[christiangirl]

I was at home, getting ready for a club meeting before school. When I got there, everyone was there, but there was no meeting. Everyone was watching the news on TV and that was the tip-off. The teachers never turned on the TVs unless the class was watching a video--the fact that it was on told me something huge had happened.

I remember, I had been 16 for exactly 2 weeks that day and almost every day had been bad or come with bad news: someone had just died, my great-aunt had Alzheimer's and my grandfather might have it too and now this. I remember writing in my diary how devastated I was to think there might be a war. War was supposed to be something you read about in history books...I didn't think I'd ever see one. So I kept the newspaper that came out the next day because I knew my kids would one day do a report on this and I'd want them to have it.