A sad and terrible day

So it has happened.
I feel shocked, upset, sad, angry. First of all, I want to express my sympathies and condolences to all the families and friends that have lost someone they love, someone they will dearly miss and mourn, that everybody in our beloved city will especially mourn.

We were all waiting for it after 9/11, but it didn't happen and we all relaxed. Shouldn't have, but one has to keep on living and not worrying every day about what might or might not happen...
And so everybody just keeps on living, even today, after what happened yesterday. I know that this is the best way to get over it, to just keep on doing what you always do, and not let the terrorists win by being afraid, but I can't help it, I can't help but be afraid, I can't help but stop for a day or two
...especially after seeing the exploded bus, looking just like the bus I take every morning to work, and thinking that if it was my bus, I would have been dead, as I always sit in the back.
Can't think of taking the bus on Monday morning.

At 9.30 on the morning of the 7/07 I arrived at my office, cheerful and looking forward to my day, unaware that bombs were already exploding around and underneath my beloved city. The first I knew of it, it was when my colleague's father called from Italy asking how his daughter was, I didn't understand what he was on about, I didn't get it, the line was very bad and then he mentioned explosions and I quickly reassured him that his daughter was at the hospital getting a scan, so she would certainly be in the safest place to be.
I then logged on the internet and tried to call my husband immediately, but his mobile was switched off. I read on and told my colleague, it was just me and her in the office that morning; we were astonished and shocked, but still nothing was clear to anybody and we didn't understand what was going on, until we read about the bus exploding. That confirmed our fears that this could be a terrorist attack. I tried my husband again with no luck . He works near Liverpool Street and I was worried he was in the area. He doesn't take the underground (we both stopped taking it after 9/11) but at that point in the day, nobody knew what was going on and there were reports of three buses exploding and bombs exploding in the streets, so I was very worried about him, mainly because I just couldn't get through to him. Then I tried the landline in case he was still home, but with no luck.
We then looked around for a radio, found it and switched it on, and listened to more up to date news. They kept saying not to move and to stay where we were, and that the attacks were from terrorists, and that there were fatalities, but nobody still knew much.
Then the phones stopped working, landline and mobiles, only text and email worked, and we started receiving emails from parents, relatives, friends, still nothing from my husband.
I then tried to send him and email and a text. And finally he managed to come back to me, he was thankfully still home, not aware of anything. I said I loved him and that I was safe and that I might stay at the office until the situation was clearer.

After two hours of listening to the news and reassuring more family and friends, we decided to leave our office against police advice. We just wanted to be with our husbands and be home safe. The police interrupted all bus services and the underground was obviously closed as well, so the only way to get home was to walk, as all taxis were impossible to find.

We locked up the office and started walking with nervousness and a bit of anxiety, but we did. The streets were empty of traffic, apart from ambulances and police, and people walking and stopping at TV shops to see the latest news. There was an eerie quiet in the city, an eerie calm and it was scary to be out there. A slight drizzle rain started to come down, the sky was grey and dark, the atmosphere really surreal. We kept on walking taking small little road and avoiding big or important junction that could be targets and at one point we each went to our separate directions. I kept on walking under the rain, around me very few cars running, roads shut down, nervous police, people walking home and getting lost, walking with maps in their hands, all looking like scared and lost tourists. Then I saw two girls desperately trying to stop cars with a sign that read ''Paddington Hospital'', which is the St Mary's Hospital in Paddington, where many wounded were taken after the blast in Edgware Road tube. I thought that they were probably trying to get there as a friend or a family member was wounded and there were desperate to get there as soon as possible. I didn't see anybody stopping, but I am sure someone did sooner or later. I really hope who they were going to see is fine.

I wish everybody was fine, but some are obviously not and I feel so upset that there are wives like me, that unlike me, haven't heard from their husbands, I feel angry that some dads, husbands, wives or son or daughter will not come home and I wish I could help somebody somehow, I wish I was a doctor or a nurse or a policeman or a firemen, instead of a stupid office manager.

I just feel helpless and wish I wasn't. But this isn't about me but about the brave people that acted with calm and saved people around them, ordinary people like me, working people that were just going to work, looking forward to the weekend ahead, sitting reading their morning paper or listening to their ipods. People that have not gone back home last night and that will never go back home.

For them I say a prayer, for them I close my eyes and wish they are safe now and not suffering anymore. I wish they are angels now and look after their loved ones from up there.

All my love and prayers go to them and their families and friends in this terrible and sad time.