A Fall Harvest & Remembrance

This is by far the best harvest I've had all season!  I picked these yesterday, and all the cucumbers turned into pickles, and the rest of the veggies, eggplant, lilac bell peppers and the giant Brandywine tomato I gave to my parents.  They loved the purple colors of the veggies and were so impressed by the half pounder Brandywine tomato.  It is a beautiful slicer indeed!

I have been picking cucumbers pretty much everyday now.  They are definitely my most prolific vegetable in the garden.  I put up 10 pint jars of sweet and spicy dill pickles.  And if that wasn't enough, I baked a banana chocolate chip bread.  Yum!  My friend started calling me the "Martha Stewart" of Staten Island.  Hahahaha, I kinda like the ring to that.  Now if only I could translate my love of gardening, canning and baking into a profitable venture like Martha, now we're talking.  :)

Yesterday was the 10th Anniversary of September 11th... I chose not to write anything yesterday because even though a decade has passed, it's still a little hard for me to discuss the events of that horrific day.  Like many of you, I remember exactly what I was doing on 9/11/01. That morning, I was walking out of the subway and onto 6th Avenue / 14th Street on my way to my office.  This was shortly after the 1st tower was hit. I remember 6th Avenue at a complete and total standstill, every car, taxi and person stopped in their tracks looking up into the sky.  Many people were gasping and crying on the streets. I have never seen anything like that before, it was a very eerie and scary feeling. I rushed to my office, on the 9th Floor of Parsons School of Design, and spoke to faculty and students who were distraught and in tears.  Many had relatives or knew people who worked in the towers, and they were desperately trying to get their loved ones on the phone.  Being on the 9th floor, we had a direct view of the towers, and we watched in horror the towers on fire, feeling absolutely helpless.  Ten years later, and it is still a pretty painful memory. To this day, I can barely watch the news about that day, and about the World Trade Center.  Even now, when I watch the news about the events of that day, it brings me to tears.  My prayers and thoughts go out to those families affected by this senseless and terrible tragedy.  We will never forget. Never.  Ever.