31-05-2025, 08:15 AM
I had a dm from friends in Boston, they are coming to Auckland next March and their ship will be here for three full days, so I am researching Must See things for them. Our friendship goes back to 9/11, when Shell and I were regulars on a garden forum. She was living in New York, very pregnant, and from her desk she watched the Twin Towers tragedy go down as I watched it on our tv from my Blenheim living room. Because of her immediacy in telling us of her terror she shared the experience on a level few of us internationals could ever feel, it made us all friends for life. When I went to the US to meet up with some of those gardening axe murderers, lol, she was raising her family and wasn't free to join the dozen or so who met in Pennsylvania, so this will be our first real life meeting, so it is bound to be a very special time, particularly now as her husband, who I have also grown to know online over the years (our politics are very similar!) has a nasty cancer diagnosis and this will be his last world cruise trip I suspect. It is a bit of a challenge coming up with ideas for such a momentous visit, this meeting of beloved strangers, very exciting...