Never Forget: The Day the World Changed

Only a few days before September 11, 2001, my girlfriend Tanya had come to the US for the first time on a visa from Russia. We were to be married that year.

The economy had been rough that year due to the dot com bubble crash. I had been working as a web developer and kept getting laid off as tech companies I worked for kept going under. I had finally landed a good job with a software company and things were looking up. I brought Tanya over and was excited about showing her around Las Vegas, where I was living at the time.

September 11 rolled around. I got up to get ready for work and checked the Drudge Report to see if there was any interesting news. The headline blared WHO ATTACKED US? I quickly turned on the news. The world trade center was on the screen with billowing smoke coming out of one of the towers. A reporter said a plane had crashed into the first tower and no one was sure if was an accident or an act of terrorism. I was thinking, are you kidding me? That can’t be an accident. Jumbo jets aren’t allowed to fly directly toward Manhattan buildings. I called Tanya over to see, and that was when the second plane hit the second tower. There was no question in anyone’s mind we were being attacked. She looked at the screen and said: “Oh, we have terrorists attacking us all the time in Russia.” Like it was no big thing.

I tried pointing out to her that was the World Trade Center and in the heart of America’s financial district. This was an attack on capitalism. I told her that whoever did this, was going to regret it because America always overreacts and will bring war on an entire region over something like this. She was horrified, saying innocent people don’t deserve that. My response was, neither did the people in those buildings. But this is what happens when people start wars. They drag untold innocents into hell for their often vain acts.

She and I did not work out. 9/11 didn’t help. But anyway…

On the way to work that day, I stopped at a 7-11. People I the store were all commensurating. A woman said she heard they had eight planes in the air ready to strike. Another man said he heard they were attacks on malls and subways. The streets were mostly quiet. I was the only one who showed up for work on time. Someone came in later and asked what I was doing at work. We admitted that it doesn’t seem like a day to work. It was a day to get ready for the next shoe to fall.

For the next few days the talking heads on TV were mostly chatting in circles. As today there was a lot of general disbelief that it even happened. I know that when I watched it happening on television it felt surreal, like I was watching a TV show. You don’t expect to see something like that for real. The whole “Why do they hate us?” meme started. In the weeks that followed books on Islam became best sellers. Despite predictions to the contrary, people did not start lynching Muslims or shooting them on sight.

But 9/11 did impact our economy as planes were grounded for days. Every business started cutting back, not knowing what would happen next. People were scared. They were waiting for the next attack. So as companies trimmed their spending, that meant service companies like the one I worked for had to get lean to survive. As a result, I got laid off from my job, which I really liked. Tanya and I split up. She went back to Russia. I started blogging a few months later and haven’t stopped since.

I have long dreaded something like 9/11 happening because I happen to love freedom, and governments look for any excuse to clamp down. I remember the days before they had metal detectors at airports. To be honest, I hated going through security before 9/11. Now it’s insane.

Before 9/11 there were security specialists who would come on networks like Fox saying to expect things to change if America ever had a major terrorist attack. It didn’t take long for that prediction to come true. And the security business has seen boom times ever since.

When you give powers to a government, they never want to hand them back. Bureaucracies have a way of growing and becoming more bloated and corrupt. Homeland security may have been founded on good intentions, but things like that have a tenancy to get out of control when successive administrations start piling more power onto them.

Our world was changed forever nine-years-ago. Even if we defeat terrorism, we should make sure the enemies of freedom don’t win by letting tyranny prevail.