Christine Hanson, two years old, from Groton, Massachusetts.

I first saw this name in the Los Angeles Times sometime in late September. Christine Hanson. That name has stayed with me over the past year. I picture her holding on to her mother's hand, perhaps carrying a small backpack filled with crayons, coloring books and a few bits of sliced apples to snack on during the long flight. I picture her smiling up at her father as they board United Flight 175 in Boston, excitedly talking to him about her first trip to Disneyland. About seeing Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Pluto. And then I think about what it must have been like for her and for her parents as their lives were ended suddenly. Senselessly.

Hers is just one name among many, yet it is the name that comes to my mind when I think of the attacks.

I did not sleep for four days after September 11 last year. I tried, but I simply was not able to. Every time I would close my eyes I would see the images that had been shown day and night on television and were, I'm certain, only too familiar to us all. The planes crashing. The buildings collapsing. The people falling out of the buildings. Those were the hardest images for me to deal with. In a way, I suppose my lack of sleep was my own fault. I was glued to the television for nearly 36 hours straight. I didn't eat. I didn't sleep. All I could do was watch.

Like most people, my day had started out normally. My mind had been in turmoil the night before over the situation involving the girl of the moment, Margaret Sheridan. I'd gotten up early that day because it was Margaret's last day at the Shoah Foundation and there were some things that had to be resolved between us. As I was getting ready, the phone rang. I glanced in annoyance at the clock in my room. It was 6:37 am.

I picked up the phone and said, "Hello?"

The voice on the other end, "Is Paul there?"

"He's asleep," I responded.

"I need you to do me a favor. I need you to turn on the television and tell me what you see." At this point, I had no idea to whom I was speaking and was wondering why one of Paul's friends wanted me to turn on the television.

"Which channel?"

"It doesn't matter." The person told me.

I walked into the living room and turned on the television just in time to see footage of the second plane that had hit the World Trade Center forty minutes earlier. Forty minutes earlier as I had just been waking up and getting ready for work. As I was preparing to go about my day, things were falling apart on the other side of the country.

I woke my roommate up, handed him the phone and then left for work. When I arrived at the Shoah Foundation, nearly the entire staff was gathered in front of a television in the IT room. I, meanwhile, was frantically trying to get a hold of my friend, Ashwin Ramji, who lived in Lower Manhattan. Not surprisingly, I was unable to reach him.

Shortly after 8:00, we were all informed that the Foundation would be closed for the remainder of the day. I left the Foundation with Margaret and my friends Angelica Ochoa and Mischal Diasanta and we all went to breakfast at Bob's Big Boy in Burbank. During breakfast, I remember placing several frantic calls to New York City, as well as trying to reach other friends who might have heard something about Ashwin. Still no luck.

I returned home around 1:00 that afternoon, after having spent several hours with Margaret in Griffith Park. When I returned home, I turned on the television and began to watch in an effort to make sense of all of it. The hours passed by and I remained in front of the television. At one point that night, I tried to go to sleep but could not, so I returned to the living room and continued to watch the constant coverage.

At approximately 4:00 in the morning, I went for a walk. I'm not sure what I was hoping for, but I just had to get out. As I walked down the street in Montrose I could see house after house with the faint glow of television sets, and I knew I was not the only one with trouble sleeping.

And then something very strange happened. It seemed like something that would almost occur in some made for television movie. At the corner of Ocean View Boulevard and Honolulu Street in Montrose, about three blocks from my house, there is an American Flag there as part of a small war memorial to local residents who died in Vietnam. I sat on the curb near that flag and stared at it for a while and then I began to think of my niece and nephew, Alyson and Sawyer. And I began to wonder how this could possibly be explained to them. And I began to wonder if things really would be changed forever. And then it happened. There, all alone, at the foot of a flag pole at 4:00 in the morning on September 12, I broke down and cried like I hadn't done in years.

I don't know what it was about that moment, exactly. I think it was just the first moment that the numbness wore off for me.

And now it is a year later. Ashwin Ramji is alive and well. Today is my parents' 37th wedding anniversary, just as last September 11 was their 36th. I don't think I even realized that it had been their anniversary last year until a few days had gone by. Last year, I remember thinking, like most people, that that day would change our lives forever. As I look around, though, things don't really seem to be all that different.

I can't watch the footage anymore these days. I have to turn the channel whenever I see it. While it's true that I was not directly affected by all of it, I do take it personally. And I do think of it often, like I'm sure many people do. And when I think of it, I think of that girl I never met, and never will. That girl who was on her way to her first trip to California. Her first trip to Disneyland. I think of her excitedly boarding the plane. And then, I think of how it all came to an end for her in an instant as it did for so many others that day.

Christine Hanson, two years old, from Groton, Massachusetts.