In your words

Safety has a whole different dimension now than it did before September 11th. And as civil servants, we feel a higher level of responsibility; we're part of a larger effort to ensure the safety of our citizens."

Sylvia Pizzini
deputy director, California Department of Health and Human Services

"I scanned the news more than I ever did before. It made me think we are in a precarious position and anything could happen. I don't scan the news as much now, but I definitely have my ear to the ground."

Susan Rainier, 44
architect and project manager for the new performing arts center at the University of California, Davis

"I'm trying to have a more positive outlook. Try to keep my eye on the whole scope of things. I'd always considered a career in law enforcement, maybe the FBI or Secret Service, and now I think I'll go into the CHP Academy after I graduate."

Connor Milligan, 21
of Fair Oaks, an economics student at the University of California, Davis, and media coordinator at the California State Fair

"We are now steeled by the unknowing and knowing sacrifice that every one of the missing made for our freedom, our families, our way of life. Their martyrdom will now become the centerpoint for re-tilting the globe, never back to the dream we have now lost, but to a world to be made safer than now, and hopefully wiser than before."

Rene Aguilera, 41
president of the Hispanic Empowerment Association of Roseville

"It's made all of us more thoughtful about the world we live in. It's reinforced the path I've tried to be on already. ... It makes us all more thoughtful about the fragility of human life."

Brian Kettenring, 30
of Sacramento, community organizer for ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now)

"I've grown to critique the U.S. government more. It's America's shortsighted foreign politics that's helped lead to this."

Anthony Bento, 16
of east Sacramento, a senior at Christian Brothers High School

"I only wore my patriotic clothes on July Fourth. Now I have more and I wear them year-round."

Alice Cook, 40
Caltrans employee from Elk Grove

"I remember a Muslim father and daughter came to our church, Davis Lutheran Church, and spoke of the misconceptions about Islam. I didn't know that much about Islam, but they were so eloquent in their presentation. That was a unifying thing for a small town like Davis: They dispelled a lot of fears."

Kathleen Joy, 59
a Davis retiree

"It changed me in ways I'm still discovering. I'm trying to process it, but I feel it's processing me. ... There is a part of me that is continually standing on that site."

Jacob Cohen, 46
of Cameron Park, who works with the Sierra Law Enforcement Chaplaincy. He and his wife were on vacation in New York City last September and rushed to the scene to help rescuers cope with the disaster.

"As teachers we want to soften the impact of death, but it takes more skill to accomplish this task after 9/11. Kids don't buy the guarantee anymore that there are going to be tomorrows. It's like the framework of death has changed."

Elizabeth Nesci, 45
a fourth-grade teacher at Sierra Oaks Elementary School in the San Juan Unified School District

"My career path has changed. Before I was concerned with making money and doing something fun. Now I'm more concerned with doing something beneficial to the community around me, and to the country in general."

Katie King, 23
of Wethersfield, Conn., who recently completed 10 months' service with AmeriCorps with McClellan Park as her home base. She signed up after the attacks killed a longtime family friend.

"In my whole life there has been no greater catastrophic event. The greatest change is valuing life more. No one on their deathbed says: I wish I spent more time at work. That was a giant body slam for more of us Americans to appreciate our families, appreciate our country, appreciate our civil service."

Francis Anfuso, 53
senior pastor at The Rock of Roseville who traveled with congregants to New York to help in the relief effort

"It's been a life-changing event that made me reprioritize things. It's also made me have a more positive outlook and appreciate the goodness in people because of all the support I got on September 11th and have continued to get since then. I always said my family was first, but really, my job was first. Now, my family is first."

Terry Cosens
of El Dorado Hills, who escaped in her pajamas from an 18th-floor room in the hotel between the World Trade Center towers. She was in New York selling state bonds for the California Treasurer's Office.

"9/11 has probably given us all the opportunity to take inventory of what it is we have, and what's important to us. And maybe those things that are important to us are paying respect to what happened that day and to the way Americans responded."

Larry Davis, 69
of Sonoma, a member of the Cal Expo board who had 125,000 pounds of World Trade Center wreckage shipped to Cal Expo as a permanent memorial

"September 11th will forever be part of our lives as our son, Joshua Jay Friedman, was born on that day at 5:49 a.m. Pacific Time, or approximately three minutes after the first Trade Center tower was hit."

David Friedman, 49
of El Dorado Hills

"It definitely changed the whole aspect of the fire service. It was our worst day and our best day. It was our worst day because we lost so many. It was our best day because it really got us our due in a lot of areas."

Geoff Miller, 46
Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District battalion chief and member of the local Urban Search and Rescue Task Force that searched for survivors at the Pentagon and in New York City

"It definitely changed the whole aspect of the fire service. It was our worst day and our best day. It was our worst day because we lost so many. It was our best day because it really got us our due in a lot of areas."

Geoff Miller, 46
Sacramento Metropolitan Fire District battalion chief and member of the local Urban Search and Rescue Task Force that searched for survivors at the Pentagon and in New York City

"From the beginning, people were suspected by everybody of being from a Middle Eastern country. We were terrified for some time. Attitudes of the public changed, with the lapse of time, but it's not like before."

Mal Singh, 62
of Sacramento, who is co-owner of Foothill Liquors in Auburn and emigrated from India

"When buildings like those turn to rubble and dust, everything materialistic inside them is no longer important. What's valuable … comes back to the person, that you can give up all that materialism. Personally, it means spending more time with people who were near and dear."

Barbara Narez
principal of Blue Oak Elementary School, whose students collected $5,000 in donations for New York by staging an on-campus "walk" to span the 2,835 miles between their Cameron Park campus and New York City

"We cry a lot more when we hear the national anthem. I just well up with pride because we are such a great country. But I get angry when people are afraid it will happen again because then the terrorists win."

Dan Black, 51
of Elk Grove, executive director of Community Health Charities, Sacramento office

"We have our flag up every day except when it rains. Most of us are more patriotic."

Suzi Marks, 35
of Auburn, business manager of Auburn-based radio station KAHI (950 AM)

"In my own home, it underlined the need for emergency preparedness. My wife and I sat down and asked ourselves: What's the worst we need to be prepared for? What are our alternatives if a disaster like this hits Sacramento? We stocked up on food and water and other supplies."

Capt. David Whitt, 41
of the Sacramento Fire Department

"I have not forgotten but I have lived to see the next level and play the game of life with more purpose. Now, to honor those who lost their lives September 11th, I will be dedicating my first public appearance as an artist to them."

Rhonda Warner, 32
whose drawings were accepted for an art show in conjunction with the Roseville Chamber of Commerce "Splash" fund-raising event Sept. 14 at the Roseville Aquatics Center

"I'm flying up to Seattle on September 11th. I love to fly. When you've been through World War II, you don't worry about it."

Warren Holloway, 83
a Sacramento travel agent, who attributes a slump at his business, Holloway Travel Outfitters, to the stock market drop rather than a fear of terrorism

"I don't want to jump to the conclusion because I am an ethnic minority that I was singled out. That's an easy temptation to rationalize. It is in order to protect itself from this kind of criticism that minorities are singled out."

Bob Baldey Singh, 71
of Yuba City, who was thoroughly searched after a flight back to the United States from overseas, including having a scanner run over his bare feet