In 2004 I decided to leave New York and travel to France to write a book about Mary Magdalene.
I worked in a pretty high end job at the time, for a prestigious hotel company at a Global Sales Office. Things were going well until September 11th, when my world came to a crashing halt. I was very traumatized by that event, my clients were directly impacted and the city that I loved with all my heart seemed to have her soul torn from her. I spent days just staring at the wall of my Park Avenue office until about a year later I said, "Okay, that's enough, this is false, gotta go."
I made the decision to move to Europe and write. I arranged for movers to arrive at my home in a Connecticut town way at the top of the food chain, and then got my travel plans together.
A week before the movers arrived, a friend phoned me and reminded me that I had promised to celebrate her birthday with her in the city. I moaned about this but then dutifully got onto the train and went back into the city. Lisa became a friend after 9/11. She was a VP of a very large insurance company that lost 300+ employees that day. The first plane went into her building and banked slightly, causing all three floors, and those who worked there, to evaporate. Instantly. Miraculously (one of those urban legends that sprang from that time) she was working in their Midtown office that day.
As we were celebrating her birthday my room mate called me and told me not to come home. "Our house is on fire" he said, and I thought he was joking until I heard the sirens.
We lost virtually everything. Had I remained in the house I would also have lost my life as the fire traveled quickly up into the wall of the house, hitting my space definitively.
I moved into my friend's place in Manhattan.
A few days later we heard about the murder of a homeless woman in Central Park. Those of us who ran through that park knew about Mary, a homeless woman we all seem to have adopted and so I grew alarmed. I ran through the park and mercifully, found her. We sat on a bench together she, ragged and alone, all of her goods packed into a shopping cart, piled high.
I had never heard her speak before but as she did I recognized a "Boston Brahman" accent as only the upper crust could enunciate. I asked her if there was anyone in her immediate family that I could contact to tell them that she was safe. She told me that she had a son in Boston, the head of a firm that I recognized quite well, large.
"Won't he be worried about you?" I asked her.
She patted me on the knee. "My dear, I made the choice to leave my home and to live like this, and I will never return."
A day before I left New York, packing the remnants of my clothes in a suitcase on the front lawn of our burnt out home and sending what was left to my brother in Calgary, a friend asked me for lunch. He is the managing partner of a legal firm in New York.
"You look so calm," he said, "and you've lost everything."
"No", I said, "I've only lost my possessions. I still have my life, my dreams and my hopes. I can get other possessions, but if I had lost my life, that is the ultimate forfeiture. At least I know that this chapter of my life is absolutely over."
We laughed at this, sipped our wine, and enjoyed each other's company before I left.
To another chapter.
I worked in a pretty high end job at the time, for a prestigious hotel company at a Global Sales Office. Things were going well until September 11th, when my world came to a crashing halt. I was very traumatized by that event, my clients were directly impacted and the city that I loved with all my heart seemed to have her soul torn from her. I spent days just staring at the wall of my Park Avenue office until about a year later I said, "Okay, that's enough, this is false, gotta go."
I made the decision to move to Europe and write. I arranged for movers to arrive at my home in a Connecticut town way at the top of the food chain, and then got my travel plans together.
A week before the movers arrived, a friend phoned me and reminded me that I had promised to celebrate her birthday with her in the city. I moaned about this but then dutifully got onto the train and went back into the city. Lisa became a friend after 9/11. She was a VP of a very large insurance company that lost 300+ employees that day. The first plane went into her building and banked slightly, causing all three floors, and those who worked there, to evaporate. Instantly. Miraculously (one of those urban legends that sprang from that time) she was working in their Midtown office that day.
As we were celebrating her birthday my room mate called me and told me not to come home. "Our house is on fire" he said, and I thought he was joking until I heard the sirens.
We lost virtually everything. Had I remained in the house I would also have lost my life as the fire traveled quickly up into the wall of the house, hitting my space definitively.
I moved into my friend's place in Manhattan.
A few days later we heard about the murder of a homeless woman in Central Park. Those of us who ran through that park knew about Mary, a homeless woman we all seem to have adopted and so I grew alarmed. I ran through the park and mercifully, found her. We sat on a bench together she, ragged and alone, all of her goods packed into a shopping cart, piled high.
I had never heard her speak before but as she did I recognized a "Boston Brahman" accent as only the upper crust could enunciate. I asked her if there was anyone in her immediate family that I could contact to tell them that she was safe. She told me that she had a son in Boston, the head of a firm that I recognized quite well, large.
"Won't he be worried about you?" I asked her.
She patted me on the knee. "My dear, I made the choice to leave my home and to live like this, and I will never return."
A day before I left New York, packing the remnants of my clothes in a suitcase on the front lawn of our burnt out home and sending what was left to my brother in Calgary, a friend asked me for lunch. He is the managing partner of a legal firm in New York.
"You look so calm," he said, "and you've lost everything."
"No", I said, "I've only lost my possessions. I still have my life, my dreams and my hopes. I can get other possessions, but if I had lost my life, that is the ultimate forfeiture. At least I know that this chapter of my life is absolutely over."
We laughed at this, sipped our wine, and enjoyed each other's company before I left.
To another chapter.