When America was attacked on 9-11, I was in my office, Suite 217, 600 Granby Street, Norfolk, Virginia, at the United States District Courthouse. Sharon Borden, a fellow court reporter, stuck her head in my office and said a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. We ran upstairs to the fourth floor to the law library where the only television in the building was, and along with Karen Johnson, the law librarian, and several other employees in the building, we watched the horror taking place on a tiny, maybe 12-inch black-and-white screen television set.

We sat there staring, stunned. It was hard to believe what we were seeing was true. It seemed like some stuntmen were simply making an action film, and the director would yell "cut" at any moment. That never happened. It was real. It was sickening. It was sad.

And like a movie with a happy ending, I hoped that all would escape harm and exit the buildings safely, but when we saw people start jumping out of the upper floor windows, we knew it had to be an inferno, and if anyone escaped with their life, it would be a miracle.

Then we heard about the plane going down in Pennsylvania, and the plane crashing into the Pentagon, and we were, once again, thrown into a dizzying sense of despair about these tragedies.

While I've not seen Ground Zero in person, I've heard--and seen on television--the gaping hole. It has to be mind boggling to stand there and see it. I feel for all the people who lost their lives and their families. I surely hope nothing like this ever happens again. I was fortunate not to know anyone in the Towers or the planes.