7 years ago
7 years ago, I heard while I was in the car, returning from dropping A off at preschool. I couldn't believe it.
I briefly thought about getting the kids, but decided that that would just alarm them more.
A was 2 and M was 5.
I remember watching the coverage all morning until it was time to go get A. Then we sat in the living room and played some game, him with his back to the TV, so I could watch with no sound.
When I heard M coming up the stairs from the bus stop, I turned the TV off - to stay off until he went to bed. I wanted to preserve their innocence a little longer.
I briefly thought about getting the kids, but decided that that would just alarm them more.
A was 2 and M was 5.
I remember watching the coverage all morning until it was time to go get A. Then we sat in the living room and played some game, him with his back to the TV, so I could watch with no sound.
When I heard M coming up the stairs from the bus stop, I turned the TV off - to stay off until he went to bed. I wanted to preserve their innocence a little longer.
Labels: kids, unclassified
posted by owlfan at 9:10 PM
3 Comments:
Yep. That was when I completely stopped watching any TV news with the kids around and flipped to the newswires on the internet to get information. I kept checking the newswires all day (around M's first day of preschool, that is).
The elementary school told all the kids that some bad people had crashed planes into some buildings in New York, so it wasn't totally possible to preserve ignorance for J even as a Kindergartener. (Plus, the boy up the street alluded to it at the bus stop that morning -- 9am East Coast is 6am Pacific time, so the towers were already down by the time J was at the bus stop). But there was no way I was going to let her see any video.
I'm not sure my kids have seen any video of it all still. I wouldn't be so opposed to it now, but its still unnecessary. For a few years we turned off the radio on 9/11 to keep things calmer, but not now.
The next year when M was in 1st grade, they made a patriotic quilt around this time.
J has seen video of the planes crashing into the tower and the towers collapsing, with the resulting dust cloud over Manhattan. She's probably also seen pieces of a couple of History Channel retrospectives (and maybe M too), like the one where they describe things from the ATC POV, and how they got all the planes down so quickly without a plan.
But on Thursday when history channel seemed to be doing the morning in effectively real time (plus commentary), we didn't let J watch it though she wanted to. Though I suspect that at least some of her eagerness had to do with bedtime avoidance... But even at 12, there are things that I just don't want her to see.
Personally, I can't handle the part where people are jumping. Just. Can't. I accidentally saw a picture of one such person on the web recently and still can't handle it without being haunted for days. J and I can (and did) discuss it without actually looking at the pictures where you can see folks faces on the way down.
Post a Comment
<< Home