NYC evening with a friend

On Memorial Day weekend, my husband and I drove to NYC for a three-day mini-vacation getaway.  It was the first time Emilu was away from us. My parents had flew in to stay with her and our dog.  We arrived on Sat. around 4 p.m. and I immediately met with my friend, a fashion blogger, for lunch in the East Village.  We walked around and caught up with our lives.  We stopped for espresso, then hopped over to Greenwich to grab a cupcake from Magnolia.  I had always wanted to try one but the lines are always too long. 

This time there wasn't a line.  I got a key lime pie mini cake, and it was delicious.  No kidding around, it tasted like the ones back in Florida (the key is key limes and sweetened milk). We sat in an adjacent park enjoying our treat. Later, we encountered the wall of Tiles for America on the corner of 7th Street, the first memorial to the victims of the September 11th attacks.  This city for all its rudeness, is quiet emotional and full of gratitude for the men and women who perished helping in the aftermath of the attacks. New Yorkers will never forget.

Later in the evening we sat down in a corner bar, enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine and realized we were both lucky beyond measure.  We had our health, our faculties, and our families' love and support.  We live in cities we both love. The rest is icing on the cake.  We ended in Starbucks and around 10:30 p.m I grabbed a cab to our hotel in the Financial District, right in front of ground zero.

9/11 Anniversary

As I was strolling around our neighborhood today with Emilu, I'm reminded of our national tragedy 11 years ago today.  It was a devastating loss for their families and loved ones.  I hope they find solace.  We will never forget.

Quiet Sunday

Today I found myself glued to the TV watching every 9/11 remembrance program and footage.  The most memorable was the CBS 9/11: Ten Years Later, shot from the point of view of the fire fighters, Engine 7-Ladder 1 Company to be exact.  I got chills from the footage (they were in Tower 1 filming, when Tower 2 collapsed).  Ten years after and you feel the impotence and pain all over again.

We went out today to the farmers market and found a city in repose.  It was not a normal, end of the Summer Sunday.  People were quieter, and in a self-reflective mode.  There was a guy playing American hymns in a saxophone.  Some kids were wearing American flag t-shirts.  And District police were dutifully positioned at certain corners. 

The hardest and saddest thing is that  first responders who rushed to help the victims of the attacks, ten years later, and it is them who need our help now.  Half of them have illnesses borne from the toxic debris they inhaled during the countless days that followed the attacks.  These brave men and women are dying, quietly and unceremoniously.  Every day is September 11, 2001 for them.

It's a bomb! A plane! No, it's an earthquake! Really?!

By now everyone has their own glossy version of where they were when they felt the 5.9 quake that shook the East Coast yesterday afternoon  The scene that unfolded in Capitol Hill, as people poured out of buildings, was the epitome of what would unfold before our eyes in a potentially disastrous situation.

Uff! That was close!  We Washingtonians got the scare of our lives being so close to the 9/11 Anniversary.   
But people in California scoffed at our reactions.  Their attitudes infuriated many here.  Because Southern Californians live with it everyday doesn't make it less fearful for some of us who don't live with it EVERYDAY, until now.  But hey, now we can say to those sultry Californians with un-prudish pride to shove their rugged attitudes up where the sun doesn't shine, because it turns out that we Washingtonians are sitting on a sparky tectonic plate, that for all we know has just begun to shift.  And of course, we can't dismiss New Yorkers' reactions, having experienced 9/11 so deeply those wounds are still fresh.
 
When I got home Emilu was sleeping soundly in my mother in-law's lap.  The only casualty I found was this wooden toy broken in two pieces.  It was sitting on the top shelf of her nursery wall.

 
And then it hit me:  How lucky we were yesterday.  We are home safe.