I can't explain how incredibly eerie it was today; I woke up late this morning to my clock radio talking about the World Trade Center, and I made a sleepy assumption it was some recap show about the bombings 8 years ago. Then I heard them say "reporting live", and I woke up into this nightmare.
Needless to say, the World Trade Center is *the* major part of the skyline that you can see from the island. After I heard about the reports, and checked my email (I had a ton of messages from friends and family members checking to see that I was OK) I went out this afternoon at about 1 p.m. to see what I could see. Due to buildings in front of the harbor, I had to walk about 1/4 of a mile before I could get a good view of the skyline. But I could see the smoke in the sky before I saw the carnage. I can't explain how astonishing it looked to see a plume of smoke where the World Trade Center used to be, especially since I hadn't seen any video or pictures of the action yet. The police were out directing traffic, which is something you never see in this sleepy little borough. I saw five fire trucks go by with their sirens blaring. People were oddly calm -- stunned, more than anything.
Don't know when I'll be back at work, as there's no way to get into Manhattan right now. These events are just an unbelievable horror.