Imagine:

a place of respect for diverse views of life, giving a little instead of taking a lot, accepting nature for being an intricate part of our makeup, and love, no fear… just love.

I consider myself an Oregonian, having spent 40 years of my life in rural Oregon, but I was born in NY,( it is in my soul) raised in a small town near the Great South Bay and Atlantic Ocean. My parents were children of immigrants from Italy and Ireland raised in NYC. I have a lot of history and memories in NYC from spending weekends visiting my grandmother, going to Broadway shows with my family, begging for roasted chestnuts in the winter from a corner vendor as a child, watching the St Pattys Day parade from the curb. In 1981 I announced my engagement to a man in Oregon to my Mother and sister on the restaurant at the top of the Twin Towers.

I returned to the city of my youth in December following 9/11. I flew to NYC for a memorial to honor my cousin, Rich Gabrielle, one of the many that died in the towers during that horrific time. After Rich’s memorial, two friends of mine and I went to Strawberry Fields in Central Park. It was a beautiful day, we wanted to walk and reflect. George Harrison had died the week before, that area of Central Park is also by the Dakota, John Lennon’s former apartment, where he was tragically shot and killed.

The weather was unusually mild for a December afternoon. As we walked, we noticed a man that looked like John Lennon, he was walking around with a guitar. A few of his friends began talking to him…. they began singing Beatle songs very softly. We walked over and joined them, singing for John, George, our world, our city.

I looked up, and noticed more people were gathering and singing, eventually there were hundreds of us. We sang from our souls as loud as we could, black, white, asian, muslim, jewish, poor, rich, young and old. To this day it was one of the most heartfelt, beautiful, spontaneous moments of my life, and many other lives.

I share this now almost nineteen years later, during the frustrating and fearful time of CoVid19. We need to come together, give a little, love a lot, respect everyone, (even if that means wearing a mask) including nature and all she provides us.

“You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one. I hope someday you’ll join us, and the world can live as one.”
John Lennon