From the 34th floor

September 11 - a day that will, for many of us, be forever etched in our memories.  A day of horror, death, fear and sadness, but also of courage, bravery and the strength of the human spirit.  No one who has ever lived in NYC will probably ever forget the events of that morning, or where we were when we watched them unfold.  Me?  I was in a hotel room in Los Angeles, having flown in the day before to give a presentation.  I watched in shock and horror as first one plane and then a second flew into one of the most recognized landmarks in all of Manhattan...the Twin Towers.  Then, just when none of us thought things could get worse, reports from the Pentagon...and from a field in Pennsylvania...and then the unthinkable...buildings toppling to the ground, crushing all within.  

I spent the next five days trying to get home - to my husband and to my friends...and to my wounded city.  So, today it seemed very fitting that I spent this morning in the CIty with two of my very closest friends, both NY-ers and this afternoon with my husband.  Peg an I had a lovely room on the 34th floor of the Westin at Grand Central, and this was the view that greeted me this morning.

Not a fancy photo, and not even an especially good one given that it was taken with an iphone through double-pane glass windows, but for me, it represents the NYC I love, the city that could never be crushed by terrorists, no matter how they tried.  It seems exactly the right photo for my blip today.

I posted two other shots of NYC and one chippie in our garden starting HERE on Flickr.

Update on the Monarch Project:  One caterpillar remaining, still eating and quite huge.  I expect he'll do his "J" tonight and pupate tomorrow.  I've over 20 chrysalids now, busy reorganizing their cellular structure to form hopefully perfect butterflies, the last of this season.

Hug someone today.

Debbi

PS: so just as Hubs and I were finishing our lovely meal on the deck, I spied something big and black making its way around the cherry tree, headed for the deck ... Yep, Mama Bear and the twins. I blasted the air horn multiple times while Hubs ran in for the paintball gun. All bears into the woods with both twins halfway up a tree. Oy vey...