From Park Slope, Thursday night.

What's going to happen? I asked. Why is everyone here?

Just wait, my mother said. Watch the skyline.

And then, without warning, the entire skyline of New York erupted into glorious light: dazzling, glittering, throbbing in triumph. And the crowds on the rooftops roared. They were roaring on roofs all over Brooklyn, on streets, on bridges, the whole city roaring for light. There it was, gigantic and brilliant, the way they said it used to be: the skyline of New York. Back again. On D Day, at the command of Mayor LaGuardia.

-- Pete Hamill, A Drinking Life

. . .

On the Brooklyn Heights Promenade, people stared at the spot where the two towers had been. In some cases, they stared where they thought the towers had been. They had never bothered, never needed, to note their actual location, and now they could not remember.

-- NYT

Photos from downtown at Macrostate. Via Rion.

Park Slope, today.
My apartment is usually under a flight path for LaGuardia Airport. Today it is under a flight path for the President's security detail. At least four loud jets, circling the city in pairs.