hello   from a nyc coffeeshop amidst inchoate autumn. too pretentious a way to start   a bulk email? fair enough. it is 9/11 today. last night, after long rehearsal   (refine! rebuild! reuse! recycle!), i attended a party meant to celebrate   “fashion” where i felt woefully out of place. i, however, am not   one to look a gift horse full of champagne in the mouth. so i grabbed a   couple and began chatting up the most interesting looking person in the room.   mike. a retired NYPD policeman formerly of the 13th precinct, guarding an   empty table adorned with pop-culture detritus, now hired to do private   security at functions where people like me feel woefully out of place. he was   quick to laugh, easy to talk to, and could tell a story that had me   alternating between stitches and tears. like a benevolent boxer who knows   when to jab with humor and then land a right hook of poignance. (my father   taught me how to box, which i had to stop for obvious guitar-hand-related   reasons.) i asked him the questions every retired police officer must get:   “what’s the craziest thing you’ve ever seen?” “have you ever   been shot at?”, etc. he said his favorite part of being on the force was   being able to help people. starting the healing process. soon enough, he got   to telling me about his experience of 9/11. how a female police officer from   his precinct was the first to call in that a plane had hit the first tower.   how the dispatch said, “what? a train?!” she perished that day   while saving new yorker’s lives. how, when he and the other men and women in   uniform raced down to the towers, pedestrians cheered them on, even chasing   their squad cars to throw in water and protein bars. he said that he used to   fret about money and retirement plans and 401ks, but that after 9/11, he   realized the only thing that mattered is being with the people you love and   being happy. so cheers to you, mike. cheers to you all. xx ac