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9/11 and the Army Wife

When we were married, I did not know I was marrying a soldier. I married a man who later enlisted, in his 27th year of life, January of 1998. We had three small children and he had enough student loans and the paperwork to fill our small apartment's bathtub. The Army promised to pay that off for us and we thought, "What's the worse that could happen?" Laughing!

I loaded up my Nissan Sentra, after his boot camp, and found myself on the outskirts of Fort Gordon, GA for his A' school. Nine months later, Fort Bragg, NC for his PCS~ Permanent Change of Station ~ for civilians.

Scott enjoyed his new enlistment, he worked for the 82nd for several years, titled himself a 'glorified secretary' and they called him 'The Work Horse'. Our kids liked North Carolina's warm weather, the new community neighborhood, our spacious (if not so) new quarters, and made friends with other 'Army brats' and 'Air Force brats', too. Thanks for to Pope Air Base's location, smack in the middle of Fort Bragg.

I made friends. The Ardennes Housing Community was looking for people to help out, volunteer, raise money for activities and events for the children who lived in the small section of Bragg's Enlisted Housing. I signed up, baked cookies, wrote newsletters, went to events and hosted them in my front yard.

I was proud of my husband, my life, and my country. It seemed we had made the right choice, enlisting.

9/11 happened. In my living room, my husband beside me, he was packing his gear. He had received orders to Korea and would be leaving soon for his year in Seoul. His first deployment. The Today Show' caught our attention with images that would be replayed for weeks, months...

At first, we thought it a mistake. Couldn't be happening intentionally. "That pilot must have been drunk!" My husband had said when the first plane hit. Mouth hanging open, I tried to grasp the sight of that second plane snapping into the building, what it meant. "Guess I'll wait to see if I am still going to Korea. I need to go to the office." He left his gear, jetted for the office, and I called my two best friends.

We gathered up our children from the on-post schools, pulling them from a busy parking lot, lucky we could walk to the Dever's Elementary but I had to drive to Irwin Middle School for our older children. Michelle stayed, glued to the television with our younger children, while Doris and I made that slow trip. The roads were choked with other frantic mothers and fathers, afraid of the

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