I am crying as I read these. I am a native New Yorker who had moved to the midwest 2 years before 9/11. It was a horrifying day that hit me at about 10pm that evening. I stayed late at work (a bank) to handle our crisis response and hear our traders talk about how no one was at the other end of the open line to the Chase trading desks. Once home, there was the normal routine - dinner, take care of my son, laundry, etc with the TV on in the background. I remember thinking at one point my 4 year old should not be around with the tv on but then again, he is autistic and he never noticed what was wrong. Once he finally went to bed, we had on BBC America which was showing footage from the NY Fox affiliate. We saw people jumping to their deaths and I just broke down. On Friday of that week, I finally was able to talk with my dad, a retired NYC firefighter. He was vacant, a rambling monotone man on the phone. He kept providing me names of people who were missing - sons and daughters of people he had worked with (sons who had become cops and firemen, daughters who largely worked at financial services firms), kids I had gone to high school with. He kept repeating himself. At the end of the horror, both my husband and I knew far too many people who had died. And we were living in a place that didn’t really understand how personal this could be. It proved to us that once a New Yorker, always a New Yorker. I am still taken aback at the skyline without the towers and every time I fly in I am in a state of disbelief that 9/11 happened at all. God bless all those who were much more drastically effected. Though it may not always seem this way, you remain in our thoughts and prayers.

Dump him. She is a smart woman in her own right. Cut loose and live your life Silda!

I have come to believe there are very few women in the same place as Tina’s friend. Either no one is shopping, or, everyone wants to or complacently accepts looking like their daughters! I have to agree completely with her friend. I am in my early 40’s and a professional who needs to wear suits and very professional attire to work. I have money to spend but don’t want to go the Chanel route. I have little choice beyond the basics and how many black suits can you have before it looks like you wear the same thing every day? And as for casual wear, it’s J Crew or similar because that’s all there is, especially in the midwest where I live.