A family reunion to remember

By Cheryl Hilliard Tillman: 2001 was our 25th cousin reunion.

We wanted to do something special to mark the occasion, so our cousin in Dayton, Maryland, invited me and our Iowa cousins to his home. We arrived on 9/6. We visited the sites around Washington, DC, including the White House, Pentagon, and the Mall and even drove to Atlantic City one day. We were all flying back to Iowa the morning of 9/11.

My brother, sister-in-law and I were on Flight 1175 that morning from Baltimore to Cedar Rapids. We dropped off the rental car and were sitting in the observation deck when the first plane struck. We watched the news on the TV there, and since I work at Rockwell Collins and know about the traffic collision avoidance systems on airplanes, my first comment was, “that's no accident.”

Soon there were a lot of people watching the TV in the observation deck. We all gasped as the second plane slammed into the South Tower. When it was time to board, I had to convince my sister-in-law to get on the plane by confidently telling her that we would be okay. We were in our seats when Flight 77 struck the Pentagon. The man next to me had a cell phone and kept us informed of what was going on outside.

Soon the captain announced that the FAA had grounded all flights and that the airport would be closing. Everyone raced to get a rental car. I stood in line, too, and a man behind me said he had a meeting at the Pentagon. I told him, “well, I bet your meeting is cancelled” and told him what had happened. By that time, the police and bomb-sniffing dogs were searching through every corner of the airport.

We could not get a rental car and called our cousin who came to the airport to pick us up. We were lucky to get to my cousin's house because by that time all the roads in and out of Washington, DC, and Baltimore were closed or being closed. We were able to contact our other Iowa cousins and find out they were okay. They had not returned their rental car yet and were driving it back to Iowa. We called our families and friends at work in Iowa to let them know we were okay. My brother, sister-in-law and I spent the night at my cousin's home in Maryland. We heard jets flying over all night long, which actually was very comforting. God Bless our military!

We spent the next day glued to the television. I can't express how we felt. Thinking that it could have been us made my knees weak. When we weren't glued to the television, we were on the phone. My cousin's wife was from Sweden and her relatives called throughout the day to find out if they were alright.

We wanted to get back to Iowa, so we called every rental company we could find to get a rental car. We finally found a compact car in western Maryland. My cousin and his wife made us sandwiches and drove us 2 hours west to get the car. My brother and I drove 14+ hours straight through to Cedar Rapids. The rental car company charged me $900, including a $500 one-way charge, but after a few phone calls throughout the next week, they reduced the bill to about $50.

2011 marks our 35th cousin reunion and we want to do something special to mark the occasion.