Yahoo! is asking Americans how September 11 changed them. Below is an account from a reader.
I met her when she was no longer a stewardess. When I found out that she used to be a stewardess, I couldn’t understand why would she give up the job that every woman I know of would like to have. I always dreamed of being a stewardess. But my height didn’t made it to the minimum requirement. I thought that once a stewardess is always a stewardess. Who doesn’t want to travel and get paid in doing so?
She told me what happened on 9/11. She was scheduled to board the flight that hit the Twin Towers. It was so severe that she was not able to call her family that she was not able to board the flight. When her mom heard that her flight hit one of the towers, she was crying inconsolably. Her children were only 1 & 3 years old at that time. Too young to grow up without a mother.
I came to know her few months after we immigrated here. Since we are new immigrants, we are adjusting to the American lifestyle. Her family embraced us & made us one of their own. They gave us outgrown clothes of her children. They invited us to celebrate our first Christmas with them. And the next four Christmases that followed. It was the best Christmas ever. All of them were family related except us. We felt extremely important.
When I met her, she was working as an assistant teacher in a preschool. I heard pride in her voice as she was telling me her new job. She was proud that she’s off when her children were also off from school. She encouraged me to do the same. My work schedule as a registered nurse in an acute hospital, does not give me the flexibility to be off from work when my children were also off from school. But I am now thinking of getting a nursing job where I can also be off during weekends & holidays, when my children were also off from school.
Since then, I made it to the point to request to be off from work or take leave as necessary in my children’s milestone. I couldn’t turn back the time when I missed those moments. I now realized that the best paying & glamorous job in the world is not enough payoff for the time we lost with our family. Nothing compares to the time that we spend with our family. It is priceless.