September 16, 2001 Farmington, Utah

I was SO thrilled to have such a good letter from Patrice last Monday and as it turned out, it was the only bright spot of the entire week!!! I want to send congratulations to Liz and Bob on the arrival of their little baby daughter - Samantha Elizabeth White, 8 lbs. plus - who was born on Friday, Sept. 7th. I'm SO happy for them and also happy that Suzie plans to go be with them in October. Bob will have paternity leave along with Liz's maternity leave so it will be a very special and happy time for them. Joan and Andy are anxiously waiting to get a court date in Russia to complete arrangements to get their little guy. A happy and exciting time for the O'Donoghue's family!!! I also LOVED reading about the Unitarian Universalist Church Labor Day "Goat and Lamb Roasts" in Maumelle Park - Patrice said they have re-named it the "Reunion Roast" with the double "u" for the name of their church. I'm SO glad you sent that WONDERFUL picture of Roy cutting up the meat - I would never have believed he would be involved in a "goat" roast - Ha!!! I can't believe that Jesse actually liked the goat meat either but I'm proud of him for trying it. You didn't say how you roasted the animals - we used to dig a very deep pit in Billings and cook pigs all night. Yours were quartered so maybe you did them on grills. It's too bad the mosquitoes ruined your plans to spend the night at Maumelle. I am happy that Timothy is playing on a new soccer team and that you like his coach - Jesse is on a swimming team too and that's great. I remember Little Rock as being "very big" on swimming and John was on a swimming team for a little while - traveling to his "meets" turned out to be hard but he loved the swimming. I'll keep my fingers crossed that Emily will get to play her flute with the Youth Symphony.

I know that each one of you will agree with me that this past week has been the most terrible week for America in our modern times - probably for all our lives. I still can't believe it actually happened. I hardly ever REALLY watch television except for Matlock and maybe the Wheel of Fortune but this past week I couldn't take my eyes away from it. I told Bob and Claire that I would spend Monday and Tuesday nights at their home with Brett and Katie while they were in Denver attending some medical meetings. I had awakened them Tuesday morning and Brett had just finished his breakfast and was leaving for his bus when I turned on television to watch it until Katie came into the kitchen for her breakfast. I saw some smoke coming from a tall building and then a plane go in back of the building and then a ball of fire - about that time the phone rang and it was John. He told me to turn on the television and then explained to me what I was watching. He had just left the JFK airport in New York and was in a taxi on his way to his apartment - he said the sky was filling with black smoke. I turned the TV. volume up and continued watching it but I really couldn't begin to comprehend the magnitude of everything. Annie called John while he was still in his cab and then she called me to tell me that he was okay. I tried to prepare Katie for what she would be hearing in her school and the first thing she said was "Will we go to war?" - I said "I don't think so but I don't know for sure". My gut feeling was that it couldn't possibly be as bad as it appeared.

The World Trade Center Towers have always been such monuments of success for America and to think that terrorists could "bring them down" in just a few short hours along with portions of the Pentagon Building is just unbelievable. Modern technology has made it possible for us to view absolutely perfect views of the devastation and also things like actual telephone calls from the hijacked planes to their families just minutes before they crashed into the World Trade Center and even a phone call from the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania indicating that some passengers were trying to subdue the hijacker. The authorities believe these passengers prevented the plane from crashing into the White House as it had planned to do so they are real heroes.

I have appreciated John so much keeping me informed on everything he can. I would never have believed that he would be an eye witness of something that will change our America for forever and his account of his experiences and the pictures that he sent to all of us will be cherished forever - I plan to read that account to my DUP members when they come to my condo for a meeting on Wednesday. So many of my friends have called me to express concern about John - his neighbors in Orem have been worried. I watch television expecting to see him in the crowds. I would have been a "basket case" if I hadn't known where he was and as it was I was relieved and could watch the events as they unraveled. He told me that his company is making space for fifteen employees of another company that lost their building in the tragedy. I LOVE the pictures that he has sent to us - the flowers being put at the Firefighter's building, the young people in a prayer circle, the crude sign on the street asking people to pray for our Nation, and people standing by St. Vincent's hospital on the street. I talked to him this morning and he said "Mom, do you realize that hundreds of young people between the ages of 25 and 50 who have been the brains in the financial world have been lost ?" That is very sobering when you think of all the college degrees they had accumulated through the years. John also said the devastation at the World Trade Center site is like a big blender had attacked it and that they were asking for things like hair brushes so they could take some DNA samples to identify victims. There was a sadness in Davis County when a Grandmother who lived in Kaysville was killed along with her daughter as they were in one of the hijacked planes - they had just taken the Grandmother's twin granddaughters to Brown University in Rhode Island and were on their way to the daughter's home in California. There were hundreds of sad stories like that throughout the nation and they will continue to unfold for a long time. The Chaplain for the Firefighters Association in Denver was killed as he was giving the last rites to another injured firefighter.

They cancelled all airline flights throughout the United States so Bob, Claire and Rick were stuck in Denver - Rick had been there for business meetings too. Tuesday night Bob called and talked to Brett and told him they were hiring a driver to bring them home and they would arrive sometime Wednesday morning. I was very surprised to have them knock on the door about 7 o'clock. Bob had patients scheduled for all day on Wednesday and he said he was able to take care of all of them - I believe their driver broke many speed limits - Ha!!! Rick rented a car and drove home that afternoon. I was glad that Ron and Roy weren't flying last week.

Mary Ann brought me a delicious dinner today after Sacrament Meetings and then she stayed with me while I ate and we had a good visit. She came home this weekend and so did Laura - it's great that they are close enough from college to do that. Jeannie was to be a speaker at the Memorial Service in their ward this morning - I am proud of her for being asked to do that because the lady who spoke in our ward has a very outstanding family. Our church leaders asked each ward to have these Memorial Services in these meetings today and they were very important. Sarah went to her first High School dance last night and Mary Ann said she looked beautiful. I went to the Davis High School Homecoming football game on Friday night and that was SO much fun - Davis High lost by 4 points but they really should have won - they had a very bad call in the last quarter of pass interference that really wasn't that way. Sarah performed with the Davis D'Ettes and they were WONDERFUL!!!

I went to Brett's ice hockey game last night in Bountiful- That was a real eye opener for me - Claire kept telling me he was playing ice hockey but I thought she really meant the kind of hockey that Roy played in Little Rock and that was not ice hockey. What kind of hockey was it Roy? I remember that I thought it was terribly dangerous. Brett also played the drums in the Davis High School Marching Band program at the game and it was just excellent.

I have thought about Michael and Russell all week and I know they must be very frustrated to only have foreign newspapers at their disposal. I'm sure their Mission Presidents have kept them informed as best they could. My friends who are in foreign countries write to me and say there are enough of their leaders who speak good English to tell them all about it and I'm sure that's the case in Italy and Madagascar too. I have been thrilled to receive so many letters of condolence for all Americans from my friends in Thailand. I have a message on my phone machine from Wantana telling me how sorry she is and I don't want to erase it.