They were both tipsy by the time their eyes locked. A few drinks later, by the time they got back to her place, they both collapsed on the bed, in a drunken stupor. They awoke hungry not for sex but for breakfast. Thomson’s Corner Market looked like 1946 in an upstate farm town. Of course it was just the last old place anywhere near Wall Street. She lived down a block or two nearer the water. They bought eggs, fresh-squeezed orange juice- “juices for Julie,” parsley, hearts of palm, goat cheese, artichoke hearts. He smiled gratefully that she was gently reminding him of her name. He returned the favor. “Hey, let’s get some Bagels for Bob.” She knew just the place. They held hands fairly running down the block, wind in their hair on this perfect September Saturday morn. After breakfast- they decided to take it to the roof- they went to Cafe Reggio a mile uptown in Greenwich Village for cappuccino. She took his hand, her green eyes looking into his blue. She said, “We didn’t do anything last night, did we?” He said with a dead serious, dead-pan delivery, “Yes.” She looked startled, taken aback. “Yes, we did something. We fell asleep faster than, well if not a world’s record, it was a slumber record for me.”She cracked a laugh first, barely a girl’s giggle. Then a pause... They laughed heartily and long, so much tension released. They gently kissed. Their first, tentative kiss. They were both 27. Both worked on The Street. She, a quant in derivatives, formerly a physics Ph.D from Princeton. He, a trader. Saturday, September 8, 2001. They went to the Central Park Zoo, had a picnic on the Great Lawn, romped, kissing, caressing- gently touching each other’s faces, holding their heads in each other’s hands in Strawberry Field. Dinner at Fine and Shapiro, splitting extra-lean corned beef and dried-end-cut pastrami and a plate of fries. A celery-tonic, lots of ice, then one beer between the two of them. A movie at the Quad, home, a few kisses, collapsed again into a long, deeply profound sleep. Sunday morning, they showered together, made love -for a long time on the couch, watched news shows on CNN, CBS... read the Times. They knew they were meant for each other. Yes, after two days. He worked for Cantor-Fitzgerald in the Towers. She worked farther from the Street. Monday. They decided to move in together. Tuesday, a loving 5 am romp in the sheets. 6:15 at the gym. 7:20 at his desk, reading news on the Bloomberg terminal. 8:31 Looked like some big bond trades of his have gone south. Bob does some spreadsheet analysis, min-max regret criterion... 8:37. Takes a coffee break to clear his head. He doesn’t want to trade impulsively. 8:37 out in the street. He decides to walk it off. Something pulls him north. 8:46 He’s a quick walker. Just north of Canal Street. The first highjacked plane hits the North Tower. 9:03 terrified, continuing to walk, faster now, breaking into a prolonged jog, north. The second plane crashes into the south face of the South Tower. He is barely conscious, fairly running. A flicker of survivor’s guilt clouds his thinking. 9:07 Cell service is dying. He calls Julie. She’s hysterical. Overjoyed, crying when she hears his voice. Noon. They meet near her midtown office. She takes the rest of the day off-personal day. Ha. They spend the next week holed up in his Washington Heights Pre-War. They take turns desperately trying to comfort each other’s hysterical shaking, tear-filled ranting. She says “I don’t know if it will help. A friend in college gave me a mediation tape.” They listen. They replay it. They light fragrant candles in the early evening’s natural light coming through the windows’s panoramic views of the Hudson and the timelessly beautiful Palisades’ dusk semi-dar. They listen again. The candles go out. They fall asleep in each other’s arms. He wakes first, just before dawn, showers, resumes meditation. An hour later, his survivor’s guilt is gone. He doesn’t know how to break it to her.He decides to be direct. For the first time, he says what’s been obvious. He loves her. He wants them to marry. He wants to have kids with her, spend the rest of his life with her- in sickness, in health. She is too drained to show her joy. She says “Of course.” They kiss. There’s more. He has decided he has to defend his country. It is the only way he can live with himself. This was the reason his survivor’s guilt had lifted. “WHAT!!!? I nearly lose you in the terrorist attack. Now you want to risk everything a million miles away?!”More crying. She pounds her fists into his strong, broad chest. Her hysteria passes. He is quiet, resolved, loving. They can’t risk losing him on the front. Even though he passes basic training with flying colors, his strategic skills are too valuable. He’s at his desk in Iraq when his cell rings. It’s Julie. She says, “Slowly, very slowly turn around.” He does. He thinks he’s having a stress-induced hallucination, a hangover’s delusion... No he has not been drinking for months. Julie slow-walks then breaks into a run. The other enlisted all look up. Time has stopped. The Commanding Officer is about to shout. He thinks better of it. Julie and Bob fly into each other’s arms. Everyone is stunned silent. Then, as they kiss and hug so desperately, thunderous applause. They got a two day furlough. They were assigned to different buildings. Good thing too. When his was bombed the next month, she helped dig him out... he was the last person dug out alive. He was lucky too: two broken legs, two broken arms. Six months in gradually less restrictive casts, a year of intensive physical therapy, he was as good as new, maybe better. He reminded himself daily that everyone breaks. Some more than others.The only way you don’t break is if you stay home safe. Then you not only don’t grow or help anyone- you rot. He also kept in the front of his mind: though everyone- even those poor fools who thought they were playing it safe- everyone breaks, it is the lucky ones among us who get strong in the broken places. For some that meant overcoming the fear of fear- inspiration from FDR. For some it meant, literally, to climb mountains in overcoming their cancer.He kept Julie’s tears, her laughter, their journey together front and center. He was shipped home on a stretcher. After the most restrictive casts came off and while he was in PT five, then four, then three, then two days a week, three hours at a clip, he was reassigned to a strategic unit in Langley. Julie was FaceTime away. Still in Iraq. She was coming home soon. Great news until the airbase she was to fly out of was bombed. Luckily it was for her and Bob, only a delay. The couple reunited in Reston, VA. He had bought a foreclosure, fixed it up in Julie’s taste. When she arrived, her sigh of relief could be heard around the world- she thought paraphrasing Emerson’s 1837 line about the start of the American Revolution. It was after all, a restart for them. It was to be one of many restarts. Bob and Julie were soon honorably discharged. Their service to their country fulfilled. ****Something wasn’t right, though. Iraq hadn’t sponsored those terrorists whose attack on American soil, with American airplanes, gave W cover for declaring war in Iraq. Some made the joke that it was Iran. Not so bad this time, because W only got one letter wrong. Of course that turned out not to be that funny or even correct. Almost all the hijackers were from Saudi Arabia- that great ally of the United States. That great ally whose oil we drank up hungrily in order to run our cars and keep our planet nice and warm. ^***A few years went by. President Donald Dumpf got top security clearing for his son-in-law. Next thing you know, son-in-law No. 1 gets a portfolio including “Peace in the Middle East.”Easy to do. Probably almost as easy as going to war with Iraq or winning a trade war. Turns out just after super son-in-law gets all the juicy inside dope, he flies off to guess where? Saudi Arabia, how’d you guess?A week or so later, a bunch of anti-Saudi, anti-Prince Salman, for lack of a less fishy title, get brutally murdered. Our Great Leader comes to Salmon’s defense. “Oh, he has nothing to do with these brutal murders. By the way, I’m so popular, so beloved of all the people - except in California- and a few of MY other cities- that I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue- right in front of one of my glorious Dumpian Towers and nobody would care. My pal Putin would call me up, congratulate me, say,Don, when are you going to get rid of your enemy of the people press. I guess he’s referring to the fake news in the failing NY Times, which by the way- when I was a precocious, brilliant young student- and I went to Harvard and Yale and was repeatedly chosen as Michigan’s Man of the year...”Not known for either completing a thought or being focused on much other than his purse, the Great Leader said when Saudi Arabian oil fields were attacked that “We’re locked and loaded.” He decided not to meet with Iranian leader who had beaten him to the punch by saying he wouldn’t meet with dumpf because he changes his mind from meeting with no preconditions to a dozen pre-conditions. Our POTUS, a few months later, as usual caves offering to help Iran fight the Coronavirus before adequately helping our own citizens or allies, in fact delaying testing to keep the numbers down so he can claim his brilliant leadership is what makes our country look healthier, bigger, stronger, more immune to the virus or any other attack thanks to his huge macho and intuitive knowledge- that he knows more about national security than our generals, more about medicine and science than doctors and scientists- because his uncle was a scientist. After all, he says he’s the Chosen One, blessed be he...Evangelicals love him. Could it be his impeccable morality, fairness, his knowledge of the Constitution, his encyclopedic knowledge and scholarship, wise-thought through-collaborative planning and decision making, his honesty, modesty, selfless devotion to our nation, the environment, our allies, his generosity, consistent self-sacrifice in helping to the underdog, his compassion, his overall decency?Nah. Great Leader said “I’m ratcheting up sanctions on Iran...” which the day before he was ready to drop. Oh, of course it didn’t help that he scrapped the nuclear containment pact with Iran. It didn’t help that Iran’s attack on shipping vessels went unpunished. Iran was emboldened. Dumpf laughed... our military had no jurisdiction to retaliate against another country’s enemy- meaning when European vessels were attacked-clarifying a few days later that support for and defense of NATO (most likely by aggression from our new best buddy Putin’s Russia) would be conditional. Did he envision a world order of N. Korea, Russia, Egypt, Turkey, Syria and Iran plus a few other countries ruled by dictators and of course with Agent Orange 🍊, the Clown Prince, the Crown Prince of Orange, at the head? Putin would sooner have the would-be President for life of the USA dead. Except as he said a few days later when Saudi Arabia was attacked. In this case “We are locked and loaded.” A not-so-subtle shout out to one of his biggest clients- I mean supporters- really one of his numerous bosses, the NRA.Rules, laws, tradition, alliances, history, science have no meaning for him. As in his statement that he didn’t need to read or hear from experts because intuitively he knew more than all of them. And when things didn’t quite work out? It was the fault of the Dems. Or Obama... Or the fault of his insubordinate subordinates who he had praised recently and to whom by twitter he issued his favorite words. “‘You’re fired.”Then our great leader’s Vice President through a spokesman said in response to the question of are we going to war, is that what “Locked and loaded means?”Mr. VP who has kept a pretty low profile, kept a straight face (though he might be a closet gay) in defending, propping up “Donald Ducking from responsibilities,”’said - through his spokesman: “ No.... Locked and loaded is a term used in the oil industry.” Great Leader releases American Strategic Oil reserves. After all, we can’t go a day without putting more hydrocarbons in the air. We need to get this cold planet a little warmer so we can drill more easily for oil and minerals in the Arctic. Hey! Let’s buy Greenland. After we do the strip mining and of course after it warms up a little, what a great place it will be to put up golf courses and resorts- the new Bahamas we’ll call it, market it to all the WASPS and their businesses which want to avoid paying taxes. Of course that was the only thing that kept the Bahamas afloat. Until it didn’t. Or maybe that was Bermuda with their bumper crop of onions -or their being bears- you know those Bermuda shorters. Those hurricanes you know. Then they had the gall to want to come to our great country. The country I made great again. Imagine! All those rapists, murders. Just like those people who don’t look like us invading our southern border. That’s why I’m diverting money from pretty unimportant military projects to build my big, beautiful wall that Mexico is going to pay for. Who needs that new cyber-security center?!Putin says we don’t need it any more than the spies I took out of Russia or the NATO defenses. Why would I want to protect countries like France and Germany from such a peaceful, peace-loving country like Russia? I mean, after all with all due redirect for our intelligence agencies, I have to believe President Putin when he gave me a strong, very strong, huge in fact, denial that Russia had anything to do with meddling in our 2016 elections. The fact that I publicly asked them and Ukraine (NOT a quid quo pro -see - and I was totally exonerated by the Senate. They didn’t need to call one witness. My innocence was so obvious... obvious as the Democratic hoax of impeachment, the Chinese hoax of global warming, the Coronavirus hoax- No one has more respect for women than I...On the Whyte House lawn I also asked China and Italy 🇮🇹 and I think Australia to help in the 2020 elections. I hide in plain sight and have the absolute right to correct mistakes the courts make in sentencing people who have helped me. Can you imagine! As the good Republican senators have said, foreign help in ejections is ok, even good and to be sought after if it helps the country and no president ever made America as great as I did. Just look at the stock market... oops. Forget this little correction. It will last only a few days, like that corona flu. These will disappear magically during the warm weather. Now is a great time to buy stocks. That’s what my treasury -one of MY departments says. “What me worry?” I read that brilliant quote in one of the greatest pieces of 20th century literature. Yes, of course I was a big reader. Now I don’t need to read. I know the truth about everything. Just read that nice piece by a woman! about me in the Internet, “Ask Dr. Trump. Russia (Too bad I couldn’t celebrate V Day over there in Trump Tower Moscow) really Russia should be in the G7- just kick out France- what with his old wife. Just because Russia wants to take back a few countries that illegally broke away? I’d do the same thing. Yes, Evilinka told me not to invade Canada or Mexico. Yeah, better in my second term. I’m looking forward to reviewing the troops at May Day Parade with Comrade (lootin’) Putin. A man after my own heart. Though I dint GHI k he has that manly lust for women -some on the young side. Sure could use a man like Jeffrey in my cabinet. Wink. 😉 wink. ****So what does Saudi Arabia have on dumpf?Same thing as Putin or is it just Donald ducking responsibility again in favor of his bro-mances with strongmen around the world?He still talks about falling in love with and getting love letters from little rocket man. After all how could he mean anything bad by launching misiles toward Guam and Hawaii. Those are states? Right? They have a lot of brown people, not like Norway. We can have open borders. See Dems I’m willing to give you guys what want. We can have open borders with Norway. Maybe then they’ll sell us Greenpoint. Oh, that’s in Brookkyn? Well we can buy Brookkyn too... Greenland has something to do with Denmark? What not really? Who cares. Fake news. We’ll tell the map department to correct the name of that big island I want to buy. Let’s have more people come from Saudi Arabi too. Oh, they’re Muslim? I never said there’s a Muslim ban. Only the terrorists who hate me more than they love America. You know those socialist, liberal Dems. Aren’t they are being led by The Squad? Yeah, Dems are socialists, communists. They just don’t understand, you know the American Way. Where is Superman when you need him. Oh, that’s me! I’m Superman. Of course I can win over the New Age vote. You know those kids who meditate? I even have a mantra, “No Conclusion. Um. No confusion. Um... No collusion... print that on signs. Give it to the pretty young girls who sit behind me at my great, hugely attended rallies. Much bigger than Obama’s. Good that the Parks Dpt. came out with the corrected picture of my huge inauguration. Good thing the weather service corrected their mistake when they used fake news to contradict my weather report. Good thing the Justice dpt. is brining anti-trust suits against those four little car companies who want- of all things- cleanse emissions standards. Can you imagine? Well it was really just California, the state with the worst environmental policies. Didn’t we get rid of the EPA, anyway? We could have a new EPA: Environmental Polluters’ Agency. And get rid of those green light bulbs. Nobody wants green light. Oh that Chinese hoax about global warming? What? Now they’re calling it global heating? Really? Putin tells me they love it in Russia. Oh and about whistle blowers, don’t you just hate whistle blowers? Don’t you hate when you trust someone and they go behind your back and tattle? What is this, Kindergarten? Cory used executive privilege well. Good boy. We’ll get him into the Senate. Oh. I almost forgot: nobody cares or has even heard of the DNI. I told Bill, just get rid of it, like Sessions was supposed to do with that Russia witch hunt. I’m always being victimized. Ugh and now this Coronavirus hoax from China. Well, it’s the hoax of fear and panic stoked by the fake news media. It’s extraordinary that I get so much done. (News Anchor: That’s really surprising. The POTUS uttered a complete, coherent sentence.) POTUS continues: I’ve deregulated the environment, so business can make more money. My tax cuts sent the markets soaring. Now that they’re crashing, I take take no responsibility. It’s the Dems and the fake news media drumming up fears about that flu. And you’ve got to be impressed by the little side bets we made just before my market moving tweets. That was a hoot. Pretty good pay-off too. Even better than what we’re raking in at my casinos, strip clubs- poor Jeffery. It’s hard to replace a procurer like that. Well the profits from military and other suck-ups spending at my hotels and the kickbacks from the airports. Well, I guess I’m profitable now. So we could release next year’s tax returns. That is when the routine audit is done. I mean here again I’m the victim. Does it ever take this many years to finish an audit? The IRS was told to hand over my returns. I told Munchkin, “no way.” He doesn’t like being called munchkin. Crowds, my huge crowds- gets a laugh every time. ***Crowley and Tina met waiting to see their psychiatrists. She was blonde, slender, well-put-together. New black suede low boots, silver- pleated dress pants, a black long-sleeve shirt, gold necklace which caught the light as much as her golden hair, pulled back in a bun. He didn’t have a man-bun, though his hair was getting longer. Her doctor came by. They were animated, happy to see each other. He felt like an old lecher. You know the joke? Old guy Doctor, I just married a beautiful young woman. Can you lower my sex urge? I’m confused, perplexed said the doc. Please explain. We’ll my sex urge is all in my eyes. So naturally I want you to lower it. When Crowley shaved off his beard, got a good haircut, started wearing business casual he really didn’t look much older than Tina. It was she who started the conversation. Remarking on how good he looked. Before that for weeks they had barely nodded a hello in the waiting room. ***In a forest glen, thousands of years before the first humans came to North America, a family of beavers worked fast building a dam in a shallow stream. Sunlight dappled the water peeking through tree branches. Glistening pebbles, schools of small fish, colorful birds in the song-filled air. The same glen, millennia later: descendants of all those same free creatures continued their lives. A young Rachelle Carlson noticed something odd. The beavers moved slowly. The birds did not much sing. The fish were few and far between. The water had plumes of murky green and brilliant blue. Rocks had a coating of rust. ****Oh it’s that Chinese hoax. ***Bob emerged from a long meditation with a gentle kiss on top of his head from Julie. She was glowing, two months pregnant. They both loved the idea of having children. Through this joy, he felt pain of the political landscape. They often discussed these with their close friends, Crowley and Tina. He volunteered after work for an aide in the City Council. After learning as much as he could, he applied for a paying aide position.Six months later, he was a trusted advisor to the councilman. When tragedy struck, that Councilman was murdered, Bob ran for and won his seat. Two years later, a Freshman in the Senate. Rarely, despite his overly-interesting life had he experienced the kind of hostility he felt from the great leader’s henchmen. At first it was attempted seduction. Then attempted bribery. All logged with the appropriate Congressional committees. Then death threats from former military and paramilitary men. His car blown up in a parking lot. Angry motorcycle macho types circling his home with their cowardly gas-guzzling roars. Complaints about noise pollution were politely answered that it will be looked into-within the next 30 days... thank you for filing the report. Gerrymandering, voter suppression-closing of polls, increasingly burdensome identification strategies, intimidation by well-dressed white boys wearing electric glowing crosses... the constant drumbeat of lies from the toxic foxian media stoking evermore fear of the other.He felt these and so much more were poisoning his beloved country. After a short run and meditation, it became obvious. He would tackle one thing at a time. The easiest, low-hanging fruit with the greatest possible impact. He made ending voter suppression his first focus-and hard-fought victory. Oddly enough, out of nowhere, he started to write poetry. ****Several years more:Up at four Out the door Be home before bedtime -for sure. Kissing, hugging wife and children, armed with cell 📱 phone, pencil, pen and a pad too, He welcomed the new day for this much was true:He could not right things alone The path compassion had shown.
