That Tuesday

All day, my mind has constantly wandered back to that infamous day.

It was a Tuesday, a beautiful Tuesday morning at Wingate University.  My best friend/roommate and I didn't have class until 10:30 am, so we had both slept in a bit and spent the morning talking and leisurely getting ready for the day.  Usually, we listened to the radio, but I had just gotten Caedmon's Call's "In the Company of Angels" CD, so we rocked out to it.  I clearly remember that I was wearing my favorite blue capris and a white t-shirt.  My hair was still short-ish from a spur of the moment cut a few months earlier. The day was starting as perfect as possible.

At about 10:15, we finally descended the stairs outside to venture to class.  A friend of ours walked up to us wide-eyed and said, "Someone just flew a plane into the Pentagon."  Now, this guy was a generally goofy person and tended to say things for shock value, so my first impression was 'yeah right.'  But there was something about the seriousness in his face and desperation in his voice that made my stomach drop.  What?  I walked a little faster to my statistics class and found out that the world had changed.  I'm sure my reaction was similar to yours.  Shock, disbelief, utter astonishment, fear.

Classes were canceled for the rest of the day, but for some reason, cross country practice wasn't.  Although, running hard up and down the hills of a nearby farm with some of my closest friends was comforting that day.  It was normal.  We had known it before.  The only other thing any of us had done all day was stare dumbfounded at televisions which played the crashes and crashes and crashes on a loop.

What was going to happen next?  That was the biggest question on my mind.  Fortunately, I had already planned a trip home the following weekend.  There was a lot of construction on 85 South in those days.  I remember crying as I passed crane after crane draped with American flags.  When I returned to school on Sunday night, my roommates and I made a big flag out of construction paper and hung it in our front window.  We cried, we hugged, we prayed.


We hoped.


"We've no abiding city here:

Sad truth! Were this to be our home!
But let this thought our spirits cheer;
We seek a city yet to come."

-Lord's Day Hymn-We've No Abiding City Here by Thomas Kelly