laughing; we had been goofing around in the hallway beforehand, something common for all of us eighth graders. But my laughter died instantly when I realized my teacher was not smiling. In fact, she looked upset. Before we had all gotten in and settled in the classroom, she said there had been an attack on the World Trade Center in New York City. We weren’t allowed to watch TV, but she told us how worried she was because she had a relative who worked there. I think we spent the rest of the class talking. 

By lunch time, the plane had crashed into the Pentagon and word was still out that more planes were about. It was quite a scary thought to think that some plane was flying around, probably waiting to crash somewhere. Being in a small city, we all felt we had nothing to be worried about. It’s ironic that the third plane actually crashed somewhere very similar to our hometown. 

Volleyball practice was cancelled that night. I went straight to my grandparent’s house as they watched me after school. I remember watching the news for a few hours and just feeling scared and sad. How could something like this happen? That night, before falling asleep, my dad came in to talk to me for a minute. At the time, I had a poster of the New York City skyline next to my bed. I had gotten it when I visited during a school trip in June. I remember looking at that poster with my father and crying, feeling so completely baffled that people could possible do something so horrendous.  - Ruth A. Harper

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I was a sophomore in high school on 9/11. I was in a makeshift classroom, our school was being renovated. My math teacher dragged an ancient television into the room and with a blurry picture we watched the world change. For two children in my town, it would mean the loss of a father. – Kali Lamparelli

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Ten years ago I was a sophomore in college at SUNY Brockport; on September 11th I had a criminal law class at 10:45 and was sleeping in. I rolled out of bed before my 10 AM alarm because noise and helicopters would no longer allow me to sleep. I went to the common room and 3 of my roommates were glued to the television. “Why is the news on?” I asked them…  - Liz Soucia

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I was in 10th grade and was walking to class when a friend said a bomb went off at the World Trade Center. Our school set up a few televisions in the library and we watched black and white, static-y news. I remember not really understanding what happened. Afterwards, I went to my friend’s house and we watched the footage in color. It didn’t seem real, and that was the first time as a teen that I really started following the news. It changed how I looked at the world, the news, and at my safety.  - Kristin Offilier

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I was a senior in high school. My history class that morning had gone off on a tangent discussion about what country the U.S. would go to war with next, IF we went to war. At the end of it, someone turned on the TV for the morning announcements and there was the first tower, smoking like a twisted chimney.

Three seats behind me, I heard a student say, “Oh. My. GOD.”

The first two words were barely a whisper. The third was a gasp and a plea. I can’t think of 9/11 without his voice replaying in my mind. What he said—and what his words couldn’t say—spoke for all of us that day. – Natalia Sylvester

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It was the night of September 10th, 2001 and my boyfriend was freaking out.

I was a 16 year old high school sophomore on the phone with my panicky significant other. He was talking quietly into the phone in breathy, worried whispers, saying he had a terrible feeling that something bad was going to happen the next day. I brushed it off, telling him that he was just being paranoid and that something must have rubbed him the wrong way to make him feel so unsettled.

The next morning was a remarkably sunny day and I begrudgingly showered and dressed for school. Everything went as it always had, much like every day before that and the one before that. My boyfriend’s concerns were far from my mind and I was looking forward to the end of the day and a new weekend right around the corner.

Later, my mother, a school nurse, would tell me that she had a strange feeling in the pit of her stomach as she straightened up her office desk and greeted children with skinned knees and lingering summer mosquito bites, most of them feigning illness. She retrieved an Epipen from the locked medicine cabinet and slipped it into her lab coat pocket. She wanted to be prepared for anything.

Unfortunately, none of us were prepared for what happened next. I was sitting in math class as we watched the planes on our classroom TV hit the first tower, then the second. Our teacher looked concerned and paced the floor, wondering aloud if she should keep the television on or protect us from this ghastly sight. At that point, there was no use protecting anyone. All classroom doors were locked and no one was allowed to leave any rooms, let alone the building. After what seemed like eternity, we were allowed to slip out into the hallways and walk to our next classes. No one really understood the enormity of the situation yet, regardless of the disturbing images we had just seen.

I remember seeing a girl I had known since elementary school with a ghostly pallor slapped across her face. She was walking swiftly yet weakly towards the main office, clutching her stomach, palm flat against abdomen. I knew her family and where her parents lived and worked. I realized then after scanning faces in my memory of childhood friends that her father lived in Washington D.C. and worked in the Pentagon, which had just come under attack. I could only begin to imagine her terror. Did she wake up with an uneasy feeling, or was she completely blindsided by the news?

My boyfriend passed me in the hallway and gave me a knowing look, “I told you something was going to happen.” What makes a human being stop in their tracks and turn the other way? What prompts a normally calm and collected person to put an Epipen in their pocket? Is it some animal instinct or a more intelligent intuition?

I learned that day that many people did not feel the same way my mother or my boyfriend had. Hundreds of people boarded flights that crashed into gleaming twin towers or walked to work where unbeknownst to them, danger waited. Perhaps a few felt uneasy and went a bit earlier for their morning coffee break across the street from their office. Many perished but some were unscathed by this impending atrocity.

On the 10th anniversary my hope is that people actively look out for and protect each other, just as they did after the towers fell. If something doesn’t seem right to you, then go with your instinct. The truth is, danger lurks everywhere and whether or not we can sense it, we can’t run and hide. Evil is everywhere.

It waits on every city corner. - Amanda Harkness

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I lived in Staten Island and had stopped working in Manhattan’s fashion district as a receptionist only a few weeks prior. One of my former carpool buddies worked at the American Stock Exchange. Most of my friends also worked in Manhattan.

On the evening of September 10, 2001 I asked a few friends if they wanted to drive into Manhattan, up to the World Trade Center to simply hang out and enjoy the beauty of the towers. Everyone was a bit lazy and declined.

The next morning was beautiful. The sun was shining, not a cloud appeared in the sky and there was a slight breeze. It was a perfect September day in New York. While driving and running errands, I listened to Z100, a local radio station and heard one of the DJs mention that a plane had crashed into one of the towers. I thought it was a joke or, the worst scenario, a small Cessna that accidentally hit the towers after the pilot lost control.

When the second tower was hit, I realized it was an attack. I immediately drove home to make sure my grandmother was ok, as she was alone. Life was so uncertain.

My family and friends were all fine, though the sense of loss throughout the city was great and we all felt it. We were all affected and involved. The smoke from Ground Zero was visible from Staten Island for days following the attacks. It was not possible to drive along the highway in Staten Island without passing a long line of dump trucks filled with debris. It was like a long, endless funeral procession. That one day consumed us and, in a way, defined the strength as a city. -Dorothy Crouch

[Photo credit: flickr.com user ginnerobot. ]