There was nothing in the sky. Not a cloud, nothing. It was bright, bright blue. The air was crisp, and the light from the sun was so bright that it hurt your eyes. It was one of those days where you could see all the way to the edge of our atmosphere. The more you looked; you soon realized that you could see into, above and beyond the sky–all the way through it, until it brought you back to that day.

    One bearing of the tragedy was that it marred all the beautiful days in New York City, no matter how gorgeous it is now, whenever there is an early afternoon like that in the city, you can hear people on the sidewalk say to each other, "It's just like that day."

    It was an amazing, tragic, awful day that is always brought back for me when the sky is clear, and the air is crisp, especially when there is a clean smell in the air. This triggers that anxious anticipation that comes with memory. It's the anticipation that the clean smell will be replaced by the smell of the burn. That smell. I'll never forget it as long as I live.

    9/11. None of us will ever forget it.

    Me? I was already having a crummy day, at the time. I was at the dentist's office, having nothing less than a root canal. My dentist had always kept the television on in his office, at his patient's request. The anesthetic he had given me had long ago kicked in, and he was hunched over my face with all of his drills and tools. It was within that strange capacity that the surreal event unfolded before me, and us, for the first time; on the boob tube, in my dentist's office, getting oral surgery, and half wacked-out on laughing gas. I witnessed one of the most historically tragic events in the world's history with a vacuum tube in my mouth.

    Eventually, he stopped what he was doing, and turned around to watch. It was unbelievable. He eventually realized the importance of what was happening, and we decided we'd better have a look. We actually got up and walked from his Gramercy Park office to Park Avenue South, and looked down the street.

    There it was, the huge plumes of smoke. I stood there with the lip retractors in my mouth, with the pins piercing through my gums and into the roots of my back molar, seeing the beginnings of the whole thing. There were throngs of people walking uptown, looking like zombies. Some appeared to be in a state of shock, most were blank-faced, and a few were covered with debris and ash. They just kept approaching, looking like the walking dead. It was like a bad movie. We went back into the dentist's office and neither of us said a word as he finished his work.

    When I left his office, I noticed something I hadn't seen in a long time; rows and rows of people lined up at pay phones. Right after the planes hit, cell phones weren't working. This is when I first began to notice the panic spreading. People were frantic because they were trapped in the city and their children were outside, in the boroughs. Or children were in Manhattan and their parents were outside, or in New Jersey. Nobody could get word in or out, and as we would soon learn, no one could physically get in or out either. Period. I walked back to my office as swiftly as I could.

    I remember sitting behind my desk, feeling out of it but also very alert. When I had come in, my dazed assistant Yavette told me about a phone call from one of the designers in our firm. Her name is Ewa, and at the time she lived downtown near the World Trade Center. At first she called to say that she was shocked to have seen a plane just fly over her apartment building on Murray Street. She told Yavette she had seen the first plane go through the building. Staying on the phone with Yavette, she stood at her window and stared up at the buildings describing everything. To her horror, she saw people jumping through the hole in the building, to get out. The hot flames raging below them meant there was no place to go. She cried and screamed and begged Yavette to stay on the phone because she did not want to be alone. Then she screamed to Yavette that she had seen a second plane hit.

    So many people the world over have seen the images taped by film crews. She saw this with her eyes, on her own high seat. A balcony seat, of sorts.

    Then, of course, it just became more unbelievable. The buildings fell, one at a time, and Ewa's whole view was awash in gray soot. She couldn't see anything for the rest of the day. Had she not been home at the time, she would have had to leave her cat, her groundhog, bird and her fish. They left the building only after firemen allowed her husband home, and they retreated to their restaurant on East 10th Street, which had a small apartment upstairs. She was luckier than most.

     At the time I was working on a major project. We were one of three firms that had won a competition to present our design boards to potential purchasers for a new building that was going up in Miami. I had to fly down to be interviewed by the clients after they had seen my portfolio, and had actually never been to Miami, except in and out of airports. They were a husband and wife team, and when I met them they showed me some of their buildings. It's so funny, coming from New Orleans, and living in old homes all my life, whenever anything is of new construction, unless it's of the highest quality, I'm non-plussed. These all looked exactly alike; large towers of glass with pre-fab walls in some kind of random stucco texture. The lobbies were done in Jolly Green Giant-sized "Louis the something"-style pieces. Just awful. I was shown one apartment that the developers had hopes of Whitney Houston purchasing. Drama was the theme, it had a glass tube elevator, so that from the second floor of the duplex, the star could descend from the heavens to the cocktail party below.

    Their new project was to be a seventy-story building, which would be a hotel, private residence, health club, and everything else. It was nice, though definitely wasn't anything that I would have found particularly thrilling. But the money was great, so I threw in my best shot. It would be a completed place, all finishes, furnishings and fixtures–everything on paper. I selected a very high end beach home look. Fortuny light fixtures, silk and linen fabrics, gauzy silk window treatments (to add mood and not kill the view), stone floors polished and my designs for custom hand made rugs, and French wool and silk wall-to-wall carpet in the bedrooms. It was all over-the-top, and would be $2 million once completed, and that was  just for the decor, if it ever began in life as it had been done on paper.

    The building designs were supposed to have been turned in on Monday 9/18, and we had until the postmark date to have these things sent off. We were pressed, to say the least. Thank God. We worked a charette, and never stopped; morning, noon and night, not concentrating on anything else except the project. In the middle of it all, that fateful day's events occurred.
   
     It caused every one of us in my office to cling to the project even more, almost as if for dear life. It was as if it were the only thing that mattered, the only thing that could keep us away from what had happened. The intense charette kept our sanity level together. Really, we did not accept what had happened on 9/11; we were busy like little single-minded bees.

    I remember during a rare break, taking some brownies to the Armory on 25th Street and Lexington. It was really the wrong place to be if you wanted to distract yourself from the reality of what was happening, which is why I probably subconsciously forced myself to go. There were lines of people gathered in front of tables, carrying Ziploc baggies with toothbrushes, brushes and combs in them. They were bringing the DNA of their missing loved ones.

    Beyond that, over on the wall, it looked like a strange art exhibit; "Missing," and "We're missing," and "Where is my wife?" and "Have you seen my husband?" and "My darling son?" and "My precious, precious fiancée." Some went further; "He worked at Cantor Fitzgerald," or "He worked at The Windows of the World restaurant," or  "She was a secretary on the 91st floor." It was truly tragic: hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of these Photostat copies of photographs of smiling people, along with explanations of who they were. Some stated that a daddy was missed, with a photograph of the children with their father or with the mother. Some even had children alone, looking for both parents. All had phone numbers, asking, begging for any information.

    Brownie, anyone?

    A few days later, I found myself strolling down 5th Avenue with my best friend Harry. We had decided to have lunch. As we strolled along, that smell loomed all around us. We talked non-stop about the tragedy, but had earlier greeted each other with the phrase "Can we please just talk about anything except the tragedy?" I went through that same twisted formality with almost every other New Yorker I came into contact with.

    We decided we would have lunch at Barneys. I always felt an affection for Barneys. I had been involved with them when I worked for José Maligno, and had selected finishes and found other pieces that could be motif-copied from a chair in the men's shoe department, or a bookshelf that could be modified for a shoe display case, or a French Deco light that could be modified and knocked off in Italy into a row of display lights. So whenever I went there, I had a feeling of familiarity that I found comforting. Deciding to eat there was like needing an old friend.

     As we walked towards Barneys, we couldn't help but stop and gawk at the different kiosks along 3rd Avenue which were selling American flag badges, and little brooches made out of colored safety pins that figured into the form of little waving metal flags. Everything you could, and couldn't imagine. I don't know where these people found these things so quickly. The tragedy had just happened on Tuesday, and here were these tchotchkes for sale all over the place: little crystal statues of the World Trade Center, statues of firemen with "remember the men" on them, ones of policemen with "remember who they are" inscribed. The constantly repeated phrase "proceeds go to charity" never sounded so deeply inconspicuous. I'll never forget, on Ebay, hours after the disaster, there were 400-500 things being offered for auction, and the auction site pulled them all because they were considered in such bad taste. Weeks later, there would be even more tasteless merchandise for sale at little tables set up down by the World Trade Center site, where throngs of tourists were gathering to pay tribute. These included little patriotic themed photo books of people jumping out of the towers, little plastic plaques with montages of the event, including portrait pictures of Osama Bin Laden, even metal lighters designed to have the flame come out of the top of a little recreation of one of the towers, with a little plane crashing into the other one. Lots of these items made the news. So weird.

    We reached Barneys and walked in, drawing the curtain on a doomed New York behind us when the doors closed. As we descended the stairs into Fred's restaurant, we talked excitedly talked about, of all things, the French fries, and how good they were. I exclaimed that I was going to have a hamburger, but wouldn't have the bun because I wanted to lose weight. We were walking down because this was when Fred's was located in the basement of the store, before it moved to shinier, brighter places on the store's top floor. But for now, a descent seemed appropriate. It felt like boarding an escape pod.

    I had decided to wear a big hat and sunglasses, and hadn't taken them off. So when we entered the restaurant, the people inside stopped and looked at me. I used to love that, people stopping and looking. I don't know who they thought I was, but they thought I was someone.

    Just a few months earlier I'd showed up for a function with Harry, and as soon as he looked over my outfit; a white shirt with a black  leafy vine print, chicly frayed collar, cuff, and ruffles–yes, ruffles–a royal blue linen blazer, a royal blue and black silk hounds tooth patterned pocket square, a large brimmed hat, and a new Goyard bag, he stopped and said, "What are you wearing? You look like a cross between Crocodile Dundee and Dorothy Draper!" to which we both erupted in deafening laughter.

    "Take off that hat and those glasses," Harry kept saying as we continued to make our entrance into Fred's, "you look ridiculous."

    "I need them." I said calmly, then adding in a louder tone, "And I don't look ridiculous! I'm bald and need the hat to keep me warm, and the sunglasses to keep the sun out of my eyes."

    "Well you look too different for the people here!" he strained through a fake smile.

    He said what others were thinking, even me. I did look different. Honestly, I think he found it perturbing that I was getting any attention at all. As Harry approached his 30's, he wasn't necessarily getting the same appreciative looks that he had grown so accustomed to as a beautiful young man, which he was. I was someone who had never been beautiful, but always different. I had learned to attract attention. I guess I slowly learned how to get those stares from people who thought, "Isn't he someone?" Years after, I actually was a minor someone–not a celebrity, but a "celebretant," let's say. But my honed techniques were still intact, and were kicking into high gear on this day. It was the week of 9/11, after all. I was a survivor.

    We were honestly expecting a crowd of sorts, only to find the place oddly empty. There were only three or four tables in the entire place that were seated. Yet, for some reason, we had to stand waiting for an eternity just to be seated. When we were finally shown to a table, it was in the middle of this cluster of diners who had been grouped together in the whole empty place. You would naturally think a restaurant would space diners apart, so they could better enjoy their meal. But not Fred's at Barneys, not after 9/11.

    We sat down and Harry seemed upset by our close proximity to the other strangers. There was one girl sitting reading a book, another table next to us with young man and his friend, and behind us, a German couple.

    We had time to notice all this, because we were just sitting there. Harry had taken some taken some medication earlier, and needed some water, or preferably a Coke. And we still sat there. We waited, and we waited. We asked the young busboy who passed if we could have a waiter please. He didn't speak any English, but motioned that he would send a waiter. Great! One never came.

    When I finally spied a waitress walking directly past us, I said, "Excuse me, my friend would like a Coke." She looked at me and snapped back, not in an unfriendly way–just stern, letting me know that our table wasn't in her section. The place was practically a ghost town.  The busboy came back, and finally brought water. We asking him, "Waiter... waiter?" He kept nodding and pointing back to our glasses.

    Earlier, I had seen a man talking to the pretty girl with the book at the table three or four seats behind us, and I assumed he was a customer. When he finished with his conversation, Harry and I were surprised to see him slowly walk toward us and ask how we were doing.

    Harry was silent, so I spoke up and told him that we were fine. Did we know this person? He then told us he was our waiter! We'd been sitting there for almost fifteen minutes! Looking around for service!

    "Well, we're doing ok," I told him, "but we've been waiting for service for a while."

     "Well then," He smirked, not in a friendly way, and said, "What can I get you?" No apology.

    It was an odd experience, being in a place that was so capable, being treated like a red-headed stepchild. I just forgot about it and smiled as I gave him our order. I explained that I wanted a medium-well burger, no bun, and I wanted my fries. I was actually only getting them because Harry would eat them. I ordered an iced tea and Harry ordered a Coke. Our waiter then just waltzed away, not saying anything.

    Well perhaps I should have ordered the bun, because it ended up that would be our last rations ever as we would fight for survival amongst others in the last restaurant on earth.

    We waited and waited. The Coke never came. Ten more minutes passed. Our incognito waiter, whom we could see chatting again with the book-reading girl at the other table, was out of earshot. When the waitress of the other section, that was literally next to ours, passed by, I was going to ask her politely if she would get our waiter's attention. But again, before I could do anything but raise my hand, she snapped this time, for real, and let me know that we were not in her section.

    I began waiving rather frantically to the girl who was reading the book. She finally looked over at us and, with a long, sighing moan, pointed in our direction. Her friend, our waiter, rolled his eyes and lumbered back over to us. I said, "We're waiting for our iced tea and Coke." He turned around again silently and walked away. Three or four minutes long minutes later; our drinks were brought to us. They were warm. They brought Harry a Diet Coke instead of the real thing. It took another ten minutes to rectify that.

    At some point before Harry and I started eating the drapery, the food came. It was cold. I (surprise!) got my bun after all. No apologies were offered once this was brought to their attention. Just a kind of low-key, hassled rage. Then, our waiter suddenly seemed to bail on our disastrous meal, and was nowhere to be found. Maybe he went on lunch break.

    The young waitress who was not running our section (yes, yes... I know that honey), walked right by us yet another time. I said so she could hear, "I must speak to you." She put her hands up, you know that "talk -to-the-hand" thing that was so funny on 9/10?

    "You need to speak to me at this point," I stated loudly, as I immediately put my hand as well. I said, "This is not proper service, and we need some assistance, please."

    That's when things got ugly. I meant them to go well, I wanted to save the day, but it all went wrong.

    "I told you that your table is not mine!" she pointed at me and said in the tone one scolds a child with.

    "Well, you're in the service industry," I quickly said, "and you should take care of us."

    "You shouldn't be so rude!" we all suddenly heard a booming female voice saying from across the room.

    Us, and everyone else, looked over at the girl with the book, who now had it folded shut in her lap and was glaring at us. It had been her. When she saw everyone looking at her, she flipped her hair and continued to glare. The whole thing was taking on the qualities of a really bad high school play.

    Going with my gut, I joined in the ridiculousness and, completely loosing myself, I looked over at her and told her that she should "...fuck off."

    Somebody dropped a fork loudly.

    Everyone's face turned and looked at mine. They all looked like... what's that painting by Edvard Munch? "The Scream"? They all had that expression.

    The waitress who hadn't a second to spare for us suddenly had all the time in the world. She looked at me and said, "You're ruining everyone's meal."

    "I feel you're ruining our meal because you won't give us correct service." I said.

    "I told you that's not my table!" she scolded again.

    "I asked you to find my waiter." I said, "Please! There's nobody in this restaurant!"

    Suddenly, the two Germans near us both turned around and growled, "Ach! Are we nobody?"

    "I'm not talking about you!" I now screamed. The whole situation was like a bad dream. I looked back over at the waitress, "This restaurant, in general, is deserted. Why is it so difficult to get halfway decent service here? While the whole time our waiter is in the corner talking to a girl and ignoring us almost completely? And now he's just gone!"

    I could hear mumbling across from me, and looked to see Harry in a state of mortification, expressing his embarrassment through clenched teeth. Amongst the chaos, he was now demanding that I remove my hat and glasses. Did I mention I was still wearing them?

    My hat added to the spectacle. It wasn't the type of hat you had to remove when you entered a building; it was something that looked like you'd wear on a quail-shooting tour in England, or a lovely afternoon lunch in the sub-basement of Barneys.

    I once again asked the waitress to please find our waiter. As the waitress scurried away, I heard the German woman say, "Ach, Americans…" as she shook her head.

    Yep.

    Our waiter was suddenly standing at our table, virtually appearing out of thin air. He stepped up to the table with a new sense of duty, and asked what the problem was. We explained that Harry had a Diet Coke instead of Coke, I didn't get Sweet'n'Low, both of our burgers were cold, along with the fries, I had specifically had asked for no bun, with everything, and had somehow received a plain burger instead. Also, we had long ago run out of water. I told him we really weren't very happy with all of this, and that we could see other customers in the restaurant getting adequate service from the waitress, who was hardly busy herself. I asked him if he could understand why we were upset. He stared. Then I told him that we'd like a new order, please.

    Did I mention I was practically shouting?

    "I have to get the manager." he responded, and walked away again.

    So seemingly out from behind door number three appeared the manager. On his way over to our table, he was approached and met by three people; the young busboy, our waiter, and the waitress, each stopping to conference with him along his way. When he got to the table he didn't smile and said, "What’s the problem?"

    I didn't flinch. I said, "There’s a big problem." I explained the whole story, and then sat there staring up at him behind my glasses. He said nothing for a while, and I figured it was because he was noticing my fantastic hat. So I pointed my finger away from us and yelled; "That girl!"

    "Who?" he asked turning and looking.

    "Her! With the book!" I said still pointing, "She obviously works here, because our entire meal has been ruined by the visiting and chit-chatting that goes on with her and the wait staff in this place. Also, she told me I was rude and I think she should mind her own business. Does she even work here?"

    "Why yes," he said calmly, "She does."

    At this point I was expecting to be lynched, but in an even more surreal moment in this truly bizarre situation, he turned, calmly walked over to her, bent forward in front of her and started to wag his finger in her face, correcting her as though she were a third grader. It turned out all of the wait staff were her good friends.  He said this and that, and reminded her about not talking to customers, be they right or wrong. It was not her place. Blah, blah. Then, in an even more bizarre moment, she buried her head in her book and began to cry hysterically. Oh boy.

    The cherry on top was when the two people sitting next to us, as it turned out a young fey man and his slightly chubby girlfriend, looked at me and said, "You’re horrible people."

    Stopping myself from agreeing with them, I told them that we weren't horrible people, we just didn't like horrible service.

    "You ruined our meal." he said.

    "That's too bad." I returned, adding more cheeriness to the room, "My meal was ruined by your waitress."

    You could still hear the girl in the corner sobbing. Someone dropped another fork. I've never craved muzak more in my life.

    It was an amazing situation. Everyone in the city had been seduced into a love affair with one other immediately following 9/11. Our mayor, who before that had taken a terrible turn for the worst in the polls, between prostate cancer and publicly dumping his wife and dating a new woman, had suddenly become a hero when the towers fell. Even Harry and I loved him! This admiration for one's fellow man reached far up to public figures, and down to the common man. Everybody was being friendly with each other; opening car doors, letting people park in front of them, holding doors for one another, grabbing the elevators, offering the three or four pennies that the person in front of them didn't have to pay for their purchase. You could see it all over.

    So here we were in Barneys, the renowned luxury shop, taking part in the most horrible lunch experience in the history of the planet. Being treated like crap and, honestly, treating other people like crap just as well. The manager approached our table again and said, "I want to apologize for this."

    I wanted to rectify things too, so I smiled at him and said, just rhetorically, "I know you must think I'm an asshole because..."

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" he raised his hands and said before I could finish, "I didn't say that!"

     Oops? I half-giggled and said, "Of course you didn't. I'm just saying that having me appear in this restaurant, with all of this occurring, you must have assumed that I'm just some jerk."

     "Whoa! Whoaaaaa whoa whoa whoaaaa whoa!" he continued, now finally cracking a smile, "I think maybe you'd better go! I don't want to cause any trouble here! I'm not calling anyone a jerk!"

     Wha..? It was hopeless. The manager walked away, and we asked for our bill. Harry crawled out of his shoes, looked at me and whispered, "I'll fix this. You ruined the entire experience. You don't know how to talk to people." So when our waiter finally returned, Harry looked at him with most syrup-y sincerity and said, "I want you to know that you're a wonderful waiter, and that I have no trouble with anyone here ...but that awful waitress is a cunt." Smooth Harry, real smooth.

    When the bill was snapped out of Harry's hand and the waiter stomped off, Harry looked over at me as if to say "What did I do?" I looked at him and said, "I'm so glad you handled this properly. These people are obviously suffering from what everybody else is suffering after 9/11, and now you've called his coworker, who he probably feels very close to, a Cee You Next Tuesday!" We began our retreat.

    As we did, I took one last look around. Do you ever do that thing when you're bored on a sparsely-filled train or plane, where you look around and imagine that some sort of crash or accident will occur, and the whole scenario is going to turn into the clichéd plot of a disaster movie, and the few people there are going to be the characters who have to ban together to survive? Like The Poseidon Adventure or The Towering Inferno?  I sometimes look at each individual stranger and imagine what their character will be. I had been doing that in that room all during lunch, recent events not-withstanding.

    Our waiter? He was the cocky troublemaker who was not afraid to show his selfish side, and who'd croak near the end of the film, right before everyone else was saved (and the audience cheered).

    The "don't bother me" waitress? She would be the less glamorous, tough-as-nails brunette who had brains but was cold as ice and a bit ruthless. She always ends up having a change of heart by movie's end though.

    The girl at the table with the book? The dizzy and genuinely likable blond glam-puss who serves as eye candy, but dies horribly at some point in the film (sorry, but that's the way it goes!).

    The German couple? They're the elderly foreigners who do everything they can to be helpful but are rather slow and frankly it would make sense to leave them behind. However they're needed to act as fodder for the hero characters to go out of their way to help, to show how heroic they are. So they stay. The rude waiter will demand to leave them behind at one dramatic moment in the story, and his survival clock will be counting down from that moment on. The brunette, tough-as-nails girl will probably agree, but will smartly keep her mouth shut and behave differently.

    The other two near our table? Oh, they're just featured extras.

    Me and Harry? Why the stars, of course.

    But the fantasy didn't help the horror of the lunch disaster, which had been all too real.

    We got up and disappeared out of the restaurant in a puff of sulphur and brimstone-scented smoke.

    That was an amazing time, an amazing day, and a horrible lunch. People often tell me that I'm so polite, and so forgiving, and so amiable. I've often said that my success was due to thank you notes and dirty jokes, and knowing how to treat people with respect. None of that was on display that day. And I can only hope that the horror of it was because of the horror of the week before.

    Later that same day I went back to the office and finished the final touches of our presentation; several boards with color schemes, floor plans and renderings. We packaged them up, and got them off on Monday. We hugged each other for another job well done. But the hugs were different this time. The grueling work had been completed, which also meant our diversion tactic had run out.

    That evening I called a private masseur to come to my apartment and give me a massage. I was exhausted and drained more than I knew. He walked in, and we said our hellos. As usual, my apartment was pitch black except for one votive in the corner, its main light hidden behind an open book. Modest I am, or vain, whichever the coin toss ends up on. So amongst the moodiest of mood lighting, he began to give me the massage.

    That's when it happened.

    As he put pressure down on my shoulders, the world just seemed lifted right off of them. Tears, gasps, snot, and perspiration immediately poured out of me. I've never felt anything like it. I wept so deeply that I could not catch my breath. I cried and cried. I got up and paid him quickly and asked him to leave. He apologized and asked what was wrong, but I couldn't even express myself. I don't even recall him actually leaving, although I'm sure he beat a hasty retreat.

    I entered the shelter of my bedroom, taking my darling little Chihuahuas Gomez and Magi, my family, into bed with me. I crawled into a fetal position and stayed there for two whole days, crying and crying and crying, reliving and re-thinking the recent events. The process felt embryonic, entirely healthy... and totally unavoidable. Every single thing about that horrible week flashed through my mind like a movie on high-speed. That unpleasant experience at lunch; the visceral phone calls from Ewa watching the destruction in her own neighborhood; the frantic, tense charette that we labored over amongst it all, even the dentist–all of the memories were interspersed with flashing images of the constant cutting and pasting and painting and drawing and taping and mounting all of these boards, like we were trying to fasten the whole world back together.

    Even though I doubt we'd even be allowed to, we swore we'd never eat at Barneys again. We kept that promise, to a degree, because shortly thereafter, Fred's moved to the store's top floor, where it wasn't the same.

    Weeks later, we met for lunch again at Guastavino's, which has since closed. It was located in the grand interior located inside and beneath the 59th Street Bridge–a real cathedral of a space, with enormous vaulted ceilings. The meal was fabulous this time around.

    Seated next to us was a pair of women, and we couldn't help but overhear one telling the other something dramatic about the morning of 9/11, as we quieted down to eavesdrop. The young woman next to Harry was telling her lunch mate that she had been an intern at large investment banking firm, one of the firms that had a complete loss of every single employee during the disaster, as they were located on the World Trade Center tower right above the site of the first plane's impact. She was an assistant to, in her words "a bitch of a bitch." She talked about how she learned nothing while working there, and that her boss only used her for personal errands, getting flowers, picking up laundry and lunch runs.

    We listened as she talked about that fateful day. Tears began to form in her eyes as she told how that morning her boss, whom she had until that moment despised, called her from a meeting that the other interns were attending. She told her to "run down and get a pack of KOOL cigarettes." The intern said she was furious, and had really had it by that point. She huffed down the elevator, and decided she needed some fresh air, so she went to a local deli on the street. As she was at the counter purchasing the cigarettes, the first plane crashed into her office's tower. In a split second, everyone she knew in that office was gone forever. She wept as she said she owed her life to this "bitch of bitches," and KOOL cigarettes. She said she would keep that pack of smokes until the day she died.

    As we sat there eavesdropping our asses off, practically leaning off of the edge of our seats and into the woman's lap, IT happened. Through all of that agony, all of that personal loss, all of the pain, I came to the realization that I was a New Yorker. I never referred to New Orleans as home again.

    When I was going to New Orleans, I was going to New Orleans. When I was going to New York, I was going home. It was a strange sort of re-birth, in a way. A New York "coming out." How odd that it took fourteen years to reach that point, and what it took to push it over. There I was: a true New Yorker.

    I had actually been reborn earlier, in the horror of the events days earlier. And I'm always reminded of the event, walking in the park, down Fifth  Avenue, wherever. I'll look up and see that it's the most beautiful, clear blue day that anyone could imagine. But in the back of that clear blue day is always the thought of horror and dread.

    I went from being someone who lived in the city to someone who was of the city. This is my home. As bad as things can be, there's always something perhaps better that comes from it. This isn't to justify or make good of anything that terrible in that horrible time except to say that now this is where I am, and it's where I belong.

    I am a New Yorker.