It's gloriously sunny and warm outside, and I ought to be out there skiing, bicycling, in-line skating along the lake, or hiking in the mountains rather than sitting in front of my computer composing another mass email … all the more so because today is “Sizdah-bedar” – the thirteenth day of the Persian New Year – when traditionally we leave town to go to the country, there to leave behind, to let go, of the “evil thirteen”, and to cleanse our souls for the coming year.
Well, I already live in the country and, this season at least, I have spent enough time already in the mountains trying to “cleanse” my soul, and my environment, of evils and evil omens. (Other people call it “skiing”; but nothing so simple or banal for me, you appreciate ….) And both needed a lot of cleansing.
The Christian year began well enough. As usual, friends came over, we drank and danced and ate and talked and bid farewell to the old year, all in style. We all wished the best for one another, looked forward to another year of success – or, at least, no regression – and drank Champagne to our health. When, on 9 January, I boarded the plane for Toronto – to teach, to see the family, to spend time with close friends – the coming year looked very promising indeed.
And then disaster struck, one after the other. (The next three paragraphs, indented, are real downers, so please do not hesitate to skip.
On the 13th, I learned that a good friend had passed away, of stomach cancer. It had come suddenly, took all unawares … he went quickly, leaving much unsaid. We had last spoken together on the November before; we were going to have dinner, but work intervened; we postponed it to February, when he would be back in Geneva. The day before Christmas he was given the news of his cancer: terminal; three weeks later he was gone. It was, and remains, a terrible shock.A few days later I had coffee with a close friend. He seemed out of sorts … the wife of a mutual friend had been diagnosed with cancer. I didn't, and don't yet, know of the prognosis; if I could pray to unseen gods, she would be in my prayers; she is in my thoughts and not a day goes by that I do not wish her well and her husband and children strength.I finished the course on the 20th of January and came back home on the 22nd. A week later, a very good friend of mine was hit with acute leukemia and confined to the hospital. The prognosis is good, but the treatment is hard. She is in isolation for fear of infections; and the Chemo and the follow-up are going to take close to two years … she is too weak most days to even take calls. But, when she has been let out on furlough from her confinement, she has been in good spirits. The story of her daily torture is harrowing and I shall not put you through it … the only good thing that can be said is that it was caught, and caught just in time, and there is a good chance that she will come through it ….
We all have coping mechanisms to deal with disasters: some disengage in spirit, others cause their bodies to disengage through sports or drinks or drugs or other healthy and unhealthy activities; some reflect and lose themselves in introspection, others take carpe diem to heart and squeeze every last bit of juice out of life; some bury themselves in work, others find work pointless; some spew banalities and bromides, others write mass emails …
I am not yet sure where I land in the midst of all this. It is true that last week, skiing in the Swiss Alps, I sensed a deep serenity at 3300 meters looking down into the valleys and looking out at Mont Blanc and the Matterhorn. I was not itching to come down. (Well, that might have had to do with the 60% incline and the fact that I was testing out boots and skis, and neither was working out well … but then again, why bother with a simple explanation when a deeper, more philosophical one would do?) But, staying up there was not an option; and once I foolishly left the relative safety of the station, the only thing left to do was to struggle down the steep incline of the glacier, avoid the crevasses, get myself to the bottom in one piece and try to enjoy it in the meantime. Perhaps that was the metaphor I was looking for?
Detachment is not an option, no matter how lovely the view. Life, H.L. Mencken said, demands to be lived.
…
In the time it has taken me to write this email, the clouds have gathered and soon it will rain. Some of you would say that that's my punishment for having inflicted this on you; others would point out that had I not begun writing this note, I would have been caught in the gathering storm. I'm going out in any event, to the lake, to the city, to the mountains – wherever I can reflect for a moment and let go of evils and evil omens on this Thirteenth Day of the New Year.