"Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" - Beatles, 1967

"It was 20 years ago today..."

I had to check my Palm for something this afternoon and saw the note on today's page. It reads, simply: "Moved to NYC, 1986."

Good Lord - it was 20 years ago today that I arrived in Manhattan to start my new life there and my new job at Goldman Sachs. It was a difficult decision to leave Houston and move so far away from my family and friends. I really didn't know anybody in NYC apart from a few of my new Goldman colleagues. But I desperately wanted to live in "The City". I had dreamed of that for a long time. And I had my chance in '86, with the job offer from Goldman.

So on the 1st of March 1986, all of my worldly possessions - including my baby grand piano, my first major purchase when I left home and got my first adult job - went into a moving van in Houston and headed up to New York City. On the 2nd of March, I followed on a Continental Airlines flight, loaded down with luggage. Sadly, I had left my beloved little year-old Westie, Mac, in Houston with my parents. There was no way I could manage having him with me until I was able to move into my own apartment. But once I had, about a week later, my folks put Mac into a pet carrier and shipped him to me on his own, via a Delta Airlines small-package system called Delta Dash. (I wonder if that division of Delta still exists?) Delta Dash had come highly recommended to me by breeders who sometimes had to ship dogs without any accompanying humans, and they were indeed a terrific service. I'll never forget how much I cried when I saw Mac's bright little face through the pet carrier's wire door, when they brought him out to me at LaGuardia Airport! I was no longer up in New York City all alone.

Anyway, was that really 20 years ago? Incredible. I was only a kid then, really, and had no idea how brave I'd been.

Maybe, years later, it set the stage for my move to England. That has taken a certain amount of courage, too.

Janet