By Heather Vogler 
A three-hour drive to New York City did sound ambitious for a Monday morning, but I was in an adventurous mood and definitely up for it. My roommates and I piled into the tiny sedan after shoving our friend’s suitcases into the trunk, assembling them like Tetris pieces before it would successfully close. Our friend’s flight did not leave JFK airport until later that afternoon, giving us plenty of time to explore the city before check-in.
We arrived early to give ourselves a chance to explore the city. As we discussed where we wanted to go and what we wanted to eat, we stopped at a traffic light. That moment seems like an eternity now. It was probably only 20 seconds. To my right, I saw one of the Twin Towers. Men and women hurried into the building, briefcases in hand. Others stood around on their flip phones, a luxury few of us had at the time. It was such a different perspective. Seeing the ground floor of one of the most immense buildings of NYC’s skyline made it real—it was not just a structure, it was a place of business filled with hardworking people.
I looked to my left—Wall Street. It seemed so dark and dreary. It was probably just the shadows from the towering skyscrapers, but it was enough to make me want to turn my head and aimlessly people-watch along the base of the Twin Towers. So I did. I wish I had known to warn them. To roll down my window and shout, “Please! Do not go to work tomorrow!”
But God knows. God knew. He is always in control.
As we sat in that car, we were just a few blocks from where an old high school friend lived. She was working in the city, helping out at a ministry. I asked my friends if they wanted to ask if we could spend the night with her, so we could do even more sightseeing the following day. We talked about it, but our work schedules got in the way. For that, I am thankful.
The afternoon of September 10th is a blur. We dropped my friend off at JFK, grabbed a bite to eat from Chinatown, and walked around Greenwich Village. We left as the sun was setting, and I distinctly remember turning to my one roommate, who had never been to the city before, and saying, “Hey! Check out the New York City skyline.” It was beautiful, memorable, and unaware it was about to be changed forever.
I was the only one home when the phone rang shortly before 9 the following morning—September 11th. It was the mother of the friend we had dropped off at the airport the day before. Frantically, she asked me to assure her that we saw her daughter off at the airport. That she made her flight safely, and it wasn’t delayed. News was just now breaking that a plane had hit one of the Towers. At that point, nobody knew anything. Not which flight it was or even which airport it had taken off from
Once she was calm, we hung up, but I was shaken. I called my mother so she would know I was not in the city, and while we talked, the second plane hit. Something serious was going on. A friend from the college living down the road called me. Knowing I was home alone that day, she asked me to come hang out in one of the school lounges to watch the events unfold together. I had just graduated that May, and many of the students there still felt like family. We watched together, we cried, we prayed, and we saw a nation change in a moment.
In just the blink of an eye.
by Joanne Newborn 
by Holly Bonner 
