Sylvia's Journal

If I hear the words ‘the final stretch’ one more time I will throw up. I am tired of hearing the stale rhetoric. The only thing that is still fresh and funny is Tina Fey Palin. After Tuesday I will miss her act.

I had been listening to the radio for hours during the day and watched some TV in the evening. During the night the bites and pixels reconfigured into dreams about eruptions of Rwanda-like race conflict, nasty and violent and a family drama (not anyone I knew) in Technicolor and multiple languages (French, English and Dutch). I also dreamed of a visit to an MSH office that was only a short ride from my home. I considered a transfer and was going to follow up later. And finally there was the classic needing-to-get-someplace-but-not-being-able-to-get-there dream. The main problem was the barricade – erected because of the race riots – and my inability to get the right car window down to receive driving instructions from inflexible uniformed men. The trip to Afghanistan is coming into view.

On Sunday Axel went campaigning for Obama in Southern New Hampshire with a bunch of guys. Their marching orders were to visit all the people who had been missed in countless earlier strikes through towns and neighborhoods. Nothing is left to chance. He came back full of energy and quite hopeful.

I am ready to cast my vote. Axel thought it is fitting that my first presidential vote will be for a Kenyan American, the grandson of a Kenyan farmer. It is wonderful and amazing. There is something unknown in this, the roots (or tentacles?) reaching into another continent. I wonder about the expectations in the extended Obama family there. In most of the rest of the world having a president in the family is a bonus. I am trying to imagine the hordes of relatives that will come out of the woodwork. The newspaper already reported on an aunt (an elastic concept) who is living in Boston. Some people are trying to make hay from the fact that she may be here illegally. I hope that everyone is too tired to invest much mental energy in small stuff like that.

I attended Quaker Meeting and tried to subdue my overactive left brain that was busy making to-do lists and chatty commentaries about every thought that fleeted through my head during the hour-long silence. No silence in there at all. I think I see some meditation lessons in the future.

I biked the half hour distance to Meeting against a cold wind, both ways, under blue skies and a canopy of yellow leaves. Sometimes I wonder if I should start to catalogue what I encounter on my bike trip, other than the many (empty) liquor bottles. This time I also found a pink baby sneaker, size 6, right foot, a large and perfect piece of plywood, enough to make a table out of, and a fancy dog leash. There was the usual assortment of returnable cans, none of which I picked up even though it could have earned me a handful of dimes.

Packing for my trip to Afghanistan is a bit more complicated than all my other trips. For the latter I have a routine and the packing is easy. For this trip I have to think hard: warm clothes that cover me from wrists to neck to toes plus plenty of scarves. I went to the second hand clothing store in our town and picked up a pair of slacks priced at 35 dollars. I asked why the price was so high, double the price of all the other slacks. My question exposed me as a fashion heathen. “Too much?” the saleswoman said incredulously, “Look at the label! Do you know how much these go for new?” I then learned that the previous owner paid some 300 dollars for them. So, it was a bargain after all. I am going to be quite fashionable in Kabul. The only other items I need to buy are tops that are both warm and will cover my bottom. Not a standard item in my closet but, it seems, on the racks as the new fall fashion at Target where they will no doubt be less pricy than my new fancy slacks.