Remembering on Shine

9/11: The Day I Became a Mother

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On the terrible day of September 11th, 2001, one woman learned how motherhood changes everything.

Yvette Manessis Corporon: My daughter was born on May 6, 2001, at Lenox Hill Hospital on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. After nine hours of labor and 50 minutes of pushing (thank goodness for ample Greek hips and whoever invented the epidural), Christiana made her grand entrance into the world. My husband Dave beamed with love and pride as he took our freshly swaddled baby and placed her in my arms. Bursting with emotion, I looked down at her little pink face and couldn't believe how lucky I was to be holding this perfect little baby girl in my arms.

But that's not the day I became a mother.

On September 11, 2001, Christiana was 4 months old and I was still enjoying an extended maternity leave from my life as a news producer for WCBS in New York. Dave, a cameraman for Fox5 in New York, called me as I was feeding our Christiana and told me what had happened less than a mile away, just across the river from our apartment -- where our beautiful baby sat in her bouncy seat playing with her stuffed bear.

What Will Toddlers Remember?

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p>When Casey told her son Will that the Weisses were coming over for dinner that night, his response took her by surprise: "Don't forget the strawberry cupcakes." Three-year-old Will was recalling that the Weiss' son liked the cupcakes Casey had served at a dinner party eight months earlier, when he was only two. As precocious as his memory might seem, though, by the time Will reaches school age, the strawberry cupcakes will be gone, along with his recollections of most, if not all, of his first three years.

Remembering 9/11

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We've had a string of stunning blue-sky, perfect September days here in the New York area, and today is no exception. It is the kind of day that makes seven years disappear in an instant, and a morning that looks so happy is suddenly achingly sad. We remember, all too clearly, that fateful, terrible blue-sky morning. As we should.