ah my sweet New York

There is no use not mentioning it, I think about it, everyone who lives here has a thought flicker by once in a while, but I'm not the sort to dwell and want to have long conversations about it anymore. But, I do not want to hear anyone make fun or joke about it, and I don't think I ever will. I am lucky enough to not know anyone directly who died on September 11, but I was born here, in Manhattan, and we all took it pretty personally. This is my home, it's a comforting, maternal place for me. Easy? No, not so much, but this is where I learned everything and it's a magical place.

New Yorkers are some of the best examples of what it means to be American. Immigrants and strugglers are what this little experiment of a country was built on. Letting people do what they will, so long as they do no harm is the noblest of goals, and it isn't always easy. Anyway, I digress.

The first time the World Trade Center got bombed I was home sick from school. I remember the snow lightly falling outside my bedroom window and watching the reports on TV. The second time, I was asleep in Greenpoint, Brooklyn and my roomate woke me, banging on my door to ask me to turn on my television. Mine was the only one in the house. You could see the twin towers from my window on Lombardy Street, so we watched, in stereo, as the 2nd plane dove into the untouched tower, on TV and in real life. The newscaster started crying and ran off camera. I couldn't really grasp what was happening, but I went outside with my old Yashica Mat and took this. It still baffles me, that cloud. I mean, if you go straight across the water, I was at around 25th street in Manhattan.

Here's to tolerance, love and forgiveness, in honor of everyone affected by this tragedy.