Hi after 9-11, I immediately thought of Phillppe Petit. I wrote this -

"I Never Knew a Building Could Die"

It seems the World Trade Towers never existed, but in our

dreams.

I once walked to work on lower Broadway in Manhattan, early

one crisp

autumn morning, puzzled at all the wide-eyed smiles of

grown-ups

pointing at some speck way, way up near the top of the towers

two

blocks away.

A man was nimbly and flawlessly walking on a high-wire

miraculously rigged between the tops of the 110 floor Towers.

For an

hour he danced weightlessly, fearlessly. Phillipe Petit gave us

this

and all New York shared for weeks his soaring bliss.

The World Trade Center inspired him to "walk" to God's very

doorstep.

I was so excited two years later when my company, ADT

Security

Systems, said we were moving into new digs, taking over one

entire,

square acre of the 92nd floor of One World Trade Center.

Countless

times, with a shoe propped up, I would gaze while on the

phone, at

the tall ships in the river far below, small planes flying by and

lower, the flat southward expanse of New Jersey with scattered

patches

of cute little cities like Newark. On the south-face nearby, the

waters far below spread and glistened in long ripples out to

the

Atlantic beyond the great bridge; and - far below - was a little

trinket: the Statue of Liberty.

I will never forget the golden sunset one December - a spill of

liquid gold above a gray-blue, temporal, trapped little world

beneath the clouds "around my ankles."

The South Tower's face smiled back ultimate orange. All desks

and

offices emptied. All were awestruck at the window.

I also loved giving out, over the phone, a mailing address that

Julius Caesar would love: "That's 'ADT, 92nd Floor, One World

Trade

Center, NYC, 1-0-0-4-8.' "

I daily was among thousands spilling off the twenty some-odd

escalators from the subways. I'd walk fast and focussed across

the

great blue carpet to the bank of new, tall mighty elevators that

zoomed

two floors a second to the 78th floor. (I was so immersed I

once

walked right into my own image in the mirror-like side panel

to the

elevator!) I'd buy some coffee in the restaurant (a haircut at

lunch-time), then took the "local" to my floor. The eight great

elevator-launching cables surely would never all break.

Everyone who ever worked in these great sky borne mansions

sensed

trouble. The building groaned and swayed some thirty feet in

heavy

wind. Lightning struck with a strange metallic sound.

"Towering

Inferno" was playing to big audiences at the movies - and John

McPhee

just wrote a book about how plutonium the size of a stick of

chewing

gum could "tip over the World Trade Center."

ADT, experts in fire safety, knew about the then lack of

sprinklers,

the shabby design that made the towers huge chimneys

molded in

plastics that, if ignited, would quickly create a thousand-

degree

inferno belching acrid black smoke of poisons that lined lungs

with

its goo.

And suddenly, seeing on television that wild, black horse of a

devil-stew crashing to earth, crushing thousands of people

just like

me - brings back those fleeting fears I felt from the 92nd floor.

I

never knew a building could die. It was in my life. Its dead are

always my kin. At best, this new Titanic, the Trade Towers,

fulfilled

their mission and returned to the gods, while we still wonder

why.

The Twin Towers are just a memory and a hole where there

was greatness

and grandeur. They were a strange god that inspired one man

to fly

like a bird, while thousands swooned; and inspired a few to

blow it

all to hell while billions weep.

I read this book in class. It was amazing. I cant belive he actually laid on the rope.

Our class read the book and loved it, but when we tried to go on line and research it we did not find a lot!! It was such a great book but our class wants more info!!

I've always been more of an Owen Quinn fan.

no doubt, Philippe Petit rocks.

I remember when this guy did the high wire act. (I think I was nine or ten). At first, everyone said he was a nut. Only weeks or months later, did he become the daring guy that crossed the twin towers on a tightrope.

Same thing with the fella who used suction cups to climb up it in 1977(?). It only became glamorized later.

People miss those buildings, but when they first went up, they were seen as a controversial government works project. The two acrobats helped to humanize the structures in the eyes of the general public.

oh, and of course, petit was one of my idols when i was a juggler- he represented everything elegant that i saw in the art. of course, i never got past five.

Mordicai was on the today show this morning.

The drawings were very impressive with amazing perspective.