September 11, 2001: Never Forget.

I am writing this on the evening of September 10th and thinking about the 2,996 people who were going about their ordinary nothing-special rituals 22 years ago today, not knowing they had only hours to live.

These weren’t people focused on their own mortality. They weren’t suffering from terminal illnesses or heading into battle. Some were packing for trips. Most were ordinary folks getting ready for another Tuesday at work.

Photo by Cyril Attias

Some probably loved their jobs, others probably didn’t. They were transit workers, stock brokers, secretaries, bank employees, government workers, food service workers, janitors, flight attendants, fire fighters, pilots and travelers flying to the West Coast for business or pleasure.

The oldest victim was 85-year-old Robert Norton, who was a passenger on American Airlines 11. He and his wife Jackie, of Lubec, Maine were headed from Boston to the West Coast for their son’s wedding. Their flight left Boston at 7:59. At 8:46 a.m. the Nortons and all of the passengers and crew on the plane died when their plane slammed into the North Tower. I imagine the couple were holding hands in their final moments.

Then, 17 minutes later, the youngest 9/11 victim perished. That was Christine Lee Hanson, who was two-and-one-half. She and her parents were flying on United 175 when it plunged into the South Tower. The family was traveling from Boston to Los Angeles to visit grandparents and then go to Disneyland.

The little girl might have been giddy with excitement about seeing her grandparents again or maybe she was groggy and a bit irritable as little kids tend to be when they’re hustled out of bed and out of the house. No doubt her parents hugged their little girl and wept with fear for her safety when they realized their plane was hijacked.

Luckily, they didn’t know what was coming.

Christine would be 24 now, but she never got another trip around the sun. One of her stuffed toys - Peter Rabbit - was featured at the 9/11 Memorial.

Today’s school children and most college students weren’t alive on that terrible day in 2001. Everything they’ll ever know about the events will come from TV, movies, history books and those of us who remember that unprovoked attack on American soil.

But we who do remember exactly where we were on September 11, 2001, and the helplessness, disbelief and profound sense of sadness we experienced as we watched awful events unfold around the country will never forget.

Nor should we.