Thanks, Christina. What a different world we would be living in if Sept. 10th stopped time.

I wrote this about a month after 9/11/2001. I call it, “September Mourn.” I love NY. I am your shops and delis on the avenues. I am the bright lights and the out of work actors. Seeking fame and fortune on Broadway, too. I am the concrete, the colors, the sounds and the aromas. All wrapped up as fine art. I am this magnificent city’s heart. I keep this city going and glowing. Downtown readings and swinging with my baby uptown. Where we can cry at each other’s words and dance on each other’s feet. But we never miss a beat. I love NY. I am the lucky few with townhouses that come with breathtaking views. From the Big Apple’s museums to its Central Park Zoo. I sleep on subway grates for I am the poor. With faces you have never seen before. But I will be there to comfort you. Because that is what New Yorkers do. I claim this land to be my very own. And thank God every night. That this is my home. I love NY. Yellow and black. Mr. Cabbie, please take me back. To when only stars fell from the Manhattan sky. Run the next light, lay on your horn. Get me away from the city that I will come to mourn. I beg you, Mr. Cabbie, give me back New York City. Please, Mr. Cabbie, show me a little pity. There’s a big tip in it for you if you can. Take me back to Monday, September 10.

The Today Show did a segment about basketball superstar Michael Jordan trying out for baseball. I thought, “ what a slow news day.” I finished getting dressed and drove to work. ( I have never allowed myself to utter those words again.) New York was being kissed by the gods with an absolutely breathtaking day - not a cloud in the sky and the blue was of a color not found in a box of Crayolas. I kept sticking my head out and marveling at such a day. At a red light, the DJ mentioned a plane hitting one of the twin towers. As New Yorkers we were stunned that anyone could miss the twin towers. The reports were coming in and they were a bit sparse but we all thought a single engine plane made a horrible mistake. I was minutes from work when I heard about the other plane. I was becoming a bit unglued. Pulling up to the parking lot, I had one foot in the car and one on the ground. I didn’t know whether to stay and listen or be with my friends and coworkers. I ran as fast as I could. Moments before a woman I know at work lost contact with her husband. He was in the second tower. So was my sister in law. The sound of screaming and sobbing from people trying to make contact with loved ones was deafening. I wanted to hide under my desk and wish it all away. My phone rang. It was my mother. My sister in law probably made one of the last calls to come from downtown. She was safe and running for her life with thousands of others. We watched the towers come down and you could only hear people holding their breaths. I left work to go to my brother’s house to wait with him and be with him. All my sisters and brothers who could, made it to my brother’s house. One was trapped in the city, one was not able to travel since major roads were closed. We sat and watched and watched the events of the day unfold and barely said a word. What could you say? My sister in law made it home around 6:30 and she was covered from head to toe with what came down that day. I finally let myself feel later on and it felt like the pain would never stop. I am a native New Yorker who had the privilege to call Manhattan my home, my community, my neighborhood. People find it hard to call something so big your neighborhood, but when you live there, it doesn’t seem so big. And on that day, some very evil people tried to destroy my old neighborhood. But they didn’t. I will always miss the sense of security of being in the city. I was there last night and it all seemed so peaceful. But the national guards at Penn Station remind me that nothing is normal. Not even the new normal we seem to live under. For myself, I know I was being protected from experiencing it first hand. I was scheduled to be in the city that day for a meeting. I was all set to take the train and walk over to our city office. But then I remembered I had an early dentist appointment and canceled the meeting. Close to 3000 people in Manhattan, PA and DC did not to get a break that day. I do think about them almost everyday and it reminds me that I was spared to do something good. To help make this sad world we live in a better place. I do it for all the souls we lost that day .

I just took 2 advils and my 15 year old cat, Minnie, who might demand a byline or 2 is miffed that I am writing about pigs. I try to explain that it’s really not an affront to her and the other 5 cats in the house -Doris, Duncan, Henry and Bellarina, but it’s about the “putting lipstick on a pig” line that has grabbed headlines. Huh? What is going on here? I may go thru the entire bottle of advil and call Betty Ford and ask her for the presidential suite. We have such a short time before the elections and I have to say that the side I am supporting and the side I am not not have not said a hell of a lot to make this a race that will bring people out to vote. And we thought “chads” from the last election screwed things up! Okay, so while people out there are deciding what shade of lipstick the pig might wear and who said it first and was it meant as a slur or a metaphor, I have put together a list (with the help of Minnie) about a few subjects that should be addressed to the America people. In no particular order: Health Care – will we ever make sure that all people in this country can be cared for if they fall ill? What about preventive care – I really don’t want to be dead for 3 hours before you approve my care! Can we get better before we become deathly ill? Only 2% of future doctors are going to be GPs because of malpractice cost. You’re killing me here. War – what is it good for – there are some of us (14, I think) that believe war is not the answer. How about forming a group of men and women who will only work on coming up with solutions to war…or ways to live in peace? If after thousands of years of war, we find that it really does not work – (plus you break the hearts of millions of moms whose kids come home in a box) could we try something new? How about a bake off? Disg(race) Relations – I used to tell a joke when I did stand up that I am Italian, Irish, Scottish, English, and a little Australian (this is not a slur about the height of the average Australian). The joke part was that my relatives were the original frequent flyers. Okay, not my best, but I want to see all races be respected and even loved. What can you do about that?We can’t get the 1960s back! Education – fix it. I want children in any neighborhood to be afforded the best education. Give me a break with the cost of college while we are at it. Don’t put our future generation into debt before they even graduate. They won’t be able to shop for work clothes. That is enough from my headquarters. So let the pig w/ Chanel lipstick just lie in its own pen and let’s get on with the issues that will really impact our lives. I want you to all grow up and let the kids in this country see something right for a change. Let them see the 2 men who are running for president talk about the issues and pssst - let us know how you plan to make it better for all Americans. Including me.

As I prepared to listen to Sarah Palin do a “stand up routine” last night, I walked into the bedroom with a few essentials: my dog’s Prozac, a bottle of cheap wine to wash down before mentioned prescription drugs, a rope to hang myself and a copy of “War and Peace.” Not to read, but to knock myself out if the Prozac wasn’t kicking in fast enough My husband chose to cower in the living room. He knew my rebuttal would start just around the time Ms Palin decided to speak. My first impression was that I was in a comedy club with a rather mediocre comic at the mike. Then before the Prozac kicked in, I realized that this woman before me was running for vice president of this country. My country. Chris Rock, she ain’t! I was rather taken aback by her infantile sarcasm and her cruelty for the sake of making a group of people giggle like kids watching something they shouldn’t on TV. When she was gleefully attacking Barack Obama for his community service, she showed a really ugly side. A lawyer who graduated from Harvard goes back into communities that needed a voice… what point was she trying to make? That Obama is a real son of a bitch for trying to help people less fortunate? Shame on you, Ms. Palin. So lipstick is the one difference between a soccer mom and a pit bull? Old joke. So violence in sports is okay, huh? I have not lost my sense of humor. I just don’t get her jokes. YOU ARE RUNNING FOR VP OF THIS COUNTRY. Go home and go to open mike night! I am still so angry with McCain for picking Palin and thinking that Clinton supporters like me will move away from their party to vote for a woman who doesn’t seem to have the same values as they do. A metaphor that comes to mind is a car full of civil rights leaders getting into a car being driven out of town by a driver in a white sheet. Intelligent voters, both women and men, know that to have this team win in November is just plain Palin wrong I sadly think as the honeymoon high wears off that people will do what they always do with a “strong” woman. They will label her a bitch. And for once I will agree.

that is a tough question.While i would love the opportunity to see if we ever get it right about living on this planet in peace, this country doesn’t seem to fancy the old. I don’t want to end up eating from a dumpster and being abused by people who are supposedly caring for me, so I think I will have to get back to this question in about 50 years. I think it’s best to live in the present and dream.

I would wish John McCain the wisdom to know that becoming president would be a major mistake for this country. I hear Arizona is a nice place to live.

I threw up a little in my mouth today when I read about McCain’s VP pick. I can’t help but think this is the 2009 version of Dan Quayle- let’s give the little ladies something to keep them happy. So do they think Hillary supporters will vote for McCain because he went the female VP route? Does he think us that thick? Please do not prove me wrong! I told my very conservative sister yesterday that I hope he wouldn’t pick a woman and insult more than 1/2 the population of the country. He did. I am. Insulted. But that just makes me want to vote for the Obama/Biden ticket over and over again. I just might.

As a young girl I just loved my President Kennedy. Then a bullet ended that love affair and I was left to wonder why. My father cried in the coat closet because he couldn’t verbalize his grief. The nuns made us say the rosary while kneeling on the hard wood floor. It took me a week to get the feeling back in my knees. A man with a voice from the gods came into my life and he spoke of judging people for the content of their character and not the color of their skin. As I type this, goose bumps are overtaking my body. I just loved my Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. My heart was healing (along with the Beatles showing up) and I believed every thing he said and knew that he was here to make us better people. But then a bullet ended that love affair. I remember screaming into the phone when news broke of his murder. It took my boyfriend about 3 weeks to recover his hearing. Now I was getting angry. But a very good man said that we needed to stay calm and keep the message of Dr. King alive. I just loved my Robert Kennedy. But then a bullet ended that love affair. My friend and I went to see him in a speech and he pointed me out in a crowd because of my red Beatle hat and that he hoped all his supporters could be as excited as I was. I think he really meant that I had a set of lungs on me. Now I lost my belief that my heroes would live to be old men. I also lost some faith in my country. Okay, a lot. Last night i felt a twinge of hope make its presence known to me. I am beginning to feel that change is possible. I am beginning to know that the only way to make this country better is by tossing out the old and bringing in the new. A new voice; a new hope and the people to make both possible. I want to be part of that again. I want to believe that we as a country can get back on track again. I want us all to love our neighbors and work together. I want the sons and daughters in harms way to come home and for us to really, really work on bringing more peace into the world instead of using war as the answer. Thank you Mr. Obama and Mr. Biden for making it possible for this former young girl to believe. Again.

I feel that I was born at the right time so I look towards the future. The life experiences I have gained allows me to keep the feelings that permanently attached itself to me back in the 60s - that we are all equal and that nothing is impossible. Okay,sometimes the government makes it a bit impossible to bring about change, but you still have to get up each day and believe. I would kick to the curb some of the guys that hurt me back then. It’s amazing what a little long hair and a guitar can do to a young girl’s heart.

I always had one major rule for all my relationships with the men I dated: “You will never have an opportunity to hit or cheat on me twice.” Those words have done me well! I refuse to live in fear or feel a sense of betrayal! My heart goes out to Mrs. Spitzer. I’m sure her husband’s cheating slapped down her like a clenched fist.