story6391.xml

story6391.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-09-12

I was unemployed on September 11, 2002, so I planned to spend the day at home looking for job openings online. I am a member of the Southside Kiwanis Club of Corpus Christi. Our club sponsors a Key Club in the Flour Bluff High School in my community and I am a club liason, so I attended the weekly meeting of the Key Club at FBHS that morning. We talked about upcoming service projects and opportunities for Key Club involvement with our club projects. After the meeting, I returned home. It was about 8:40 a.m. CDT. For some reason, I had left the television set on, so when I walked into the living room, I immediately saw one of the twin towers smoking. I thought there must have been an accident. Then I realized that some kind of attack had taken place. My 26-year old daughter called from Denver. She was crying and wanted to know what was happening. She had a newborn daughter and it all seemed very frightening to her. My son, who is in the Army and was stationed in Anchorage, Alaska, at the time, phoned soon after. They had been awakened in the barracks and put on alert. He called me to see what information I had about the attacks.
I watched the television reports for a while, then left to attend a meeting of another Kiwanis Club in the area. Following that meeting, I went to a local hospital (Doctors' Regional)to donate blood. I stood in line five and one half hours to do so. Of course, we did not know that the people in New York were mostly dead and there would not be thousands of wounded in need of our blood. But, we did not know what else to do or how else to help. I was still in line when the time came for me to attend class at the local community college, but I stayed in line. Luckily for me, a television news reporter was interviewing people in line to give blood, and my college instructor saw me being interviewed, so I was excused for my absence that evening! (Actually, class was cut short anyway that night because everyone wanted to be at home with their families.)
I found a new job on October 1 - I took it as a favor to a friend, just to "help out" but it has turned out to be a wonderful place for me to be.
This year, on September 10, 2002, I again attended the FBHS Key Club meeting. I talked about how last year, we all rushed out to try to help out - to try to make a difference in the lives of people we didn't even know. Well, Kiwanis and Key Club are dedicated to community service, so if anyone wants to do their part to make the world a safer, happier, place, then Key Club is a good start. This year, we have twice the number of students joining the club. I think the experiences of the past year have shown us all that we have something to give back and an obligation to give it. Good has come out of evil.