On September 11th, 2001, I was in my 9am Physics Lab as a sophomore at WV Wesleyan when a classmate said aloud that a plane had hit the World Trade Center in New York City. We all laughed it off thinking it was some idiot flying a small private plane. We finished our experiments early that morning, and I was back in my dorm room while typing up my lab report that the anchor of ESPN’s SportsCenter announced, “A second plane has hit the World Trade Center.” I remember pausing as I typed and asking myself, “What did he just say?” I then spun around in my chair, reached for my remote, and I began to flip through the channels. It was HLN where I stopped and began to watch the live broadcast of people running through the streets of New York City while the Twin Towers behind were engulfed in smoke.

Like so many, I will never forget that day. I will never forget trying to convince myself that I was in fact watching live television and not some movie. I will never forget the feelings of being alone in my dorm room by myself (no roommate that semester) as I could not look away from the screen as I too learned about the Pentagon, the crash of Flight 93 in nearby Pennsylvania, and watched each of the two towers collapse in front of my eyes. I will never forget showing up to my noon Bonner Scholars’ meeting only for it to be cancelled as classmates tried calling family members who worked in New York City. I will never forget going to my 1pm class for “Discrete Mathematics” and being dismissed after just five minutes. I will never forget staying up until I do not remember watching the news, praying for all those that had died in front of my eyes, all of those who tried and were trying to rescue any survivors, and praying survivors would be found.

On Wednesday, September 12th, I remember going to my 8am Calculus II class, and instead of doing calculus, we discussed the events of 9/11. Prior to 9/11, I had always had a passion for studying history and politics. It was after 9/11 and our discussions in Calculus II on September 12th that I began to think about those passions but also my interest in learning about why 19 hijackers would turn commercial airliners into weapons of war. I realized I wanted to talk about people, not numbers. I had gone to college to be a math teacher as I had always had high math scores, but I knew math was not my passion even though it was one my best talents. Despite the advice of several who tried to warn me that it would be easier to get a job as a math teacher than a social studies teacher, I would change my major within a week or two.

I became the teacher I once was partly due to the events of 9/11. I have studied and taught about American history from its birth to its present. I have studied and taught about the history of the world and particular regions of our world from early 20th Century to the present. I have studied, learned, discussed, and taught about various constitutional issues including the Patriot Act, racial profiling, U.S. v. Korematsu, so many other 9/11 related topics. I have studied and taught about the complexities of the religions of Islam, Judaism, Christianity, and others as well as the socio-economic issues related to the Middle East, the foreign policy of the United States, and its standing in the world especially how the United States is hindered if it acts, when it acts, where it acts, and when and where it does not.

While 9/11 changed me and so many others, I wish that we here in the United States could remember that on September 12th we were not liberals and conservatives or democrats and republicans; we were simply Americans. We still had to learn that Muslims should not be defined by the actions of an evil few just like Christians should be not be defined by those who preach white supremacy. We need to realize and remember our founding fathers knew what they were doing when they implemented religious freedom as the very first freedom in the 1st Amendment as well as in their early foreign agreements like that of the United States with its Treaty of Tripoli. The United States can still be and should be that shining city on a hill, but not as a gated community for those who look like us, pray like us, and think like us. The United States should always be a new home for those seeking freedom and opportunity but also a beacon of hope and justice that shines into the dark corners around the globe while simultaneously continues to struggle and strive to be a more perfect union. God Bless America and all of her people!