May 1, 2011 at 11 pm...where were you?

Everyone remembers what they were doing on Tuesday, September 11, 2011, and when they found out about Al Qaida's attack on the World Trade Center and DC. I was a freshman at UT, just coming out of my 8 a.m. calculus class when I saw people gathered around a TV that screamed, "BOMBING ON CAPITOL HILL." That was an early mistake of the press when American Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon. I remembered sitting in front of the TV with my roommate watching footage of the planes crashing into the WTC and the towers falling afterwards. I remember the deathly quiet that fell upon campus in the following days, as no one knew which city would be targeted next. Austin was an attractive city to attack if one really wanted to target President Bush. He had been the governor of Texas for years, and his daughter attended UT.

Last night I checked my Facebook while working (it was my last night working the 7pm -7am shift) when one friend's status caught my eye: "Security sources say that Osama Bin Laden is dead!" Disbelieving, I checked CNN.com and saw nothing about such a story. Then my fellow nighttime resident got a text from the Associated Press, and she said, "Hey, you're right! Bin Laden is dead!" We then recalled hearing earlier that President Obama was planning to address the nation; fortunately we had finished our admissions at the time and hurried down to the resident lounge to watch the president speak. We were joined by several other residents, and when Obama finished speaking, all we could think was, "Wow."

The following footage of the people cheering in DC, New York, and the Phillies game (yes, fans there were chanting, "USA!" despite the game already dragging into the 12th inning) was uplifting. Most of the revelers on the streets were college students, who were only in elementary school ten years ago. It was encouraging to see that the September 11 attacks made such a huge impact on them so that they were the loudest among all those celebrating. Although I'm not really one to celebrate the death of another person, I was sure that the families of those who had lost loved ones to September 11 could find some closure in Bin Laden's death. And if that's the case, then the cause was a good one.