As in a previous generation everyone "knew where they were" when President Kennedy was assassinated or when Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, for my generation, everyone "knows where they were" on 11th September 2001 when the planes were deliberately flown into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. I had just started working in a new job. I remember I was in the office and when a couple of colleagues came back in from lunch they told me what had happened having seen the news on a pub television.
That evening, going home, it was possible to listen to a running news commentary on events all the way from the office to my bus stop. It was a warm "Indian summer" evening in Glasgow and every vehicle in town had its radio on and the driver's window open and they were all listening to the news coverage. Already by 5.00 pm UK time there was a special edition of the Evening Times (Glasgow's evening paper) showing pictures from New York.
For the rest of the day I think I watched wall-to-wall news, finding it hard to comprehend what had happened and finding it impossible to understand. Of all the wicked acts that humankind has perpetrated on each other, this seemed to rank with the very worst. The visceral impact of global news including live footage and later capturing the planes crashing on camera seared the images into our collective consciousness.
Even though we are ten years on, I do not believe enough time has yet passed to be able to gain a true perspective on what impact the attacks will have on world history.
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