Sylvia's Journal

I biked to Quaker meeting, just about my only exercise of the week, and enjoyed the ride under blue skies even though I was up against strong winds. It’s a heavy bike, the road goes up and down a bit and I sit up straight and so there is no aerodynamic advantage. But the ride always clears my mind which makes it easier to still it once I sit down. We were a small group, with one newcomer from the next town over and two students from a nearby college. We like to have newcomers as it strengthens the blood supply to our Meeting. Sometimes we get a little anemic.

Milt was there. Milt is a retired business man whose grandson was one of Sita’s high school classmates. We did not know Milt then. In 2004 he started funding an effort called the International Peace and Prosperity Project which did its first interventions in Guinea-Bissau. The intent was to detect early signs of impending societal violence and then take action to keep it from spinning out of control into civil unrest, war and needless destruction. The chief of the military and other high level officials were very engaged in the process.

When, about a month ago, this same chief of the military and the president were assassinated we all thought of Milt and his team. Yesterday I asked him if his heart was bleeding when he got the news. He said, yes and no. Yes of course because they had worked closely with the chief who was a man genuinely committed to peace; no, because after that things had not spiraled out of control. Not that everything is OK over there but it could have been worse.

I bicycled back from meeting with the wind in my back. I parked myself on a bench by Manchester harbor to write the poem that had formed in my head but instead composed a shopping list for the Tibetan tsampa soup planned for our dinner last night (from the cookbook ‘Beyond the Great Wall’ by Alford and Duguid). Without the original ingredients of yak meat and yak butter it is not entirely authentic but it did have the defining flavor of roasted barley. It’s on our list of favorites for not-quite-spring-and-not-quite-winter-evening meals.

The soup is a great accompaniment to the reading of the novel Blue Poppies (by Jonathan Falla) in which an entire Tibetan village treks through the Himalayas, eating a more authentic (but watered down) tsampa soup, trying to stay alive while outsmarting their Chinese persecutors (it’s in the early 1950s) with the unlikely help of a Scottish radio operator named Jamie Wilson.

I took advantage of the nice weather and, after the cooking was done, started to liberate the garden and flower beds from their fall and winter debris while grand dog Chicha hang around with a ball, putting it ever closer to me in the hope that I would throw it. I did a few times but I don’t have quite the same level of energy for ball throwing as she has for ball retrieving. Besides, my right shoulder is still under repair.

It took some time yesterday to settle back in to normality after the eventful morning. Axel spent a few hours on the roof to clean up the glass and re-arrange windows. That was a good thing because a downpour was expected, and did indeed occur, in the afternoon.

Charles will stay in the hospital for awhile, allowing the doctor(s) to check out all his systems. Last we heard he was resting comfortably. This gave Ted a chance to do the same, after a few interrupted nights.

It was a good thing that the rest of the day was uneventful. Axel worked upstairs preparing for the town meeting on Monday where his committee will ask people to pay extra for historic preservation in order to attract more matching funds from the state – this won’t be easy. Downstairs I was finishing my 40+ page chapter to pass it on to a colleague for review and across the driveway Tessa was doing work for the competition. The only one who had commuted into Boston was Steve because the lab mice cannot be fed and groomed via the internet.

For entertainment after a hard days’ work we drove through a monsoon like rain to Ipswich to our friends Edith and Hugh and welcomed Anne and Chuck, who had returned from their winter hideout in Cost Rica, back into cold and wet New England. Edith had cooked a wonderful spicy fish soup that was greeted by Anne with the words “I can only eat fish if it is not too fishy!” Apparently it was not too fishy for her!

At the end of the meal we drank Costa Rican coffee liquor while everyone had a story to tell about precious liquids left behind with security people at airports in Costa Rica and the US. That, as I had not realized, included a bottle of coffee liquor Axel had intended for us.

And now it is Saturday and Bill has reserved a plane for us for the morning. But what I see outside does not look good for flying. It’s time to check the weather.

It is too bad that it takes someone else’s suffering to distract you from your own. I returned home yesterday from work about noontime with a severe allergy attack that produced tenderness on my face and such pressure on my eyeballs that I could barely look into the light. Not (yet) a sinus infection said the doctor, but definitely sinus congestion. I went to bed and slept.

When I woke up this morning I felt even worse. While making tea I was wondering what there was to write about yesterday since all I could think of was my congested head and how lousy I felt. How boring that would be.

And then the telephone rang from our neighbor Ted asking, with an edge of panic in his voice, for Axel and strength. Our other neighbor Charlie, 80+, had fallen in the bathroom and wedged himself against the door so Ted could not help him. There was no need for strength since Charlie was out of reach. It’s the one time in my life that I have called 911 and I hope never to have to do it again.

Two cruisers and one ambulance soon filled our driveway and a bunch of vigorous young men jumped out with a variety of large bags. After berating me for not having a sign with the house number out at the far end of the drive way they disappeared into the house filling up the tiny hallways and stairs with their bulk.

No one could get at Charlie – but we could talk with him – he did not have a stroke, something we feared at first. The most agile of the men got onto the roof, talking into the walkie-talkie strapped to his shoulder that they had an ‘access’ problem. And then he proceeded to dash in the windows, producing a shower of fine glass slivers to fall down on everything below. As landlord, standing below, I did register that a few more tasks had now been added to our to-do list, in addition to our elusive fireplace project.

After a good hour of maneuvering Charlie emerged, pale and bewildered and was strapped to a chair that took him down the stairs. Outside he was transferred to a gurney that took him into the ambulance, and off to the hospital, under weak protests.

Tessa and Chicha slept through the entire episode. Chicha would have gone bonkers with all those dark clad and buzz-cut young men rushing around. Not to speak of all the glass splinters. “Good we cleaned the dog poop from the lawn,” said Axel, as they wheeled Charlie away. Not entirely. In the consternation I did step into one that had been overlooked. Lucikly the gurney stayed clear of them and entered the hospital poopfree.

The anti malaria pills I am taking leave a terrible metallic taste in my mouth. I thought at first that the taste came from the whipped cream I have been eating in the evening after I discovered that it is really good with the amaretto chocolate (in powder form) that Axel brought back from Costa Rica. But then I realized it is of course the malarone. [or ‘macaroni’ as my spell checkers suggests]. One more day and I should be out of malaria danger. I am glad I don’t have to keep taking the pills for months on end, which I did when I travelled to West Africa a lot.

So far not a word from Ghana so I am remaining in that space of suspense – will they, will they not accept my proposal? When you communicate per email with high level officials in Africa (who have nearly all yahoo mailboxes) it is hard to gauge whether they got your mail or the mailbox is full. I once asked a senior official in Senegal why they use private mailboxes as official email addresses and the response was that they can’t rely on the government regularly paying its bills to an internet provider. There is no indignation or any sense that this is unacceptable and they don’t seem to think of themselves as part of this disembodied ‘government thing.’

In the meantime I am sucked up at work in our annual ritual of work planning. I participate because I have to but I have little energy or enthusiasm for it as the activities I am associated with in the plan don’t usually match what I end up doing. The plan does provide an illusion of control over our agenda and some coherence to the activities of a cast of thousands. It also tells our accountants how much it would cost if we did what we say we would. And, most importantly, we have to provide our client (the US government) with this plan; part of a chain of requirements that goes all the way up to the higher echelons in the US government. It’s our ‘government thing.’

But since I am not an accountant, and many of my assignments come out of the blue anyways, for me the work planning benefit is not obvious. In fact, sometimes the few things that were planned long in advance end up being postponed or cancelled altogether. I have never in my career at MSH consulted the plan to answer the question, “what should I be doing next?’

Right now ‘next’ is a trip to Kabul, in a few weeks – potentially closely followed by a trip to Ethiopia, but that will reveal itself later.

Sometimes I wonder whether our frequent visits to doctors and allied professionals are still part of the long tail of the accident or whether it is the beginning of old age. Axel continues to struggle with the after effects of the head trauma. A sudden attack of vertigo on Sunday, while driving, made us decide to pull him from behind the wheel. Several consultations with various specialists later we are still a bit in the dark. An EEG is ordered. But with those you never know whether it is actually needed for the patient, to protect the doctor from a lawsuit or to ensure an income stream to pay off expensive machinery.

The Boston head doctor tells him to start doing his vestibular exercises again. This is a wonderful low tech approach to trick the brain: he stands with one foot in front of the other, a small business card with a big X on it in his outstretched hand while his head makes fast but small L-R movements and his eyes remain fixed on the X. It has done good things before for his balance.

Because we decided that it is safer if I drive him, his doctor’s appointment becomes mine as well. And then I have my own physical therapy for my arm/shoulder injury and phone calls for more appointments (is it a tear in the muscle?). The entire morning was gone in no time.

I explored the presencing website in anticipation of some positive news from Ghana and joined the health and the ‘Lage Landen’ (lowlands) communities of practice. I also dropped a few thoughts here and there in blogs and comments, waiting for people to respond and see where it leads. It’s exciting to enter an entirely new ecosystem that is populated with people who are pursuing a more meaningful way of working with and in organizations. There are many active participants in the Low Lands, Holland in particular I noticed.

I organized myself for the week to come, finishing this and starting that before heading out to the church at the end of the afternoon with my two tricolor lasagna dishes. All the churches in the Greater Beverly area take turns to provide meals in the Baptist Church hall to some 60 people. Since our Quaker Meeting is small we get two Mondays a year. Yesterday was one of them.

In an odd convergence of conditions, there were fewer down and out people who showed up for their free meal and more lasagnas baked by Ffriends than ever. This meant that I returned home with two partially eaten lasagnas and a bag of leftover breads and day old pastries, the latter a donation from Panera. I sat for awhile at one table and learned how for some people this free meal is a main source of nutrition. I was glad I had all the major food groups worked into my lasagnas. We brought plastic containers for people to take leftovers home – some live most of the week on these. It is a part of American society I have very little contact with.

I am really bad living on my own – my meals are unbalanced and I work too much. At some point last night my body protested so loud about sitting in front of the computer – through aches and pains – that I got the hint and looked at the clock – 9:30 PM! I had been working on my writing assignment since 3 PM and not noticed the time. I truly was ‘in the flow.’ The good part of this flow thing is that I am nearly done with my chapter (some 40+ pages long). I expect to send it out for review tonight and can then scratch that big job off my very long to do list, shifting my attention to what’s next (Ghana).

It was good that I went walking with Chicha at noon time, so at least I had moved my limbs a little during the day. We went to Singing Beach. It was a glorious winter day, even though it was technically spring. Chicha ignored all the attentions and advances from other dogs, her eyes tight on the yellow tennis ball in my hand (which she had found for me), retrieving it like a rocket. Neighbor Ted researched Blue Heelers and said Chicha can’t help herself – retrieving is in her genes; the additional Border Collie genes only make it worse.

If Axel had been around he would never have me left in my office so long. He would have shamed me into proper meals and corrected my posture, each time he walked by. I hate it when he does that but I missed it yesterday. Instead of a proper meal I had (homemade) bread and honey for breakfast with Ethiopian coffee, then bread and summer sausage from Canada for lunch, and for dinner a piece of week old brisket and a beer (consumed at my desk).

I extracted myself from my very messy office (when I write I pull out papers and books willy-nilly and leave them right where they fall) and finished about a pint of ice cream and the remaining whipped cream before going to bed. I like to clean out the refrigerator especially if there is no one to provide a commentary.

Before going to bed I watched public broadcasters ask for money on the screen and interrupt with a movie on Chi-Qong – which you get if you contribute 80 dollars or more. Having so abused my body I felt compelled to follow the instructor, especially after he promised that the exercise would undo all the bad things I had done to it during the day. In anticipation of the promised mental clarity, energy and a peaceful feeling I got out of bed and floated my arms up and down, bend my knees, twisted my hips and spine and breathed deeply and rhythmically in and out of the belly. In the process I discovered that my shoulder joint is far from being fixed by the last cortisone shot and that any of the very simple upper arm and shoulder movements are out of bounds for now. No yoga either. Still, I fell asleep in seconds after I hit the pillow and had nice dreams that I cannot remember, so the peaceful part worked.

The mental clarity and energy will kick in now, I hope, as there is much to do before a taxi will drive up to my house in about 12 hours to take me to the airport. There is a morning of flying with Bill and then the packing and charging all my electronics. I am travelling light with my Kindle, no books – everything fits in a small shoulder bag. The small suitcase that I had planned to carry on will be checked – lifting even a small case in an overhead bin is not in the stars for now.

There are rowers on the river again and sailboats in the Basin; these are the impatient ones, confident that they will not flip over in the still very cold waters of the Charles. Yesterday’s balmy weather also brought out the joggers in shorts and tanks tops and a young woman walking with her lover along the bank of the Charles River. When the wind blew her miniskirt up, much like Marilyn on the subway grate, there was not much underneath by way of clothing. Spring is coming to Boston.

Spring is also coming to the North Shore. Now that we have daylight savings time I arrive home with a couple of hours left of light making work in the yard and garden possible. I spent some time uncovering the tender shoots that will become crocuses, blue bells, daffodils, tulips and bleeding hearts in due time, liberating them from underneath the heavy and wet pile of leaves that kept them white and leggy. This also revealed the tracks of countles small rodents that have been burrowing close to our house’s foundation, or maybe even inside it; to stay warm I suppose.

I am checking the asparagus bed nearly daily in the hope of some sign of life but nothing is showing yet. The garden is dead, at least at first sight. I know that weeds are alive and well and making their way to the surface. The parsley, and other winter crops that we forgot to harvest look miserable.

Sometime in January, when we get restless, we have all these good intentions to order seeds, growing flowers and vegetables from scratch. But it remains a plan, a set of intentions, and then, suddenly, spring has arrived. And we say ‘oops’ and resolve to do better next year.

Spring also means raking leaves and other debris from the lawn, an enormous task that is best done piecemeal. I did the lawn right in front of the door and uncovered many sticks, dead toys and turts that belonged to Chicha. It looks nice now.