Sylvia's Journal

Not much to add to Joe’s narrative. He gave a faithful account of the day. Let me fill in the part between returning from Salem and this morning of the last day of July. A thousand whiplashes is what I am feeling this morning. Some days my body isn’t so prominent in my mind but this morning every movement I make hurts, no sharp pains, but sore sore sore everywhere.

We have so many different dishes in the refrigerator that we could have a daily menu offering many choices. I dined on Diane’s vichyssoise, Carol’s beans and fresh beets from Mary that Sook cooked. Joe had the pesto and pasta and Sita, Steve and Tessa are on another schedule. I don’t know when they eat or sleep. Sita came back with a car load of stuff which is being stuffed into the studio.

Thanks Caty for the zoethout tea and the heads up about the Dutch company. With my frequent flights through Schiphol I have managed to handcarry such items throughout the years.

Thanks for those of you who suggested workplaces for Steve and Jim, all sounds promising and they’ll follow up with you. Steve, being Canadian, has to sort out work permit issues we just realized, but Jim should be OK.

Today Sita and I are going on a road trip to Worcester. I am not looking forward to this, especially since we have to get on the road at rush hour for the Manchester-Turnpike stretch early morning. Thanks Bob Buxbaum for his suggestion of an abdominal binder. It is a very (very) watered down version of the plastic contraception that keeps Joand and Axel steady. It made the road trip to Salem more comfortable and will do the same today to Worcester.

I wll be seeing the orthopedic surgeon and the trauma folks at the surgical center. I hope they will open the cast and explore why I am having these pains in my heel. There is also an X-ray to be made of my right chest to check on the ribs and continuing pains there. Sita is going to get all our X-rays and scans and what not so that we can move our care to local doctors, so this should be the last of our trips to Worcester.

Arne from the flight center came over and helped me fill in the NTSB forms, all 9 pages of them, which included things like where the center of gravity was, what the pressure altitude was and annual inspections of the plane. Another mishap at the flight center (this one only serious for the plane, not the pilot) meant that they are two planes short after an accident-free existence for the longest time. Thanks Arne for helping me through this chore. We also talked about flying again and that I will need another checkride with an instructor before I am let loose again. Of course, I would not want it any other way.

Dear ones, near and far, thanks again for the outpouring of love and support. As you can read from our journal we are absorbing as much as we can for use right now and putting the rest in storage. Joe is sitting down with the girls to begin charting the next few months and moving us from being trauma victims to being a project for our daughters and sons-in-law. Caring, compassion and gushing love is always good but as a project we will need to be managed, a different set of skills, which requires planning, organizing, implementing and of course monitoring progress and evaluating what works and what is not. Thanks Joe for your guidance. I think MSH published a book about this, by the way!

Happy birthday Axel! I have the feeling that this is going to be a very different year than all the ones preceding this birthday. I am so grateful that we are all alive and on the mend. My mind sometimes drifts into contemplating the other unspeakable outcome (or anyone of a number of scenarios) of our failed landing, but then all my muscles contract as if to prevent access to this thought and I stop in my tracks.

Things are looking good, even through the veil of rain outside. It’s a droopy sort of day but I don’t feel droopy at all. Nurse Tessa is making my breakfast, counting my pills, making coffee and putting the finishing touches on Axel’s birthday cake…wonder woman!

I went to bed after watching Miss Marple in Bertram’s Hotel with Tessa. Right there two accomplishments: watching through an entire movie without asking Tessa too often for extra explanations, and going to bed at 10:30. Tessa massaged my hands and shoulders, a treat each time. I took the triple dose of Oxycontin and had a painless night as a result although I keep waking up many times. For a habitually sound sleeper like me these cut up nights are still hard to handle.

I spent several hours with Axel at the rehab on Sunday and saw him progress from sitting up in bed to standing up in a walker and finally sitting down in a wheelchair, all this without fainting or sweat drops on his brow. A true pirate, patch firmly in place.

In the meantime Tessa’s Steve with his friend Roy were building a mini-ramp that will allow me to get in and out of my bedroom on my own. The threshold is about one inch high and the ramp is an elaborate construction from shingles that have been fiber glassed for strength. There is another set of ramps that need to be built later which would allow me to go outside and then back in again. I’d have to bridge 8 inches, a dazzling height for me at this point.

Jim and Steve have both changed their (summer) plans so that they can be with us. Jim is giving up his job in Amherst by moving into the studio across the driveway with Sita and Steve wants to postpone his return to Canada as long as possible so he can support Tessa. As a result both are without income. If anyone in the Essex county area can think of work that could provide them with some revenue while they are here, I would be so very grateful. They are caring for me and Axel as if they are our sons and they are providing support to Sita and Tessa in ways that no one else can. Steve is looking for work for the month of August. He prefers working outside; he loves animals, and is strong as a horse. Jim will need work that continues after Labor Day.

Glad to read another contributor to the journal and more eye witness reports about Axel. His computer is also in rehab but as soon as it returns I hope that Axel himself can start to post. For now Joe or Tessa or Sita will do that for him.

Yesterday I wrote about the two necklaces. There are a few big and prominent beads on the necklace of sighs and disappointments which I did not mention because they are so hard for me to look at and describe. These are the beads that represent Axel, Joan, Morsi and Neveen and Ahmad (Morsi’s children). Something momentous has happened in their lives for which I am responsible. This is as far as I can go with it, now. (By the way, they are also beads on the necklace of blessings, where I can look them more squarely in the face).

The first few days after the accident I had this movie playing in my head and I was trying to give it another ending. This compulsion has stopped now. The movie still starts sometime but then I physically turn my head away – I don”t want to see what happens next.

One of these days I have to tackle the big brown manilla envelope which contains the paperwork that I need to fill in for the NTSB. I have asked Arne from the Beverly Flight Center to assist me in this. Arne, I think the time has come to do this, what about Monday?

The plane(wreck) is in Maine somewhere. Suddenly it had left Gardner airport, before Jim was able to get our belongings out. (I am especially anxious to get Axel his backpack with his notebook and camera back. As you know he did not travel anywhere without these two items.)

Antony from Baku had asked what about the plane….well, it is a wreck. If you google my name plus words like small airplane crash and/or Gardner airport you will see that question answered quite clearly.

The night is still cut up in countless half hour segments through which I move in slow motion. I have given up on getting the pain medication right. I should have known that there are constantly changing dynamics in my body and between my body and mind, which makes settling on one fixed dose impossible. Nurse Tessa is doing her best but here no one can advise me I fear.

I am going to visit Axel this morning. We had a plan to visit him yesterday but my body tends to be at the end of its rope by the time 6 PM rolls around and protests against even the most minor challenges. A road trip to Salem seemed like a cross country trip.

Tomorrow is Axel’s 61st birthday. I have a lot to be thankful for.

I was very aware of the end of the graduation ceremony of the BU course yesterday. Here I am listed as faculty and never showed up. Another disappointment among so many others, the things I cannot do, we cannot do, have to cancel/postpone, mourn, etc. It’s like a necklace, each bead comes with a sigh: the Bastille party at Anne and Chuck, the cookout at our house with the BU students that was to take place the 15th, the salsa dancing at Castle Hill, Flying to Martha’s Vineyard, with Axel and Andrew, a tour over Essex county with Karen and Sarah, kayaking with Axel and the St. Johns, followed by a mussel meal on our beach, tending the garden and picking its goodies, picking the ripest raspberries just minutes before the chipmunks show up before going to work at 6 AM, etc.

There is another necklace that has mostly covered up the one made up of disappointments and that is the one with the blessings. Each bead is one blessing. It is an enormously long necklace: the bog and trees that broke our fall, the rescue teams that got us to the hospital, the resilience and strength of our bodies, our daughters and their mates, our families, the many friends and acquaintances who are rooting, praying, cooking, driving etc. for us, Blue Cross Blue Shield, MSH, my many colleagues and friends in far away places, the Beverly Flight Center staff, our neighbors, the Gloucester Visiting Nurses, etc. This necklace is on top!

I am full of anticipation for this day, which brings week two of our recovery to and end. I am celebrating Axel’s transfer to Salem and hope to see him later. Sita went back to Amherst to take care of her own life for the weekend, make some music and pack up for the move to Lobster Cover. Tessa has taken over the RN role and is learning about dosage and pain medication while Steve is busy setting up the pen for Tessa’s rabbit Nijntje so we can all be together again.

I had a visit early (Friday) morning from Judy Seltzer, beating traffic all the way from Ashland, we had a nice time while the rest of the household was in deep sleep. I had my first cup of coffee since the accident. Another first, sitting outside at the end of the day, a glorious evening at lobster cover, I sipped a pretend beer (O’Doul) and it tasted like a real beer. I am surely but steadily getting better!