Sylvia's Journal

The left hand knows it is not going to be fixed next week; its symptoms were not as bad as my right hand’s. But now, when I wake up the fingers on my left hand are tingling badly. Something is pinching. But it will have to wait. I don’t want to come out of the hospital with two hands bandaged. I am told that the pre-op nurse visit and the pre-op EKG are valid for respectively 1 and 6 months, so I can schedule another operation as soon as my right hand is OK again.

Our retreat finished on a high note that got even higher when a cell phone rang with the news that we had just won a big proposal. There was much clapping, high fiving and relief for those who had sacrificed their vacation, weekends, evening and family life to get the proposal written, staffed and out of the door on time. I played no role in all this, yet our livelihoods depend on such wins, so I am grateful for the good work of others.

We ended our retreat in the middle of the afternoon and I decided to go straight home rather than making an appearance at the office across the Charles River. Because of the early hour the ride home was smooth and fast, a sharp contrast to the one and a half hour ride in even though I left the house at 6 AM. I am not sure why. Is everyone getting up earlier? It should take me only 45 minutes door to door at that hour. Luckily I have a wonderful book to listen to during the commute and the extra time gives me more book-time. I am listening to Kabul Beauty School and am so totally engrossed in the story that I have taken a few wrong turns on my very familiar route. The book resonates with me because it is essentially about endless small and big acts of leadership by women whose circumstances make them unlikely leaders. They are smart, funny and resourceful in the face of a constant barrage of obstacles put in the way by a society that relegates women to complete subservience and appears to be afraid of them. It is at once hopeful because it shows that the human spirit cannot be oppressed at its core, as well as thoroughly depressing in its heartbreaking descriptions of the suffering that men inflict on women. My interactions in Kabul the last few years have been primarily with those who know that no nation can pull itself out of misery and dependence without the active involvement of all its citizens, men and women.

At home I cooked an italian dinner that took advantage of the bounty of fresh vegetables on the (farmer’s) market. While waiting for Tessa to arrive back from her part-time job in Boston we headed for the rocks again to go fishing, too nice to sit inside waiting. This time I had the camera ready to capture the next catch. The sea was churning with high waves. Fish like this, according to Axel. Tessa, Steve and Chicha showed up just in time to see the nibble, the bite, Axel bracing himself for reeling the big fish in when the line went slack and both lure and fish were gone. His disappointment and surprise was captured on camera. The lure was bitten off clean, so we think he had a bluefish on the line, a big one with big sharp teeth. We were imagining this big fish swimming away with the glittering lure now attached to its mouth, attracting other fish, biting too, getting all hooked together. It is too painful to imagine this cluster of hapless fish caught by an unattached lure.

After dinner Axel and I descended into the moldy basement and set out to create a workspace for his school projects. This required much cleaning and sorting and opening boxes that contained stuff we had not seen in years as well as things put away last summer when our downstairs was re-arranged to accommodate a bed and a wheelchair. We also threw away some things that, only a few years ago, we did not think we could live without, quite an accomplishment in our house. This is the good thing about getting older: perspective, distance and common sense.