this dogwood's just outside our place & it's not the only tree who's leaves are turning shades of orange & scarlet already thanks to the drought were having this month around these parts!
on this day, two years ago, early in the afternoon in our old living room and with god as our only witness, we pledged our love and faith in one another to each other and like so many couples in times before us, we hopped over a broom together, a symbol of our unity.
yup! i'm 31 years old and it's been 15 years since i took the written test the first time and 14 years since i had a learner's permit and nope! i never had a license!
it's a long story. failed the road test more than once back in the day. oh i can drive just fine (then & now) but get me on that course & it's a whole other story! to say i got nervous is the understatement of the century. so i kept renewing my learner's permit every 6 months.
got sick - was told by my pcp i couldn't drive. so i didn't. for 12 years.
last night we were watching another 9/11 documentary on a&e and the narrator stated that only 12 people from the 78th floor of wtc tower 2/the south tower made it out.
i've seen this documentary numerous times but i do not recall ever hearing that statement before. a shudder washed through me and i asked my husband if he'd heard that. he said he did & with tears in his eyes, he held onto me for the rest of the documentary.
i told him that i'd like to think that i would've gotten out of tower 2 before the (2nd) plane hit it, even though they were telling people in tower 2 to go back to their floors/offices and regardless of security saying that "only" tower 1 had been "affected." but, i don't honestly know. how can anyone know what they would do in such a dire situation until they are actually in it?!
maybe i've said some of this before ~ i apologize for the repitition if so.
we just finished watching another documentary about 9/11 ~ one we've seen before but can't help but watch. seems since that alleged terrorist plot in london was stopped this week & with the 5 year anniversary looming, 9/11 is all over the tv again. (along with the oliver stone movie in theatre's too).
i think it's a good thing to have the footage on tv ~ as much as possible. much of the nation is no longer united the way it was the day after 9/11 and the reminder is necessary. without it, history repeats itself.
had i not chickened out of what others would've considered a dream job, i would've been on the 78th floor of tower 2 that morning. from 9/11 on, any time i watch the footage of the towers falling, i cannot imagine how i would've come out alive. i honestly don't think i would have.
i felt so guilty for so long ~ why had i not been there? i had no husband, no children, no one depended on me... surely one of the lives lost that day was worth far more than mine?! i didn't understand. i couldn't believe how unfair it seemed to me.
since meeting my husband in 05/04, i realized that maybe he was why i wasn't at the wtc on 9/11 and i have become so thankful ~ every time i look at him, eveery time i feel his love for me, every time i see the footage of that horrifying day...
since we now live on the coast, i've seen more monarch butterfly's this year than i've seen in my life! this one is pale orange & yellow. others are bright orange or bright yellow. i lucked into this pic since my husband had his cell phone when we left the house this am & i didn't have my camera!
don't ask! when i was trying to get the scarecrow in the back seat, i said "come on johnny!" hence & therefore, he's now johnny!
it was very hot when my mother & i brought it home ~ we got to joking about her car bursting into flames due to "spontaneous scarecrow cumbustion!" i told her to call her agent ~ who's a bit of a snit anyway ~ and ask if "spontaneuos scarecrow combustion" is covered under her car insurance policy, or would they consider it an act of god...?!?!?!?!?! (like i said, it was very hot that day!)
this is absolutely my favorite time of year! when the heat starts to break & cooler nights are back with us... crows are cawing & crickets are chirping... the air is sweet & humidity free... the leaves begin to change color... (did you know that leaves actually begin to change color in july?! go for a walk in a forest & you'll see red & yellow!)
i've made my first fall purchase of this season! i'll upload the pics later!
Jo aka Bloomin'Chick: Wife, mother of an angel in Heaven, survivor; Jersey Girl. (Not the kind you see on those "reality" shows!) Lifelong writer and reader, longtime gardener, photographer and blogger. Sometimes knitter, lover of Autumn, Winter, pink & snow. Braider of pigtails, my Summer trademark. Eclectic, creative & happily married late 30-something who loves her kitties and lives at the sea w/her heart in the mountains who happens to be disabled with Arthritis, AS, Fibromyalgia and migraine. Author of The Portable Homestead, a gardening memoir column, on Connect*Share*Grow.
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