After the immediate shock, my feelings were near panic, over the safety of my own two daughters.
When the first reports were aired of the plane crash in Pa, I was worried about my eldest, who had moved to SW Pa just 10 days earlier - I wasn't sure how close to the crash site, but I had to call & make sure she & her family were ok. I hadn't memorized her phone number, so I had to go home for it - my boss was quite understanding, as no one was working anyhow. Everyone was glued to the tv, in horror, that morning.
As I pulled into my driveway, there was a special bulletin on the radio, a statement from Cleveland Mayor White, about the FBI holding a "suspicious" plane on the ground at Hopkins Airport. No other details were known, (including the identity of or reason for the attackers of the Twin Towers) at that point, so anything could have happened - and my younger daughter was in middle school, less than a mile from the airport...I wanted very much to go get her out of school, but finally decided against it - no point in scaring her, if she was safe. I could, and did, hug her all I wanted, when she got home. Both my daughters were ok, but the US hasn't been the same since, and neither have I. I rarely see a plane in the sky, without wondering, what if?
And I still wonder why we went after Saddam Hussein, and not Osama bin Laudin!