Appropos of nothing...

I stayed in the World Trade Center for half a week in the spring several years ago. In fact, I stayed in the Hilton, on about the eighth floor. I still have the door key.

My company had gone to NY for its IPO. The President had told the VPs to select some nice lackey from their department to send, instead most the Veeps sent themselves. Luckily, I was in a small department, and my VP couldn't go himself. So I went.

Newark -- flying into Newark. And the chauffered limo ride through the part of New Jersey which I can only describe as an extended garbage dump. A stay in the Hilton, visits with the brokerage company who was handling our stock, and breakfast at Wall Street before the opening bell.

Standing on the floor, the trading floor, while the Prez rang the opening bell a few feet above our heads.

Cool.

Got to meet Richard Grasso -- nice guy, actually. Too bad he fell out of favor -- one less name I can drop. Not that I've dropped it much. But now it's somewhat like mentioning "The other day, I was talking to Michael Milken, and he said..."

Also included were dinner at a nice Broadway restaurant, the Broadway version of Chicago (it was not too bad -- I appreciate any free Broadway tickets -- but I failed to be impressed overall), and a day of tourism, which was mostly wasted on red buses which never got more than a four blocks from Times Square.

Before I left, I wanted to go up to the top of the World Trade Center. But time was running perilously short. I should have gone earlier -- not like I wasn't staying there, for heaven's sake.

I told myself I'd come back to New York again, sometime, and make a special point of going to the top the next time.

No you won't.

It was a strong impression: not verbal, like that, but how else to express it? I'm not always sure I trust these feelings -- it could be me or anything else. Why not? Sure, I'll be back to visit, and I'll see it then.

No, you won't.

Again! I pondered this. Why was I getting this impression? I looked up at the towers from the square below. They were awful big, awful sturdy. Would they be torn down? Would something happen to them? Or maybe I'd just never get to New York again. I tried thinking the latter, and got no similar feeling.

Perhaps it was my imagination. But it felt pretty strong.

I couldn't shake the impression: I told others about it when I came back, quite openly. Disconfirms James Randi's pet theory, that we get these impressions all the time and only remember the 'hits'. Yet I told people when I got back, and it was the only 'impression' I'd told people about that year.

And I pondered it often, afterwards. Would the building be condemned and sold for scrap? Rebuilt? Terrorism? They'd tried that already, to little effect. What could it be?

Well, we know what happened. My room collapsed in a pile of rubble, hopefully with no occupants, due to its low position in the building. The good Hilton employee who ran behind me when my wallet fell from my pocket in the lobby? I tipped him well and he clearly tried to refuse.

I hope he survived.