SAN ANTONIO – Sylvia Nothstein, a senior at Travis Early College High School, said she’ll always know the significance of 9/11 because she was born the next day.
She said her mother didn’t want her joyous occasion forever linked to the horrific events at the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania.
“She begged the doctor for me to be born the next day, the C-section for the next day,” Nothstein said.
She said her mother wanted her birth to represent renewed hope at a time when it was most needed.
Nothstein said her father, who is still with the San Antonio Fire Department, was deeply affected by the sacrifices made by so many firefighters at the World Trade Center.
Every year, she said, her family stops to remember 9/11 in their own way.
This morning, it was a group text from her mother that read: “I wanted to say I love you guys very much. This day is so scary and I don’t know what I would do without you.”
Nothstein's classmate, Felisha Bocanegra, said it’s sad knowing how those early days of unity and support have given way to division.
“It should be a reminder that it is important to stay united,” Bocanegra said.
Gabriel Hernandez, who initially learned about the 9/11 terror attacks on his first day of school, said it shouldn’t take “a time of crisis for us to unite our country.”