549 days, 11 hours, 39 minutes, 37 seconds

From today's Times – a headline on how airlines will now permit the small, disposable cigarette lighters on flights. Had Richard Reid used a lighter instead of matches that bomb might have ignited , but what's done is done. Can't live in fear of the past forever. And trying to confiscate lighters (and small scissors, and screwdrivers) trivializes the security process. Small batteries can set off bombs also. She thinks of her husband, traveling with a walkman, an mp3 player, and a cd player, never knowing what he'll want, or need. She thinks of their first years together, when he still smoked, pushed to the back of the plane. Always the last to board and exit. But he'd never think to harm anyone.