Returnings

Well, I got home last night around midnight Santa Barbara time, having just by the skin of my teeth finished getting everything closed out and paid off and shipped away, all my goodbyes said, et cetera. The flight was long, of course, and I was glad to have been mysteriously bumped up to business class for the longest stretch of it, Frankfurt to San Francisco - better food and plenty of room for those who can sleep on such flights.

Sadly, I made it home just in time to see my mom off to the Next Thing. She had been declining steadily for the last few months and was really just waiting to see me again before letting herself pass away, which she did about 4 PM today. We got to talk a bit, and I played ud for her, which she loved, said she wished she could get it together to sing, but it would take too much energy. But she wasn't afraid; she had a fine life, did most of what she'd wanted to do (perhaps there's a simulacrum of Paris she can visit where she is, now), left a lot of love in her wake, and died surrounded by people who loved and appreciated her, so it's all turned out as well as it could have under the circumstances.

In response to my last post, my friend Gregory sent me the following poem, an old favorite and one I think is appropriate for this moment, for my mom and for me, and maybe for you too... Konstantin Kavafis' Ithaca. Enjoy - I hope to write again soon.

As you set out for Ithaca
hope your road is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
angry Poseidon - don't be afraid of them:
you' ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians, Cyclops,
wild Poseidon - you won't encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

Hope your road is a long one.
May there be many summer mornings when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you enter harbours you're seeing for the first time;
may you stop at Phoenician trading stations
to buy fine things,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
sensual perfume of every kind -
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
and may you visit many Egyptian cities
to learn and go on learning from their scholars.

Keep Ithaca always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you're destined for.
But don't hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so you're old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you've gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaca to make you rich.

Ithaca gave you the marvelous journey.
Without her you wouldn't have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.
And if you find her poor, Ithaca won't have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you'll have understood by then what these Ithacas mean.