MARCH 7, THURSDAY

TRANSITION

When I am writing this I have been back a week. I am just getting over jet lag. Since India is almost half way around the world, almost 12 time zones away, when I first got back my body felt that noon was bedtime and 8 in the evening was time to wake up and begin the day. So slowly I’ve been trying to push my bedtime back and my waking up back. The first day I made it to 2 a.m. before being wide awake and ready to go, the next day 3, the next day 4 with some relapses. Today I was asleep at 9 and awake at 5, close to back to normal.

During this same time I was floating along in limbo without feeling that I was here or anywhere at all, unwilling to go out of the house and face the world. But after missing one doctor’s appointment and then going to two I began to feel that I was home again, but just as that happened that part of me which is always unconsciously looking ahead was beginning to be alarmed. I had two and a half weeks before leaving for Germany and all my plans there were falling apart.

The reason I had a round trip to Geneva on March 26 was to visit my granddaughter Caroline who was going to have a five month spring medical internship in Geneva. But there were complications and it looked like she wasn’t going to be able to do it. It turned out that this was not a good time for me to visit niece Tina in Riseholme, Lincoln, England. It was not a good time to visit Henny in Haarlem. Mary, Todd’s sister broke her wrist skiing and Craig’s (her husband’s) mother suddenly died. Elke, whom I most planned to stay with, had an operation and was told to do nothing strenuous for six weeks. Wildblume, where I could rent a room in Winsen, instead of staying with Elke, was partially booked up for April. I had an unrefundable air ticket and no one to visit. This finally pulled me out of my jet lag lethargy.

But in one day of emailing and phoning it looks like everything will turn out just fine. Wildblume has a room for two weeks, I’ll stay with Elke and Heinrich another ten days and at the beginning of the trip I have ten days in which I will find something interesting to do. Suddenly I am not only home again, but I’m already gone again, just here for a brief visit, already living in the future.