Lots of stuff going on this week, but I continued on with the challenge somewhat successfully. I'm not hitting every single day, but I figure that its not exactly part of the practice to get angry at myself for not doing it every day. Its a challenge not a commandment. Days where I did not meet the challenge are in red.
DAY 8 No yoga. Again, didn't quite get up in time to do it in the morning, and I was getting together with Christopher for dinner so no yoga after work. We met for dinner at Rice, and then I got to experience the frustration of parking woes one encounters when living in the East Village while a film crew takes over your neighborhood. Needless to say, we had a side trip in the middle of the evening to Williamsburg to deal with the parking dilemma. Due to the fear of finding a spot, it was a short adventure.
DAY 9 My day of the week off due to the current paycut situation. Carrie was in town for work, so I was planning on meeting up with her and Kathleen in SoHo after having lunch with Roberta in Leffert's Garden. Or is it Manor? I forget. Either way, I had to be in Brooklyn around noon and SoHo around 3PM. Yoga, yoga, when can I fit this in when I've got plans for the bulk of the day? Plans included:
A viewing of The September Issue. Fantastic fashion documentary of the production of the Vogue 2007 September Issue. It's right up there with Unzipped, the Isaac Mizrahi documentary. Although I still can't believe Anna decorated her townhouse with that shabby chic furniture.
Drinks....somewhere. Fancy new hotel on Crosby was not accepting 'non-residents' until the following week. We ended up at Sweet & Vicious.
Dinner at MacBar. Now that I am ok with gluten, a macaroni and cheese fest was in order. I felt as good afterwards as any normal person ingesting massive amounts of processed cheese.
Back to the yoga situation. Thanks to the DVR, I've been taping episodes of Namaste off the Fit! Network. I came upon an episode on strengthening poses. Fantastic.
DAY 10 Woke up to a rainy but somewhat warm day. I was scheduled to sail the morning Harbor School sail from 1100-1500 hrs and then the 1600-1800 hrs public sail. The wind was perfect for sailing. Unfortunately, it also made me complete exhausted and not able to do much of anything for the rest of the day. No yoga.
I was however able to drag myself to Brooklyn for dinner with Heidi and Carrie. Heidi had gotten her share of the CSA bounty that morning, and made a great dinner (with Tom's help on the fish). Halibut, mashed potatoes, fresh green beans, and bok choy. Ice cream for dessert.
DAY 11 In looking at the calendar, I've missed two days this week, so I feel motivated to go today. Today was also the team day for the Ladies Social Tennis Club out in Prospect Park - four hours of play between the different members. I already woke up to sore shoulder muscles from sailing the day before. Tennis today was going to be challenging. Luckily on Sunday nights there is a restorative yoga class at Om. I love restorative yoga. Its a series of poses where you're propped up on pillows, blocks, or bolsters, and you rest for 10-15 minutes in a pose.
I head out to Brooklyn at around 9:15AM en route to Heidi's. This was the weekend that the MTA had decided it would be a good idea to do work on just about every single subway line. Instead of taking the normal route of the A to the F, I just take the A one more stop to Hoyt/Schermerhorn. I discover that although its a slightly longer walk from that station to her apartment, its a shorter trip since I don't have to wait for the transfer at Jay Street/Borough Hall.
Do I thank the MTA for this little bit of transit knowledge? Hell no. That's a small victory in the confounding set of options that I'll have to deal with for the day. We ended up driving out to Prospect Park and avoided MTA pain. For the morning at least.
The tennis wasn't so bad considering that the soreness in my shoulders in the morning was only the beginning of the pain that was surfacing from the day before. In the end, it was my whole back, as well as my sides and abs. Basically, the whole torso. Strangely, my legs were unaffected. I needed a massage.
At 5:00PM, I headed to Union Square for the restorative yoga class. As I was hoping, it was just what I needed. Although I did fall asleep in some of the poses. Really, what do you expect?
DAY 12 Ah Monday. Columbus Day. My office does not take this day as a holiday, so I'm in the office with about five other people. It was a slow morning, so I checked out Om's schedule for the day, and there is a stretching class at 7:30PM. Sounds good, hopefully they will concentrate on the back of the legs where I have the most trouble.
The slow morning turned into a slow day, and it seemed like it was days before I could leave my desk. I get to the yoga studio for the class, and all the students are waiting on the instructor. I'm anticipating a slight man to walk in - most of the teachers are either women or men of small stature. In walks this guy who is about 6'-4" and he's just big. Except he has a small head.
He starts off the class with us in Vajrasana. I hate this pose. It's a seated pose, where you're legs are bent underneath you, and you're sitting on your heels. My knees just don't like being bent that long. We're in that pose with different variations for about 10 minutes. I'm somehow able to unbend my legs afterwards.
Then we moved into downward facing dog. He decided that this would be a partner pose where people would pair up, and one person would place a strap around the other like a harness and help the person get deeper into the pose. Cue the S&M images of someone getting lead around like a dog on a leash. Hilarious.
A while later, he directed us into a pose where we were kneeling with one knee against the wall with the shin against the wall, and the foot of the opposing leg on the floor in front of us. We were expected to be able to sit up straight from this position. Sort of.
All in all, it was a very challenging class.
DAY 13 Took a break. Chey came over after work to do laundry.
DAY 4 I got up and thought about what I needed to do for the rest of the day, and when I'd be able to do yoga. My first thought - I should have gotten up an hour early. I was scheduled to play tennis, had to run over to Prospect Park for the rescheduled Pioneer picnic, and then work on the boat for the last two sails.
Things seemed to be working out when David called to work for me during the 4-6 sail, and Dan had already offered to work the 7-9. I thought I may be able to leave the picnic early and make the 5:30 restorative class. Then my mom called.
Mr. Fagan had died. Mr. Fagan was one of my parents' closest friends who had suffered from Prostate Cancer for nearly 6 years. He was the first to die from what has been referred to as the "Irish Mafia", the group of people that have been in and around my life for as long as I can remember. I told my parents that I wanted to go to the funeral, which was on Tuesday.
I really wanted to go home and be alone, but felt that I needed to stay at the picnic. In hindsight I should have just left. Hours later, I did enjoy the fireworks though. After the fireworks, I went home, and did one of the shortened versions on the yoga DVD. Although it was not a concentrated effort, I was glad to continue on the challenge.
DAY 5 I had decided the night before that I would get up early and do my practice in the morning. Since I had to head up to the compound right after work, and didn't quite get up early enough to head to the 7:30 class at the studio, I did one of the programs on the DVD. I got through the day, and headed up to Grand Central for the Hudson Line to Peekskill. Since I don't have a car, I had to head upstate to meet up with my parents. The funeral was the next day in Colts Neck, NJ at 9AM, and there was no way my parents were going to come into the city to pick me up before headed out to Jersey - the traffic was probably going to be a nightmare anyway.
DAY 6 I'm awakened from a banal dream where I'm on Pioneer during a crew meeting signing up for sails by a knock on my childhood bedroom door. Its my dad, telling me that it was time to get up. It was 5:30. It takes me a couple of minutes to get up, get to the bathroom, and jump in the shower. I had realized the night before that I forget to pack my bag of toiletries; I had nothing with me, but at least there was a new toothbrush in the bathroom that I could use.
As we were getting ready to leave to house, both my parents mentioned how they were having a really hard time dealing with his death. They knew this day was coming, but it was still somewhat of a shock. There is always the hope that something will work out, some drug will be discovered, somehow the person will beat it. Mr. Fagan is the sixth person I've known in the last eight years who was diagnosed with cancer - 2 of them prostate, 1 brain, 1 melanoma, 1 pancreas, and 1 a rare form of abdominal cancer. Other than my cousin's wife who had the pancreatic cancer, they had all either gone into remission or had stabilized and seemed like they had a chance. They have all succumed to the disease, two of them in one week back in 2003. Its awful having to decide who's funeral you're going to go to - the one in New York for your old boss or the one in Denver for a very good college friend.
The Irish Mafia were the group of people that we grew up with in New Jersey before we moved to New York in 1980, and Mr. Fagan and his wife Ita were my favorite parents out of the group of my parents' friends. Most of the Mafia were from Ireland, some of them - like my father - had married an American. There was a core group of four couples, and all these couples had at least three kids, and we were mostly within eight years of each other, with most of us settling within a four year age difference. Between my family and the Fagan's, there was my sister Erin, then Brian, then me, then Erris, then Tara, my younger sister. A couple of years later the Fagans had another daughter, Orla. We all grew up together, our fathers belonged to the Friendly Sons of the Shillelagh, and we learned Irish step dancing.
After we moved to New York, my parents remained close to the Jersey crowd, and we would continue to go down there on weekends for all sorts of festivities. In recent years, the men had joined the Sons of St. Patrick, and both Mr. Fagan and my father have been honored by this group.
After the funeral, the family hosted a brunch at the same hotel that my sisters and I had thrown my parents a party for their 40th wedding anniversary, which is the last time I saw most of the Mafia back in 2004. Although my family had moved to New York nearly 30 years before this, my parents' close friends were still centered around this Irish community in New Jersey, and we decided to invite these people to celebrate my parents dedication to each other. Even outside of the core group of four families, there are many more people that are a part of this group. I was reminded of how close this group remains as I was speaking to friends of my parents, and its truly an amazing bond of friendship these people have formed, mostly due to having a culture in common. This group lost a vital member this week.
After the brunch, my parents drove me home into the city. I felt that I needed to do something to get my mind off of the events of the day, so I looked up the yoga schedule. There was an open and restorative class at 4:30. Fantastic. It was just what I needed.
DAY 7 Back to work. At least it was snack day. I was going to go to a yogaCORE class at 8PM, but once I was home, I really didn't feel like leaving again. I did the full practice from the DVD. I really need to work on that preparation for forearm stand.
I feel like I'm making some progress. Although my legs are still really tight - don't know how much that can really improve - I am starting to get the Sanskrit names for the poses.
I've been practicing yoga on and off since shortly after I finished college. Unfortunately, it's been mostly off. Earlier this year my therapist recommended resuming my practice and going to yoga at least twice a week, one of the classes should be a restorative yoga class. She said that I owed it to myself. I had never thought of it in that manner, and started looking for a restorative class. I figured if I could find a studio where I liked the restorative class anything else would fall into place. This took longer than I expected.
The first place I tried was Om Yoga. I liked the studio a lot, and the instructor was great. Unfortunately the class was on a Sunday, sailing season was about to start, and I usually sailed on Sundays. I figured that since that place was great, it wouldn't be so hard to find another. Again, I was wrong.
Next I tried Virayoga. Their restorative class was in their annex, which was a 100SF room big enough for two people to do yoga. The instructor started out with asanas that would be in a typical yoga class. After about 30 minutes, she started the restorative part of the session. Unbelievably, she continued talking. She went on and on, and it was in no way relaxing not to mention restorative. I nearly left, but being one of her two students, that would have been awkward.
There were other studios, but they had their restorative classes on Fridays. I typically sail on Fridays also, so I didn't bother trying them out. Instead, I decided to start sailing on Saturdays so that I could go back to Om Yoga.
Restorative yoga is one of the most relaxing activities I've ever encountered. Its very close to meditation, but you arrange yourself in different poses where you're propped up on bolsters, blankets, or blocks, and remain in the pose for 15-20 minutes. In its own way, its rigorous. 180 degrees from this are their open classes. I went to one of those today, a class run by Joe, and was invigorated. One thing I really like about yoga is that I can stay focused and my mind does not wander (at least in the open classes. Sometimes that's a little hard during the more relaxing poses). I only think about what I'm doing in the present.
This month, Om is running a challenge - 31 days of yoga. Practice once a day for every day in the month of October. Although I've been going semi-regularly for the last two months, I think participating in the challenge will help me establish a better practice. This is how its been going so far:
DAY 1 Didn't go. Planned on taking a 7:45PM Open class, but was distracted. That afternoon I was at a board meeting at the Cooper-Hewitt, and was invited to the cocktail party after. That was not the distraction, that one I felt pretty good about saying no so that I could go to yoga - one distraction avoided. However, on the way home I remembered that it was Lex's last day at the Seaport, and there were drinks planned for her. Another friend also texted wanting to avoid his own studying. I got caught up in distraction number 2 and joined some Seaport folks in wishing Lex well.
DAY 2 I had Friday off, but couldn't do my typical 12 noon class since I had volunteered to help out on Pioneer in the afternoon. Thursday night I set my alarm for 6:30 so I could go to a morning class. That didn't work, getting up that early on a day that I don't have to go to work wasn't the greatest plan. There were two classes at 10AM, a Basics and an Intermediate. Thinking I wasn't quite ready for an Intermediate class, I went to the Basics class. Too basic.
DAY 3 Open class at 12:30. Joe was teaching, so I was looking forward to it. It was similar in effort to his class that I took last week, but he focused on different poses. It was really enjoyable, and it was the first day of the challenge that I was satisfied with.
I hope that the rest of the month goes as well as today. To deal with days that I can't make it to the studio, I bought a DVD. There's also a cable channel that broadcasts 30 minute classes, so I'm DVRing them. When I put my mind to something, I can usually get it done.
It's a rainy late September, and I'm slated to sail all day. In looking at the sky and the rain coming down, I'm doubting we sold any tickets, but its the kind of rain that looks like its going to clear up. Eventually.
Charlie calls me at 1130 hrs to ask a favor. He doesn't have the number to the visitor's service desk, and asks if I can walk over there to see what the ticket situation is for the rest of the day. He sounds ready to cancel the whole day. I'm to call him at 1200 hrs.
I walk over to the Museum. The conversation goes something like this:
"How many tickets have we sold for today's sails?"
"None for the 1-3. 18 for the 4-6. 2 for the 7-9."
"18? Are those actual tickets are reservations?"
"Reservation. 18 tickets for one person."
I groan. Damned ghetto charter. If it weren't for that group, we could cancel the whole day. We don't even know if they'll show up. I call Charlie and he officially cancels the 1-3 sail, and says he'll call reservations around 3 to see what's going on with the group. If it's still spitting rain like this, I doubt they'll want to go out.
So the waiting starts. On days like this, what I'd rather be doing is watching the Mad Men marathon (I can at least watch part of that, on right now is the "I'm Peggy Olsen, and I want to smoke pot" episode) or True Blood on HBO Demand. Or knit. Or finish that lanyard. Or a combination of those. A museum show would be great also - free access with my Smithsonian ID card (the Cooper-Hewitt project is at least good for that).
What I'd really like to do is go to a restorative yoga class at 1730 hrs. Unless both the 4-6 and the 7-9 are canceled, that can't happen today either.
I'm not saying I'd rather be doing all these things instead of sailing. I'd love it if there were three sure-to-go-out sails today. We're at the end of the season, so the opportunities are waning to go out on Pioneer. What I don't like is not being able to plan anything else, staying in and watching the radar.
It's 1252 hrs. now. I'll update during the day.
1500 hrs. I leave the apartment again, half thinking that the 18 person group is not going to show up. The sky is clearing, but still...depends on where people are coming from. We wait until 1535 hrs., the group shows up, so we get the boat ready in half the time. The sail is uneventful, the NYU students are happy. We end up heading in a little early because there is a front appearing to the west, a line of menacing clouds hanging over Jersey.
1804 hrs. All the passengers have disembarked. Mike calls Visitor's Services to see what the ticket situation is. Still only two sold. Captain Charlie debates what to do. We've got five volunteers, two passengers, and a guest with a front approaching. No one really ever wants to tell eager passengers that we're canceling the sail, so the decision is postponed. At around 1835 hrs, a couple is seen checking out the sail times poster, so we have a volunteer approach them to see if they want to go out for a sail. They do, so we now have four passengers, so the captain makes the executive decision to go out on the 7-9 sail. I assign dock lines, we get the passengers aboard, Mike gives the safety speech, and we're ready to go.
The passengers are more than ready to help us raise sail, so I get them assigned to the main peak and throat lines. About halfway through raising the main, Mike calls me back to take over setting the main. He runs down to the engine room where there is obvious trouble. There are abnormal sounds coming from the aft cabin, and the transmission is not staying in gear. Charlie directs me to lower the main and raise the fore. This gets done, and then the captain asks for the main to be raised. Luckily, we had very enthusiastic passengers who were more than happy to raise the sail again.
All this time Captain Charlie is on the radio with the Coast Guard. First they direct him to radio channel 21. Then 22. After he gives them our position, East River off of Pier 11, then Pier A, drifting towards the deep water range. He tells them he is trying to stay off the Whitehall ferry terminal. They ask him if he has GPS (we don't) and whether he will anchor in the deep water range. Why the description of our position isn't good enough is not clear. Neither is their suggestion to anchor in the deep water range. The captain's plan is to gybe the main and sail into the pier.
Mike and ZZ have been working in the aft cabin on the transmission. After getting some fluid in the transmission, things seem to be working in some order, and we get the boat turned around. Since we can't trust reverse, the docking plan is to get the bow spring on, port side, haul it in tight, and get the boat around. We start coming in, and the captain decides this approach won't work, and we move everything to starboard side to.
We come close to hitting Peking, but the captain wasn't worried. We get the boat in tight to the float, and the passengers disembark. After, we move some docklines around, I direct the volunteers in getting the boat put to bed while Captain Charlie and Mike assess the state of the engine. There are some concerns that the transmission is leaking into other areas of the engine, and Captain Charlie alerts Captain Richard to the issues we faced this evening.
All in all, everyone handled themselves well. As far as volunteers, we had a deckhand, a deckhand in training, and two new (but luckily sharp) volunteers. I couldn't have asked for much more. Mike thanked all the volunteers, and we retired to Fresh Salt.
Funny how a day that starts off as a day of waiting turns into a day of being in high alert. The adrenelin is still running 3 1/2 hours after I got off the boat.
As Captain Charlie stated at Fresh Salt, "If all else fails, you can always put up the sails to get home." I thank everyday that I get to sail with this man. It's always a learning experience.
I've never been good at selecting fruit. I do my best with what I've heard as surefire ways to pick a good one, but to no avail. I feel that when I get a really great tasting piece, it's all luck. Case in point this week: peach. I find that they are especially difficult; there really seems to be only 2 - 3 weeks a summer when they're good. Most of the time, no matter what the color or even firmness level, they're hard and tart. Not what I want out of a peach.
The last couple of weeks they've been good, but then today, ugh. I picked one up at the deli on the way to work today. It was on the larger side, but a beautiful yellow undertone with dark red patches. It smelled delicious. After lunch, after looking at it for hours, I bit into it. Absolute disappointment. It was still fragrant, but the texture was mealy. I nearly spit it out right there. I took another bite thinking it was just that spot, but no. The whole thing had such an unappealing texture. Such disappointment.
I posted my disappointment as my Facebook status. This was mostly just because I needed to change it, but people immediately started commenting, lamenting the sad state of finding good fruit. Everyone had a suggestion for picking good fruit, ranging from slapping a watermelon to making sure that pomegranates have to be a deep red. Here are some others I've found:
1. Bananas: A banana should be complete yellow when ripe. A banana with a lot of brown spots tastes better than a yellow banana with a green top. This one I totally disagree with. Bananas with brown spots are too soft and gross for my tastes.
2. Oranges: For the juiciest, sweetest, fruit, look for oranges with a sweet, clean fragrance.
3. Tangerines: The best tangerines have a strong sweet smell.
4. Mangos: Haden mangos are good when they are yellow/orange, only slightly firm, and yield to gentle pressure.
From what I've read, in general you should be able to rely on smell, color, feel, and weight (fruit should be heavy). I would think that these rules are easier in the summer when its easier to find local fruit - unless you live in warmer climates.
Last week I was out for drinks with a friend, and we were talking about the gorgeous blue sky that day, that specific cloudless blue that you usually only see early to mid-September. I always have mixed feelings about a sky like this. One the one hand, its one of my favorite colors, and seeing it has the immediate impact of putting me in a good mood. On the other hand, it reminds me of a day eight years ago when the sky was this exact incredible color. We traded our recollections of that infamous day, which for both of us are still vivid.
I think on the eighth anniversary most New Yorkers are reflecting on that day, like we do every September 11th. What follows is my experience from that day, and the days following.
NEW YORK, NY SEPTEMBER 11, 2001 8:46AM It was one of those perfect September days, one where it was in the low 70's with a cloudless sky. As I climbed out of the subway at the Chambers Street A station, I noticed there was a crowd gathered at the corner of Chambers and Church Street. I was a little early for work, so I wandered over to see what was going on. Everyone was looking up to the southwest at the Trade Center. What they were looking at was incredible: there was a huge gash in the upper floors on the north facade of one of the towers. Everyone assumed it was an accident, that a Cesna had flown into the tower. A sidewalk vendor kept telling people that no, it was not a small plane, it was an American Airlines jet that crashed into the North Tower. I was amazed, the hole just didn't look that big, the scale of the building was deceiving. No one seemed to believe him, thinking he was exaggerating, that he was mistaken in what he had eyewitnessed. I left the corner to go to my office.
9:03AM I called my mom to tell her to turn on the news, that a plane had flown into the Trade Center. As I was getting the words out, I felt a faint tremor. The second plane had hit. There was a collective realization that this was not an accident.
My office was on Reade Street between Greenwich Street and Hudson, and there were only a couple of us there. We didn't know what to do: should we get to work? should we leave the area? I had walked down to the corner of Greenwich and looked south. There were rows and rows of people walking north on Greenwich. They were all covered in dust and blood. I looked up towards the tower and saw people jumping from the top floors of the tower. I turned away in horror from this sight and walked back to my office.
My office was in the ground floor of my boss's townhouse, and he had come down to tell us to come upstairs. The three of us who made it in that day went up to his living room and spent time talking about what was going on, watching the coverage on TV where we learned that we were not the only city that had been attacked. There were rumors that a plane had hit the Sears tower, and there were rumors that there were up to 10 planes that were missing. Luckily this did not turn out to be true. I walked up to the roof and looked south. The top of both towers were engulfed in flames, and people were jumping from the windows. One after the other they lept, at least 30 of them in the matter of a minute. The mind works in curious ways, and I was reminded of an educational filmstrip that I saw when I was probably around 8 years old. It was of a group of lemmings jumping off a cliff. At the end of the film, my teacher would run it backwards, and you could see the lemmings rising from the water up to the safety of the cliff. I immediately felt ashamed for the comparison, and put it out of my mind. I can't even imagine having to make the choice these people had to make knowing they were never going to make it out of the towers alive: be burned alive or jump to your death.
9:59AM I walked back inside the penthouse to watch the news coverage. A couple of minutes later, there was a rumbling, and the guys finishing up work on the roof rushed inside. They told me the tower was coming down.
I went down two flights to join the rest of my office and my boss's family. The south wall of the townhouse was glass, and at the time it was like looking at an opaque wall, the smoke outside was so thick. We all silently stared at the wall, hoping that flames were not to follow.
10:29AM After the smoke cleared, Sara, my boss's wife, suggested that we go down to the office to get our purses and other personal belongings just in case we needed to evacuate. Liz, the office manager, and I offered to go and get everyone's stuff. As we were grabbing the bags, there was another rumble, just like an earthquake. The glass storefront started vibrating, and we ran to the cellar. We stayed down there for a couple of minutes, and then went upstairs once we thought it was relatively safe.
For the rest of the morning and into the afternoon, we continued watching the news coverage, and called our families. The relief in my parents' voices was palpable. They did not know how much of Lower Manhattan had been affected by the tower collapse, and I was only five blocks away. My mother told me that my sister hadn't heard from her husband, he was at work in WTC 5, one of the lower buildings. She didn't heard from him for hours; when she did finally hear from him he told her that he had run out of his office, leaving his cell phone and wallet behind, and none of the payphones were working.
We stayed at my boss's house until around 5PM. I borrowed Sara's bike, and rode back to Brooklyn. As I biked down Reade Street crossing West Broadway, I took one last look south towards the Trade Center. It was a blur of red, orange, and black, a hellish sight. I wondered what the next couple of days would bring.
I called my mother when I got home, and she told me that three of my cousins were missing, all firemen. Later that evening, I gathered at an apartment on Atlantic Avenue with friends and my friend Will kept my glass of bourbon and ginger filled.
The next day, Heidi and I walked around Brooklyn looking to donate blood. Lots of other people had the same idea, and no more blood was needed - they had nowhere to store the blood that the flood of volunteers was willing to give. I spoke to my mom who told me that all three of my cousins had been heard from, they were apparently a little busy the day before, and couldn't call their wives and mothers. I knew I wasn't going to be able to go to work for the rest of the week, so I took a train up to the compound to get out of the city. I have never wanted to escape New York in that way before.
That Friday, I got a call from my office manager. She said that Lower Manhattan below Canal Street was closed to the public, but that on Monday they were going to start letting people who lived between Canal and Chambers through the barrier. We were going to meet at the SoHo Grand Hotel for breakfast Monday morning, and attempt to get down to the office. My boss was thinking that since he lived in the area, he would be able to get his employees in the secured zone. He was right, and the National Guard officer told us that over the next couple of weeks we would need to bring ID and a letter proving our employment within Lower Manhattan. We walked the nine blocks to Reade Street to see the state of the office. My boss hadn't been home yet, so he had no idea whether there was power or telephone service. We walked in, tried the lights and phones, and everything was in working order. Apparently we were lucky: because the building was new (construction had just finished the month before), we had been able to connect to the relatively new electrical and phone service coming from the north. Most of the neighbors service came from the south, which ran under the WTC and had been destroyed. We were able to get back to work, which allowed me to start to get back to a sense of normalcy.
Of course, things were not normal. I had to go through a National Guard post to get to work everyday. Trucks with debris from the WTC drove past our storefront several times a day. There was an RV parked outside our office from Chunky Soups, they were donating food to the workers. There was also the stench from the burning site, a combined smell of burning plastic, metal, and things we didn't want to think about. Although the EPA had stated the air was safe to breathe, my boss came in one day with the independent test results that the PTA from his kid's school had contracted. Their recommendation: wear an N100 mask if you can spell the smoke. I wore a mask intermittently almost everyday for the 99 days that the towers burned.
NEW YORK, NY SEPTEMBER 11, 2009 10:19AM I'm watching the news coverage of the annual event at the WTC. The Reading of the Names started after a moment of silence at 8:46AM, and they are up to the letter K. It is absolutely heartbreaking seeing family members lose their composure when getting to the name of their loved one. The immensity of 2,819 deaths over the course of approximately 1 hour and 45 minutes is apparent is hearing this seemingly endless list. At the first anniversary of the attack, the NY Times ran a section with the photos of all the victims. Seeing page upon page of the black and white 1"x 1 1/2" photos had the same impact.
Its good to see that there has been progress on the building site. The steel structure for the memorial can be seen behind the stage, and I'm remembering back to the day this past year when I heard that what had been referred to as the Freedom Tower, would offically be called 1 World Trade Center. I think this was an important move of looking towards the future and what the site will become upon completion.
As the unofficial end of summer arrives, I've been thinking about how I've spent my time this summer. I always feel the need to plan trips out of the city, but typically I get so caught up in what's going on in the city that it's hard to find time to leave. I don't want to miss out on anything. This summer I did have two events that compelled me to get out of the city - a wedding at Mass MoCA and a wedding in Maine. I also had the two week 'exile' when I had to take a furlough at work. Other than that, there was the day at the beach (well, that was technically still in the city, Staten Island), and two other trips in the past couple of weeks. The first of these trips was to Fire Island, the second was to Marshall's Creek, PA to go kayaking in the Delaware River.
FIRE ISLAND AUGUST 24TH-25TH
While sailing on August 22nd on board Pioneer, talk turned towards Chey's upcoming week out in Kismet on Fire Island. I had Monday off, so we made a plan where I would join her out there for the day. Getting to Fire Island can be a bit of an ordeal - subway to LIRR to Ferry. It's fine if you time it right, but most of the time it takes at least 2 1/2 to 3 hours - but as soon as you step off the ferry onto the carless walkways, its worth it. This was the second time I've been out to Fire Island; the first time was 2 or 3 years ago with friends that had a share in Fair Harbor. Both times I've immediately had the feeling that I need to spend more time in this place. The absence of cars has a remarkable effect on my well being. The air is clean, both from the odor and the sound of combustion engines, and its immediately relaxing. Chey and Ryan came out to meet me and direct me to the house. The arrangement of houses and wooden sidewalks can be confusing: nothing seems to be marked, and finding a place that you've never been to before can be difficult. They greeted me like people who've been at the beach for days even though they had just arrived the night before in what seemed to be a pretty frazzled arrival from what they told me when we were finally at the house. We had lunch, discussed the upcoming kayaking trip logistics, then Chey and I headed to the beach loaded with US Weekly, People, and books to balance out the trash. The beach was mostly empty, and reminded me of the beaches down at the Outer Banks in North Carolina. Those beaches are expansive, and although there are rows upon rows of houses filled with happy vacationers, the beaches never seem crowded. We spent a couple of hours in the sun reading and napping. Around 5 or 6PM, we headed back to the house to have a cocktail, and think about what to make for dinner.
Dinner is a bit of an epicurean adventure. The deal with the house is that the people that are there on the weekend stock the pantry and fridge, and for the most part if you're there during the week, you can pull together a meal out of what is left over. We had chicken, portabello mushrooms, corn, and a salad mix. There was some honey and Grey Poupon, so I was able to make a marinade for the chicken, and although there was no balsamic vinegar, and very little olive oil, Chey was able to pull together the makings of grilled portabellos with the little olive oil we had and lemon juice to substitute for the vinegar. There was no butter for which there is no substitute, so Ryan went to go be neighborly and see if he could borrow from the neighbors (he was successful). It was a great meal, finished the evening off with drinks, a walk on the beach, and some episodes of the first season of Mad Men.
The next morning I dragged myself out of bed to catch the 7:25AM ferry back to the mainland. I was on the edge of calling in sick, but knew that I had a full week at work, and would pay for that lapse in judgement one way or another. On the ferry back, I vowed to somehow find a way to spend more time on this island next year. I've since spoken to my friend Amy who had the share in Fair Harbor, and may be able to get some time in her house next year. MARSHALL'S CREEK, PA AUGUST 30TH
Earlier in the summer, Emily had sent around a list of trips she wanted to make this summer. I think we succeed with two of them - one to the beach (Great Kills) and a kayaking trip out to the Delaware Water Gap.
We had a couple of scheduling issues, but Emily, Adam, Anilsa, and I got over to Staten Island to meet up with Tom. Tom is the only one of us with a car, and it is a lot easier to get from Manhattan to SI via ferry than it is to get to Manhattan from SI by car. Years ago, you used to be able to take your car on the ferry, but that was stopped years ago right after 9/11 due to security concerns. The ferry is also free.
After about an hour and a half of 'are we there yet' and 'are we still in New Jersey' questions from Emily, we arrived at Adventure Sports in Marshall's Creek, PA. There was some filling out of liability paperwork, some cash handed over for the kayaks, a safety speech, then we were on our way to the river. After another safety speech, the driver put our kayaks and canoes in the water, and we were on our way.
The water and hills surrounding the Delaware River are gorgeous. Emily was determined to get in the water as soon as possible, and she succeeded in doing that within five minutes of being on the water by trying to change out of her shorts in the kayak.
Lesson 1: Do not try to change out of your clothes in the kayak. It will only end in disaster, or at least you in the water and a puddle in your kayak that you just can't quite get rid of.
She was able to get over to the side of the river, and with the help of Adam and Anilsa, was able to get most of the water out of the kayak. This was a constant root of laughter throughout the trip as Emily was constantly adjusting the angle of her clothes that were trying to dry on the front of her (and eventually my) kayak. The three hour trip down the river was a mix of paddling alone, floating in a group, and getting through the rapids. All in all, it was a good day.
When I returned to the city, I was later than I expected, and had to get over to Greenpoint to meet up with a group of friends at Doug and Naomi's for the inaugural OC: The Game match. Since none of us had watched the show in a while, we bent the rules to fit our needs. It was a great way to end the weekend, drinking champagne, playing a board game, and watching the OC after a fun day out of the city. Lesson 2: I need to get out of the city more next summer.
s this guy who is about 6'-4" and he's just big. Except he has a small head.
