I lived in northern Virginia in 2001, and worked in D.C. Our office didn’t have a television, and the news we were getting was sketchy.

Once we learned what had happened, the principal of the firm made the decision to send everyone home for safety reasons and because there were some rumors that egress to D.C. would be blocked; that anyone in D.C. at a certain point in time might be stuck in D.C. until, well, who knows?

So my strongest memories of 9/11 were not of the tragedy, but of the subway ride home on the Metro: a trainload of nervous passengers, myself included, keeping to themselves and breaking off eye contact with each other almost immediately after establishing it.

I don’t think I’ve ever been on a train so quiet.