1. For over thirty years, I've known her as Sparky, although I always knew her name was Judith or Judy. She and I are having a splendid email exchange and now I know that Sparky has reverted to being known as Judy. I also know that her calendar is wide open when I come to Eugene (fingers crossed), starting December 4th, so, knowing that, I will now contact other friends to see if we can make plans to see each other. In our exchange, I learned more about how Judy is doing. It's been a rough several months -- her partner, Joe Cronin, was receiving in-home hospice care until he passed away on May 15th and about six weeks later Judy suffered her own health problems, from which she is recovering. (If you and Judy and I are friends and you don't know what happened to Judy, contact me privately and I'll let you know.)
2. Reading Haruki Murakami's Underground has been like listening to a Bach variations composition. In much the same way that Bach holds a series of variations together with a musical theme he establishes early on, so Murakami, as he tells each interviewer's story, comes back again and again to the details of what happened on the Toyko subway trains when the attackers released the sarin gas.
The variations come as each interviewer tells his or her response to the gassing. Many had the same physical reaction -- difficulty breathing, pupils contracting, legs giving out, etc. --, but the variations come as they tell Murakami about their lives, how they responded to the emergency, their lives in the following weeks, even months, and in these variations, the book offers up a fascinating look into these people's lives and psyches.
The last interview I read tonight was unique. It was the first (and only?) interview with the spouse of a person killed by the sarin. The victim was a young man and his wife spoke at length, fascinating length, about her life, his life, the day her husband died, and how her father and the victims' parents provided her with loving and material support in the aftermath of his death.
3. Tucked away in the back of the fridge, I found a small container containing a helping of the chicken enchilada casserole we served on Monday for family dinner. I had fixed Debbie some spaghetti to do with what she would when she returned home from The Lounge, and on this night of eating what we would for dinner, this leftover casserole, combined with some left over rice, eaten cold, satisfied me unreasonably well!
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