Another cold day in Jersey...

Then again, it is winter.

As I'm driving home from work today I must have hit 4 lights...now not for anything but I don't even live that far from my office. If you asked me how long my commute is I would tell you five minutes. Some days I even feel guilty when I see others all bundled up and bracing themselves against the wind...but not guilty enough to want to join them!

I can remember when I first started working...commuting was exciting. I lived in New Jersey and like most kids that lived just a train ride from the big city (New York) my first job would be in downtown Manhattan. Now this was when they were just beginning to break ground for the World Trade Center. At that time when you took the Path train over to NY the underground terminals were damp and dreary...not to mention the unbearable smells on hot humid days or when water that would seep onto the tracks from the stairways leading to/from the street. But, when you are young, none of that matters, even though back then women didn't wear sneakers or long pants to work.

My first job back then was with a company that made...are you ready...nuclear reactors. Most people paid little attention to nuclear anything back then till a little mishap called Three Mile Island. Then it was all downhill. Changed my job after a few years (but still traveled by Path and watched the building of the WTC continue.) Darn, I think back then most of those in construction worked in that area...well, at least it seemed that way to this teenager. My friends and I would walk pass and pretend we didn't hear the calling out of guys that just wanted to make their presence known. Gee, those guys back then really did work hard...they were pretty proud of the work they were doing.

I can remember the excitement in my mom's voice when she spoke of this huge complex of buildings. She was so awed by the idea that people from all over the world would be working within the same buildings...this was monumental to her...she had never really ventured far from home back then. She asked if I would look apply for a job with one of the companies within...I told her no. I never did like large buildings...at least not being inside them.

It was bad enough that the job I did have at the time was on the 8th floor of a building on Trinity and Rector. The only thing that made that job (nuclear guys) wonderful was it's proximity to Battery Park. I use to love going to the concerts there at lunchtime...or shopping on Maiden Lane...what a madhouse...the street narrow and crowded with one store after another and vendor upon vendor selling their wares.

It would be years before I moved 'uptown' and went from crowded narrow streets to the grand wideness of 42nd and Fifth Avenue. Best part of uptown was the museums...it just didn't have that same flavor of the Wall Street crowd.

To this day I am in touch from time to time with people I knew back then. It's a wonderful world we live in. I never met a person that I wasn't genuinely happy to have met...even if later I might change my mind...it would always be a new venture into a little part of someplace that I hadn't been or might never be.

And so it is with the world of cyberspace...we will meet people and for a brief moment in time they will show us a little bit of their space on this wonderful planet...and, if we are lucky, they will become people years from now that we will still be in touch with, from time to time.

Have a wonderful evening...

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OWW/Claire