For many years we have been aware that the world is growing smaller. Terms like "spaceship earth" and "global economy" remind us that as man has conquered distance he has also eliminated safety barriers. If we in the United States were not profoundly aware of that, the tragic events of September 11 changed us forever. We in Manhasset will never again have the sense of security that we thought was our birthright. The nightly news brings us images of violence in every quarter of the world but it's no longer distant and remote. This past week when I was driving home to Manhasset from our office in Mineola, I saw a group of teenagers standing on I. U. Willets Road, between Willis Avenue and Searingtown Road, my usual route home. The next day I read that there had been a drive-by shooting and a 17-year-old boy from Manhasset Hills had been shot and killed at that spot. Every day now I see the accumulated bouquets and wreaths and the bicycle the boy was riding the night he was killed. They are vivid reminders that we are not free from violence even here. Violence must be dealt with and stopped on the local as well as the global level. Isolationism is no longer an option. John Donne reminded us that "no man is an island" and Tennyson said "I am a part of all that I have met." And cocoons are for insects.

E.F.B.