Sylvia's Journal

A good night sleep, the right heating and then icing must have contributed to a good start, or maybe the heavy exercise regimen is starting to pay off. Between the two of us we did hours of exercises yesterday. I felt more limber this morning than I have in months. But I am cautious because I have learned that limber now does not mean limber tomorrow, and cause and effect is never that obvious in our recovery.

Sita came back exhausted but enthusiastic from Shanghai, bringing more stuff into the house as well as some spectacular green tea and green tea cookies. But mostly we did not see her as she spent the day recuperating from an exhausting flight and a missed day.

We enjoyed the day sitting outside as much as we could, it was another 10 plus day until the fog rolled in. Tim Browne came by for IT help to Axel which mostly meant moving shelves and things around in his office and sorting out the cable mess. Now Axel is ready to take on the computer-based financial and paper administration of our household again. Tim told us some good stories about his project to bring digitized children’s’ books to parts of the world where libraries don’t work or are unavailable. The most fascinating piece was his discovery of hundreds of exquisite Japanese children books in some US university’s book depository. The books were part of a load of thousands of books that were confiscated by the head of the US occupation administration in charge of censorship after the Second World War.

Woody Kelly came by to report on his trip to England and the launching of a book that features his mom as one of the Airport Transportation Auxiliaries (ATA) during World War Two, “Spitfire Girls” His mom, Ann, one of my heroes, who passed away a little over a year ago, cheered me on as I was learning to fly. A photo of her and two other ATAs at an airfield in Montreal, taken during the war always accompanied me on my flights and was retrieved, without a scratch, from the wreckage. She will continue to fly with me.

Since Sita and Jim were on a completely different time schedule, especially with regard to waking and sleeping, we dined just the two of us on leftovers from several delicious meals and then watched Babette’s feast, a story about redemption and the reconciliation of religious and earthly bliss. I had seen it many years before and watched it through different eyes now. It is also a story about community and grace, two things we have learned a thing or two about. We put ourselves to bed once more without the supervision of our children. That too is beginning to feel normal.