Sylvia's Journal

Tessa probably doesn’t understand when she gets up at 5:30 that her ma-ma is up as well, even though she is on vacation. But my internal alarm clock is set at about 5 AM. This is no great feat when you go to bed early.

After Tessa and Steve leave for work I sit by the window overlooking a glorious Lobster Cove and the greenest of gardens and read some more in Rubin’s the ‘Fragmentation of Afghanistan.’ It is incomprehensible, the stupidity, greed, blind-sidedness and sheer incompetence that has messed up that country over the last 60 years when military technology has made fighting much more consequental.

While most countries focused on developing their human and social capital, in Afghanistan it has been reduced, literally, to rubble and stubble. That Y-chromosome, again! There are no females with any power in this drama, only victims.

The worst of it all is that many of the perpetrators, if not dead, are living elsewhere, far removed from the consequences of their action, some no doubt in great luxury, with full bank accounts, state pensions; others are heroes (alive or dead). Only those still living in Afghanistan, or areas bordering on Afghanistan, are daily confronted with the resulting mess.

I learned from MySpace that Mr. Kalashnikov sleeps well. He claims he has not profited from the sale of his famous AK-47 rifles and that he only receives a state pension (of about 80 dollars, for special services to the Motherland). He says that it’s not his fault things have gotten out of hand with his rifle. “It’s the politicians who are to blame for failing to come to an agreement and resorting to violence.” I discover that he really would have preferred to be famous for the design of agricultural machinery. I am sure many wished he had.

Tessa and Steve’s friends Sean, who works in his father’s Pittsfield bakery, wakes up after his friends are gone; it’s his day off. Despite his protestations I feed him breakfast: my homemade raisin bread that I made the other day, without raisins but with all the other dried fruit and nuts that survived the winter oatmeal routine.

Sean knows a thing or two about breads and always brings us several loaves, a kind act that determines what we eat the rest of the week. Sean says ‘like’ a lot, about every third word. I learn, in between these annoying ‘likes’ that he is hoping to get a noisy motorbike when his tax refund comes in. He promises that he will turn the motor off or at least not rev it he reaches our house when I tell him I can’t stand the sound of such bikes.

After he leaves I spend some time working on things that cannot wait followed by more reading, outside in the sun. It is a 10+ days with blue skies and birds chirping and trilling away. We decide to have lunch at home because no restaurant can compete with the view, and we can turn the leftover bass into a seafood salad that sits nicely on Sean’s bread – served with ice cold glasses of vinho verde.

In the afternoon we go on a shopping expedition for plants, herbs and veggies. This will be the project for today: kale, sprouts, Chinese cabbage, cilantro and many annuals for the window boxes.

After our first hamburger cookout of the season, and eating outside without mosquitoes (yet), Tessa and Steve withdraw inside their studo to watch a (the?) hockey game. Axel and I drive into town to listen to author Andre Dubus III read from his work in progress, an ‘accidental autobiography’ at the community center. One person asks how one knows if one is a writer. “When you cannot help yourself and have to write each day,” is his answer.