[Above photo: Sunset at the Fish River Canyon, Namibia]

28 November 2021

Martha’s Vineyard is a lovely island. Again, stolen from the Native Americans. Now it is, like Manhattan, very pricey real estate. The Obamas just bought a multi-million dollar place on a large piece of waterfront land. I looked at Zillow for fun—-for $760,000 I could get a 1 bedroom cottage (800sqft) on a 2200sqft patch of land.

I spent Thanksgiving and surrounding days with my friends, Jeff and Bonnie, at their lovely, spacious home in Chilmark. They got it a few years ago at a reasonable price, along with some acreage. Much of the latter is in a conservation easement, which means a wild buffer for them with no taxes. They often have, and can accommodate, numbers of their children, partners/spouses, and grandchildren, loving the noise and energy and associated senses of history and accomplishment. This time it was just we three.

We ate well—smoked turkey with dressing, homemade pear/cranberry compote, the Ottolengi squash/onion bake with tahini and za atar, matzoh ball soup, and bagels I brought from Portland’s Rose Food—-took easy walks, and talked like crazy. I was able to learn more about each of their beginnings. Jeff and I share college (he was there 2 years before me), medical school (contemporaries), memories, and career interests. Plus, the challenges of aging. It was relaxed and easy and fun; I slept until 8AM which is unheard of for me.

The drive down and back was easy, excepting the tangle of bridges and tunnels through Boston, and I, of course, love the ferry ride. Vineyard Haven Harbor has, always, a lovely assortment of sailboats—large, capable cruisers, numerous small schooners of both gaff and Marconi persuasion, and even a sweet old catboat—over which I drool.

MV has an interesting future, I think. As the rents and prices blast skyward, only the wealthy can afford to live there. Often this means older people in retirement, who may need some assistance with shopping, cleaning, yardwork, and house maintenance. But the service people will not be able to afford to live on island and may not want to commute an hour to and from work each day.  It feels a little like Japan here now, with an aging population and younger people not wanting to do the jobs they traditionally would have done.  Perhaps it will eventually go back to the Wampanoags.

The publication for which Erica is the Managing Editor, Inside Climate News, has a couple of remarkable stories currently. One is about the environmental devastation of the Canadian tar sands petroleum extraction. The other is about the largest nickel smelter in the world, 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle in Siberia. It was built and staffed by Stalin’s gulag and has been spewing out toxins for 80 years, polluting the rivers, poisoning the fish and animals, and killing the trees in an immense surrounding area.  Not to mention the striking increase in various cancers and other serious illnesses in humans living nearby. That plant alone emits more sulfur dioxide annually than the entire United States. And the lies and coverups about the ruination of a pristine and beautiful part of the world are infuriating. Inside Climate News is a great investigative organ, obviously timely. <insideclimatenews.org> Worth your support.

Disinformation in any form is so upsetting. Don Jr., our most visible used car salesman, has been ranting on Fox News about how the US media is not reporting on the riots in Europe over vaccine mandates. What riots are those, exactly? And you are suggesting Americans should riot in protest to our own vaccine mandates, rather than acting “like sheep” for not doing the same? Large groups of unmasked people shouting in protest seems like a great way to spread an airborne virus. Finally, Alex Jones’ chickens may be returning to their roost. I can only imagine what it must feel like to be a parent whose child was shot and killed at Sandy Hook and have Jones mouthing off that it is a “total hoax” with “actors”, all the while earning a fortune from supplements and survival gear he promotes on his show.  One family has been harassed—I’d guess threatened—so often as a result of his disgusting tirades that they have had to move numerous times and remain in hiding.

Jeff mentioned how so many of us, and so easily, are moved to paranoia. If unhappy or depressed, we could accept our plight, assume what responsibility we may have for it, and work to improve our lot. Alternatively, we can regress to a state of blaming others, our imaginary enemies. You’d think just by natural selection paranoia would have vanished, since a paranoid stance doesn’t appear to be a very successful state of mind. “Still blaming your parents, eh?”  It can certainly motivate powerfully, however, and many of our most savage dictators have been extremely paranoid, Stalin and Hitler being prime examples.

The sun is setting now at 4:07PM. The clouds are intensely red/orange. My internal clock hasn’t yet readjusted from living in the tropics where old Sol is up and down at 6 throughout the year. Early darkness is just like when I was a kid in Seattle. I do like the long days of summer, however.

I am thankful for too much to name. However, the lists were the part of Moby Dick I didn’t much like. I suppose the gifts of life, health, and relationship top mine.  It is incredible to live, to love others and to be loved, and to be aware of much of it.

[Above photo: On the Island with dramatic lighting c/o a cloudy late September evening.]

21 November 2021

I tip my hat to the virus; I acknowledge its potency. I am much better, although still easily fatigued ascending a single flight of stairs and unable to taste anything. Each morning after a shower I bury my nose in the manual coffee grinder to test the return of smell. Its absence is different than I experienced with chemotherapy; the latter also induced some nausea and an aversion to food.  I recall the first time I smoked weed in an attempt to improve my appetite, I downed a pint of chocolate ice cream. “What kind is this? It’s amazing!” My wife replied, “Trader Joe’s”. Nothing so special, but that step from 0 to 1 is a dramatic one.  I’m still awaiting the return of taste and will perhaps try some zinc supplement to hasten it. I vaguely recall a New Yorker article by Oliver Sacks on ‘Anosmia’ in which he prescribed zinc for a couple of people with the condition—admittedly, not secondary to covid-19—and it worked!

I’ve only been in my apartment for 7 weeks but feel loneliness wrapping me. I must remind myself that I’ve been absent or quarantined half that time, travelling to see friends and sorting my storage space in Bar Harbor.  This covid go-round leaves me feeling frail and vulnerable. And diminished, an inevitability with ageing anyway, as we lose our strengths and senses. Mostly I feel diminished in purpose and meaning, since my professional life has mostly halted and I am far from most friends. I keep checking, but I don’t feel depressed and remind myself to temper my expectations with the reality of my situation.

Maine now has its highest new daily covid case numbers since the beginning of the pandemic. Break-through cases are not uncommon. And the longer the numbers are up anywhere in the world, mostly correlating with the rates of vaccination, the more likely we are to get a variant that dodges the vaccine. The events of 9-11 did change the world but this little spiky fella is having a more widespread, a more lethal, and a longer-lasting effect.  The idea of easily mingling with strangers to meet a new group of friends, whether in a book group, cross-country skiing, or taking/teaching a class, doesn’t seem in my immediate future.

I’ve now been out of Myanmar for nearly 8 months. My return, at least in the near future, seems unlikely. If suddenly democracy were restored and the military receded to their proper role, I’d head back promptly to resume my crusade of establishing child and adolescent mental health services in the country.  Failing that, and it is most unlikely to occur, I’m here.

I think, thus, I need to change the domain name of my blog from “A psychiatrist in Myanmar” to reflect my current reality.  “Settling in Maine” has a double-entendre that troubles me, however true. More a double meaning, as double entendre, it seems, implies that one meaning is shocking or risqué. Then, again, if I really want to be teaching abroad, being here does carry a sense of resignation.

Do I have the interest, and the juice, to start a similar project elsewhere? I think I’d choose S. America, because I know a bit of Spanish and could learn more. And I’ve never travelled there. And I like the food and much of the music. Now, I am exciting myself. I may look into another Fulbright after March (I’m next eligible two years after the last one ended).

Maybe “Perched in Maine” would be more appropriate, suggesting a transience to my residency. Having my camp on the Island gives me an adequate sense of having a home base, which I require.

I’ve been looking at blue-water sailboat ads, refining my search to land on the “perfect” boat for me. I can easily lull myself into an ocean-crossing or a tropical sojourn. Then I will see a video of a cluster of cruisers caught in a tropical cyclone between New Zealand and Fiji, with consequent terror, serious injuries, rescues, and loss of both lives and boats. Not so much, I think. Besides, the necessarily constant and meticulous maintenance and cramped quarters of a live-aboard cool my enthusiasm.  I now like my shower, my large and comfy bed, the kitchen appliances, and the fact that if, tomorrow, I want to fly to San Francisco or Bangkok, I just need to buy a plane ticket, lock the door, and take an Uber to the Jetport.

I think my fantasies run, predictably, toward open horizons when I am cooped-up. Just as, unable to smell or taste, I read numerous recipes yesterday in a wonderful cookbook which my daughter gave me for my birthday.  Reading and writing, instead of taking actions to effect my escape, make much more sense right now, although they lack the visceral pull of fantasy.

I’m strong enough for a real walk today. Maybe this afternoon I’ll go to the downtown cineplex and watch “Dune” or “The French Dispatch”.  A more practical outlet for fantasied longings. And double-masked.

14 November 2021

[Below photo: A poor quality photo, taken with a phone through both glass and screen, of a hummingbird at the feeder on the Island. She provided me with endless entertainment, as did her 4 babies when they learned to fly.]

Thursday I went shopping. I’d cancelled dinner guests for Friday because of my “cold”. I imagined a fish chowder would feel right, given the chill in the air, my symptoms, and being in New England. I bought a piece of cod.

Friday, still coughing my brains out, my nose running like a faucet, and feeling great fatigue, with an abundance of caution I drove to a covid test center. Bingo! “You are my first positive!” said the cheerful nurse practitioner. Going home through driving rain and high winds, I was lucky to find a parking spot in front of my apartment.

Saturday, after some fussing, calls, and emails, my friend Ellen’s daughter, who is head of Urgent Care at Maine Medical Center, arranged for me to get an iv infusion of monoclonal antibodies. Oh, no! I thought. Just like DT. 8 hours after arriving, I left, well-infused.

Sunday, today, I was finally making the fish chowder. First I cooked the bacon. I thought, Some cheap bacon. No smell. Then I put in the chopped onions and couldn’t smell them. I couldn’t smell anything. So I have a fish chowder that is undoubtedly most savory and no way to appreciate it. At least it will nourish me.

One of the issues with ageing is lacking vision in the shower.  I don’t mean metaphysically. It adds to a sense of vulnerability, as well, for being naked and old in front of a bathroom mirror is to learn about collagen failure and wrinkles. But seriously, how to tell, in a hotel, motel, or friend’s home, which is Body Wash, which is Shampoo, and which is Conditioner? There usually are all sorts of words written—‘Lemon Essence’, ‘Lilac Compote’, ‘Creamy Restoration’, etc. Plus, the fine print. I think they should have it embossed on the lid: B, S, and C, so oldsters like me know what we are slathering on where. It could be an Executive Order, since the GOP would likely block it if it came to the floor. The preparations are probably all pretty similar and I don’t expect my hair will fall out or that I’ll break into an exfoliative dermatitis  if I use the wrong one or use them in the wrong order. Still….

Don’t the oil and coal people get it? Do they really think that continuing to burn them isn’t causing significant warming and climate disruption?  Or do they just want to squeeze the last few $ out of their investments before quitting?  The Glasgow Summit results were less than encouraging to me, although I’m not versed in how these negotiations could go optimally.  Only teenagers, it seems, can shout with authority, as did Diana Ross and the Supremes, “Stop, in the name of love!” Love of Earth. Love of Humanity. Love of animals. Love of plants. Love of Nature’s abundance, diversity, and beauty.

I am fading fast. Even this little bit of mental energy—and after reading this I think you’ll agree that not a lot was expended—and finger exercise has exhausted me. Despite this virus, did I mention how lucky I am? Triple vaccinated, able to get the latest—-well, next to the latest—treatment available, rent paid, plenty of food, friends and family calling and writing.  Pretty amazing. In olden days I’d be put in my kayak and eased seaward.

PS: I am in no respiratory distress and am slowly recovering, so no cause for alarm.

10 November 2021

[Above photo: My living room, since I have no more recent photos. Note the 15′ wide original 1850’s pine flooring.]

Getting to the Portland Transportation Center was a challenge. Google Maps sent me deeper and deeper into a hotel parking lot with no exit. Once arrived, it was a smooth and pleasant ride down I-95 to Boston’s South Station on a quiet and comfortable coach. Next, I boarded the Acela and quietly sped along the Connecticut coast, crossing the Mystic, Thames, Quinnipac, Housatonic, and Connecticut rivers and dropping me at Moynihan-Penn Station. Finding the uptown subway 1 Line was a slog, but I was warmed by its gritty similarity to the IRT of the ‘60’s. Exiting at 79^th, it was a short walk to Harold and Connie’s on West End.

They have a spacious and graciously appointed apartment, cleverly designed so that the guest bedroom seems in a separate wing. There are views of the Hudson and of penthouses with small potted forests. And the wonderful rooftop water towers/tanks allowing for a constant flow, despite upstream vagaries. I was welcomed and fed and we planned our moves for the next few days of my visit.

Since my sleep has not been sound, I was done by 10 and slept, with the usual interruptions, until 8AM. And I dreamed of being in a room with friends and colleagues when I suddenly saw  a myriad of black dots in the sky. Upon closer inspection, they were crows, parachuting ominously into the neighborhood. Associating to it, I recalled the hundreds of crows who would gather nightly in the huge eucalyptus grove at Ginnery Corner in Blantyre, Malawi. At first, it seemed miraculous; later I saw them, aggressive survivors and carnivores, as wicked. In Yangon, the only birds left in the city are crows, pigeons, and little house sparrows. I then, for some reason thought about Hillary’s “deplorables”. How did they get that way? How did I get to be how I am?

Long story shortened, I took the subway and walked to The Strand, New York City’s huge used book emporium where I quickly located a copy of Freud’s Civilization and Its Discontents. My thought was that, for many reasons, the sacrifices we make to sustain civilization—I’m angry at someone, there will be a payment if I whack him. She’s tantalizing, but I cannot just possess her or Big Trouble. That shiny object beckons me, but it isn’t mine to take.—are no longer worth it for many to whom the promised rewards have not come. Rules and values of the rich, educated, and priviledged. So, we abandon truth and lie with ease. We incite and enjoy violence. Honor and civility aren’t valid currency. Restraint, art, logic, science, and intellectual pursuits take a back seat to superstition, impulse, greed, avarice, tooth and claw.  My thesis becomes hazy on awake inspection, but. I swear, it was lucid in my post-dream reverie, lying in 800 thread-count sheets with a lovely duvet keeping me warm. I’ll approach it with more rigor later.

Harold and I went to the [new] Whitney and wandered through the immense Jasper Johns retrospective. Not so much my kind of art, but it was an impressive oeuvre and the museum itself is magnificent. We then cruised up the park along the Hudson to his apartment, joining Connie on the roof for a glass of wine.

Off to Marcy’s 80^th birthday, 7 of us, at Genaro’s where we feasted and feted. Toasts included her brilliance, her beauty, her friendship, and her incredible persistence as she has fought, much of it singlehandedly, for 50 years to preserve the riverine west side of Manhattan from the developmental depredations of a series of massively rich and powerful men. Barry Diller managed to best her with his little erection at pier 55 but she has outmuscled the others. She is one rara avis.

The next day I spent with Erica, seeing her new place, doing some minor installations there, and walking with Chloe to Barney Greengrass, the Sturgeon King. He knows—well, knew—his sturgeon. As, later, we moved to meet her publisher and executive editor at a bar, we sought a cab. An Uber would be $45. Why, you ask, for a 12 block ride?  It was NY Marathon day and every spot on the Upper West Side was overflowing with celebrants, including those wrapped in blue ponchos wearing medals.  We grabbed a bicycle rickshaw at $7/ minute. Wait, red lights? I won’t reveal the final fee but it was a pleasant ride and our cyclist was happy at the payoff.  Erica’s editor has run 85 marathons. At 60yo his time was under 4 minutes. His mitochondria are ridiculous.

Our appointed restaurant where we’d meet H & C had cancelled the evening: “a plumbing problem in the block”. We slipped around the corner to an old standard that they all liked but had forgotten (perhaps because they only accept cash) and settled into outdoor seating. Suddenly a long string of ambulances and other be-sirened vehicles rushed by. Had there been a bombing? We never learned but had a wonderful meal, including mussels flown in that day—so said the proprietor—from Portugal? Italy?

The energy of New York, the sheer juice of the place, is like nowhere I’ve been. I imagine Shanghai matches it. The train trip up the coast the next day was, again, sedate and effortless. And there was my ancient Subaru, waiting to ferry me home.

Glasgow seems disappointing so far. China threatens Taiwan. Biden gets his infrastructure bill passed. And Paul Gosar broadcasts anime of him killing AOC and attacking the President.  What a descending path into depravity our Trumpers have taken. Desperate, primitive, they seem willing to do anything to regain power.

Meanwhile, I watched “Lorena, Light-Footed Woman”, a wonderful antidote to all the terrible nonsense, on Netflix. It is about a young Mexican woman from Chihuahua who is an unassuming ultramarathon champion, running in her traditional skirt and sandals. Refreshing!

31 October 2021

[Above photo:  Sunset from my living room window.]

The weather forecast announced showers today but it has  been brilliantly sunny, blustery, and with a variety of clouds threatening but never leaking.  It called for a bike ride and I layered and set out, riding on bike paths past the Portland waterfront and around Back Bay. It took me 2+ hours of steady riding and provided a good workout. I felt like one of the high school wrestlers who work out in plastic bags before a meet to sweat down to their weight class, though, since I’d over-layered.

I’ve begun to explore maps of the many bike trails in Maine, especially the East Coast Greenway, which leads from Calais at our northern tip to the Florida Keys, over 3000 miles. Some is on byways but much is on abandoned railroad lines, similar to the one I took last weekend with Harold and Connie. These are springing up all over the country. Removing the danger of being eliminated by a passing motor vehicle makes for a much more pleasant ride, even if the former railroad trains would make good sense today.

Back Bay is a large tidal pond with marshlands for nesting shorebirds. Many walkers were out, a few runners, and fewer cyclists. On the next sunny day, I’ll head from S. Portland down the Eastern Trail, which leads through the Scarborough Saltwater Marshes (3000 acres) to Kittery at the New Hampshire border.

I visited my storage space in Bar Harbor once again, staying in an “inn” in town since it wasn’t convenient for me to spend that night at Ari’s home. I finished sorting, took another load to the Blue Hill dump, left my stereo system and some power tools with Ari, and moved everything to a smaller space. Linda created a wonderful lunch for us from her very productive garden and we caught up. Her energy at maintaining a 3 story-plus-full-basement home is a wonder to behold; this climate is tough on homes.  I would have down-sized long ago but she enjoys filling the house with friends and family. Also, she built it, so it must feel like an extension of herself.

I caught two mice in my 4 traps. Overnight I caught another entering into my new storage space. “Poor boundaries.”, I say. “What’s private property?”  they say. I left the new space after setting 8 traps, hoping I can discourage a new crop of mice from homesteading. I doubt that encountering the dead bodies of their cousins will prove much of a deterrent to newcomers, however. I’ll check them over Thanksgiving, as I’ll be visiting Ari and enjoying the fare at the Brooklin Inn, as I did in 2019 before the virus struck.

As well as mice, I came across dozens of journals I’d written and letters I’d sent to my siblings and mother. Two of the latter shocked me. In one I noted to her how uninterested in talking with me she was when I called her on her birthday and on a second occasion. I don’t recall her acknowledging or apologizing. In yet another, I was responding to some explosion on her end that I’d forgotten her at Christmas. I soberly explained that we’d sent her carefully chosen present to my brother’s home, 5 blocks from hers, because we knew she was out of town over the holidays. Then I noted how easily she came to call me “a bum”, “a shit”, and “a fake” at different times. The major surprise to me was that I had completely repressed it all. She once exploded at me that I “looked like a schizophrenic” when she met me at the airport. I was coming to visit from medical school in New York and was wearing Can’t Bust ‘Em overalls, perhaps provocative of me, I’ll grudgingly admit. How my dad put up with this, I don’t know. She was like a mouse trap; a slight disturbance in the field would trigger a disproportionate response by her. It did affect my self-esteem for years but less now that I can recognize it as emanating from her fragile self, quite unrelated to me.  It also helped to explain why my sister-in-law once mentioned that my mother hadn’t treated me very well. I had remained puzzled by that for many years and, I suppose, never wanted to explore her conviction.

With this trove of material—-letters and old writings—I have no external excuse for not resuming the writing of my life story. Internally, I think it still frightens me to approach all those memories. But I’m fortunate that it will stir up dreams which will help me to decipher my submerged struggles.  I also have come across a huge number of slides—-Remember photographic film?  Shortly before the end of my marriage I bought a photo scanner, so I can imagine cold winter days spent reviewing reflections of warmer ones.  The local quality photo shop suggested that rather than purchase a light box, why don’t I just use an old laptop? I tried it. With the brightness at maximal, a Slide Show view of a blank Power Point slide makes a terrific LED light pad!

Off to NYC by train on Friday for a friend’s 80^th.  How quickly we’ve aged!  So has Joe but look at him go, trying to shift the machinery of state to actually help people and the world, rather than just facilitate the unbridled grabs of the wealthy. Silver-tongued old Ronald Reagan certainly was a friend of lower taxation (especially for los ricos) and less government regulation of industry. He did ring up a whopping, for that time, national debt. See where it has gotten us, as the world crisps and the rich-poor gap is wider than ever. Then think of FDR. For a wealthy and patrician fellow, he really helped the Little Guy in so many ways.  Despite their marital struggles, Eleanor was his better angel, I am certain.

[Above photo: Tushy, the add-on bidet. That’s an invention I wish I’d made!]

27 October 2021

To this Californian who spent the last 4 ½ years in tropical latitudes, winter has come. Mainers would say, “Not yet. Pretty toasty still.” Today it is 46 F outside, with rain and wind in equal measure. I am attempting to be comfortable at 68 F inside, which is an effort for me. Yangon and Blantyre were only that cold during the last Ice Age!

Now that I am nearly settled, the reality of my solitary existence wraps around me. It is strange for me to consider my unattached state. At times I feel like I’m at a dance in high school without a partner and compare myself with those more enmeshed unfavorably. I must appear like someone’s eccentric uncle, I imagine, perhaps an object of pity.  Yet the freedom to seek society when I want and not have to constantly consider what the effect on another of my sitting in the living room or listening to John Coltrane (or Bach) is excellent. I’m watching the glamorous, deceptive mess of Hemmingway’s life on PBS and don’t envy it at all. But I’m not built as he was and couldn’t have considered all the infidelity in which he engaged, let alone want to be on display at all times. If I awaken at 4:30AM, as I did today, I can try to fall asleep or I can switch on the light and continue reading Anita Desai’s Baumgartner’s Bombay without worrying I’ll disturb my bed-mate. I am struggling to adjust to a different phase in my life, I suppose.

Onwards and downwards! After expelling yesterday’s meals, for the past nearly 5 years I have used small hoses which are attached to toilets to spray myself. Said hoses are all over Africa and SE Asia. It makes sense, feels pleasantly clean, and saves toilet tissue. In going through my storage space I came across ‘Tushy’, a bidet-attachment I had ordered 4 years ago, which accomplishes the same without any contortions, gymnastics, or wild streams, since it has a fixed nozzle. My unit, which uses cold water, attaches to any toilet easily in about 10 minutes. It requires a pair of pliers and a screw driver. It does not require a plumber.  I can’t say it has drastically changed my life but it is a terrific addition to the household.  I encourage anyone reading this to check the link, hellotushy.com, if only for the cute pictures.  Tushy makes a warm-water model, as well.

We in the US are not as advanced in some realms as we enjoy imagining. Our internet services have lagged behind Europe and Asia. Much of the world uses water to clean, not paper to smear.  A little bit of tissue to blot yourself dry and, voila, as good as new! In developing countries you generally must supply the tissue. In the bathroom in my building at the College of Medicine in Malawi, the previous year’s financial report had been cut into neat squares and placed on a shelf behind the toilet. A good use of such a document, I think.

Needing a haircut last week, I walked to Longfellow Barber Shop on Congress Street, the closest to me. One chair, one barber. “Walk-ins. No appointments.” Norm at 84yo, has run it in the same spot since 1961. He gets up about 4:30AM, rides with his wife to the Saco bus stop, catches a 6:02AM bus, and is at his shop by 6:15AM. That is, if Terry is the bus driver that day because he arrives at 6:02AM exactly. Norm reverses direction in the afternoon, closing his shop at 5PM.

He is a kayaker—-or was. He had a number of Folboats and Klepper singles and loved to go out in the ocean when it was rough. I did also, and we swapped [tall] tales, as happens in barbershops. At the end he said, “It’s nice to talk with someone with whom you have something in common.” I agreed.

Norm is a meticulous barber, using warm lather and a straight-edge razor on my neck. He isn’t rushed but moves easily and surely. It’s the best haircut I’ve had in memory, all for $12.

I drove to Old Chatham, NY, across the western border of Massachusetts, to visit Harold and Connie. They have a spectacularly beautiful 90 acres set in a bowl of deciduous trees doing their Autumn thing, with a pond, a tennis court, two gazebos, a fenced kitchen garden, and wonderful lawns and plantings. And an ancient shagbark hickory whose height is 3’ greater than its distance from the house. The primary house is late 1700’s, built around a central chimney, and it was kept in the same family. H & C have made it all into a lovely, comfortable retreat, especially useful during these COVID years, when they pulled back from Manhattan.

We biked on the old electric railroad trail, hiked on Greylock Mountain, and hit tennis balls, eating and laughing in between the exercise. I imagined I’d be able to pick up a tennis racquet and resume where I left off 30 years ago. I wasn’t that good then and, not surprisingly, my skills have deteriorated. It was pretty astounding to me, since I have an image of myself as quite athletic but the reality was, well, shocking!

Tennis is a common entrée for expats in Africa and SE Asia. “Clubs” often have tennis as their centerpiece, although drinking, eating, and chatting actually occupy much more time. I felt chagrined at my clumsiness on Harold’s court, simultaneously enjoying the experience. Perhaps I’ll join an indoor tennis club as a primary setting for winter exercise.

I wanted my drive to Old Chatham to be on byways, so as to pass through the Green Mountains in Vermont. But Google Maps kept insisting I take the Maine turnpike so as to save 1 ¼ hours driving time. This digital conflict had me following a variety of little roads near Portland, often directing me in u-turns and other specious moves.  It exhausted my patience and I yielded, taking the pike and saving the time. On my return trip, however, I studied the map and was able to outwit Google, passing though Bennington, Brattleboro, and Keene. Although the view was partially obscured by drizzle and fog, the Fall colors beamed through mutedly in scarlets, orange, and yellows. I stopped once for food but after 15 minutes waiting and no movement, I skipped lunch in favor of returning in daylight and having pho ga at my favorite Vietnamese restaurant here. It, of course, was closed on Monday but I happily bought a pizza and salad in my neighborhood and retired to my apartment, exhausted.

One final trip to Bar Harbor will allow me to finish sorting my stored belongings and move what I keep to a smaller space. That part of contracting, shrinking, feels good.

14 October 2021

[Above photo:  Sunset from Northport Island.]

Humans, or many of them, seem perched on the edge of violence. We’ve concluded the wars, largely, in Afghanistan and Iraq and, mirabile dictu, there are murmurs and whispers of a civil war at home. Like high schools, whose optimal maximal size is estimated to be 1200 (I’m not sure how they come to that figure.), would we be more peaceful in small (100+) bands of hunters and gathers?  But then we wouldn’t have washing machines and TV’s!  Our technological progress has outstripped our social evolution, as others have noted, creating dangerous conditions. I think of DT as a 6yo who got into his daddy’s Cointreau and now is driving a schoolbus filled with children down a curvy country two-lane road.

Watching the Frontline documentary on the resurgence of the Taliban, it is clear that: 1) might makes right and, 2) many there aren’t democratically inclined, given their traditions and religion. My point is, if we hadn’t waged a starry-eyed war we could have limited our objectives to those achievable and would not have imagined, as Condoleezza Rice still asserts, that we could drag them into the 21^st century.  Our recent knowledge of epigenesis would tell us the same.  It is, however, heartbreaking to witness those who have evolved to want a more equitable and enlightened society crushed by the “traditionalists”. It’s a truism that women generally come out on the bottom of the pile when “Our traditions”  or “Our religion” are fiercely asserted.

I drove up the coast to thin out my storage space in Bar Harbor. The leaves are turning and it was difficult to keep my eyes on the road, so stunning were the colors. En route I stopped on Southport Island to visit a friend from high school, Louise, and her partner, Peter. They were staying at a darling ancient cottage, 50 feet from the water’s edge, which is part of his family’s vacation compound. A bench is perched on the rocks and we enjoyed a glass of wine as we watched the sun sink. They are both retired academics. She was one of the first to successfully sue for gender discrimination in promotion (at Brown University), after which she moved to a tenured spot at the University of New Mexico. It was a good locale for an anthropologist. They made a delicious supper, Peter cooking the swordfish to perfection, and we chatted for a long time. Louise convened our East Denver High School Class of 1958 gatherings in the Bay Area when she would visit each year, reconnecting me with friends who assumed I was dead. Once when a class mailing was sent to my mother’s address, it was returned “Deceased”, referring (I’m pretty sure.) to my mother.  

After supper I drove to my daughter’s a few hours north and east, mildly wine-deadened as I negotiated the two-lane backroads seemingly forever. When the white lines at the road’s margins are absent, it is terrifying to come over a rise, on a turn, facing the glare of an approaching car’s headlights.  Enough of those experiences made me determined not to drive, except locally, after dark unless on a freeway.

And to think, in college four of us would drive for 30 hours straight in a VW bug, all 38 horsepower, from Cambridge to Denver 3x per year! Two of those annual trips might include considerable snow, at Christmas and Spring Break. West of Chicago, there were only two-lane roads.  We were astoundingly fortunate.  If we travelled in the summer months, we’d often pull a few miles off the highway and put down a tarp in a pasture or another rural bedroom. 

It recalls the time in medical school I drove directly from NYC to Denver in 28 hours. I was doing a “driveaway”, delivering a car for an academic moving to the University of Colorado (Boulder). It was a small Oldsmobile. I had enough money for gas and for food or a motel, but not for both. The day before I left someone had been found cut up in bits in a bush in Central Park, so I wasn’t eager to sleep alone in an unknown meadow. Lots of coffee saw me safely home.

After sleeping at Ari’s, we drove to my storage space in Bar Harbor. Upon arriving, I realized that when I moved into my new apartment, I put three new house keys on my keychain and removed the two storage locker keys. Fortunately, I had a spare set at Ari’s so I dropped her and Pearl off to climb Parkman Mountain and I, feeling very stupid, drove two hours roundtrip to retrieve the spare keys. We then loaded some heavy family furniture into her truck, taking it to her home.  The next day we humped it up to the second floor of her barn.  I was amazed at how strong she is.  I am always surprised that I am not as strong as I used to be, despite being in pretty good shape for my years.

Returning to my storage space the next day I made 4 piles: photos, paintings, and kitchen stuff for my current apartment; a car-load to the Goodwill in Blue Hill; a much-reduced number of boxes to move to a smaller storage space near or in Portland; and trash bags full for the dump. The rodents ate and urinated a lot over the past few years, destroying a fair bit.

As little attached to possessions as I imagine I am, when I finally got out of a long shower at my apartment I was horrified to note that my bracelet, a macramé affair with 5 18C gold charms, was missing from my left wrist. I’ve worn it continuously since my first graduating class in Myanmar gave it to me two years ago. It must have slipped off when I removed my fleece, which has tight elastic cuffs. I did that here in my apartment, in the guest bedroom at Ari’s, and at the storage space.  The first two have been searched to no avail, so I’ll make the 3 hour trip up today, spending the night, to look for it.

I think it is an especially painful loss since my work in Myanmar was interrupted and much of what I enjoyed there is completely unavailable to me with the coup.  I continue to receive regular US Embassy Security Alerts; today US citizens are requested to leave 3 townships in lower Burma immediately because of the dangerous conditions. I know the bracelet is simply a symbol of the exchanges I had with my students, our mutual learning processes and our laughter together. Still, when I think of their limited financial means and the feelings they invested in getting it for me, I am upset. I still may find it, however.  It obviously also triggers my feelings of other lost attachments: mother, father, brother, marriage, son. memory, coordination, strength, endurance. Yikes!

Then I think of the Afghanis, the civilians in the country, and my self-pity vanishes.

[Note: I made the trip to Bar Harbor again and searched for the bracelet to no avail. In going through boxes I surprised two mice nesting in them. I baited 4 traps with peanut butter and set them before I closed up the space. If I had shed my attachments, I could have coexisted happily with them. Actually, come to think of it, I wouldn’t even have the storage space!]

6 October 2021

[Above photo:  The place, ready for winter.]

Michael and I left the island with ease, having loaded most of our baggage onto Stella at high tide the night before. My cabin is buttoned up with solar panel stowed, water drained, antifreeze in the drainpipes, old sheets over everything, floors swept, and plywood over all three outer doors. The vegetable garden has had lime pellets, blood meal, seaweed, and fabric spread over it, the latter for weeds. Firewood is cut, split, stacked, and covered with a piece of metal roofing to dry for next year’s fires. All the bottles have been taken ashore and I sprinkled a biodegradable poison around each of the outer foundation piers to discourage carpenter ants. The ridge shingles I replaced this summer have survived several storms.

I’m now in Portland in my apartment, which is excellent. It is the 2^nd (top) floor unit in an 1850’s house that the landlady has rehabilitated with insulation, new windows, refinished 15 inch pine floors, and attractive paint. I need to bring some of my own pictures (paintings, photos) to hang and purchase a hide-a-bed couch for my living room for visitors. Otherwise, I am very comfortable and anticipate a good winter.

I’ve located, with the help of Harold’s very generous and clever niece, a great bakery, THE bagel shop, the best place for fish, a dentist, and a car mechanic. I visited City Hall and changed the title of my car, registered it, paid two small parking tickets, got a neighborhood parking sticker, and changed my voter registration from Bar Harbor to Portland. Mainers in administration, I’ve found repeatedly, are pleasant, smart, helpful, and efficient. Nobody was surly. They are grinding their axes at home, or else someone else does their chopping.

The town of Portland hosts ½ the population of Berkeley, yet it seems larger and more metropolitan. I suppose it is older and was an important seaport for many years. I walked from my place in the West End to the other side of town, passing many interesting-looking restaurants, browsing through a used book shop and buying a few items at Reny’s, “a Maine institution” (No one was ill that I could see.). A stop at Standard Bakery yielded a croissant and an absolutely delicious marinated olive bread.  How I missed good bread in Malawi and Myanmar!  The walk home along the waterfront was quicker than I’d imagined. It’s a good walking town with many interesting old homes and buildings. Long walks, plus light weight work and the 7 minute workout from the NY Times, will keep me fit enough.

The above niece and her husband had me to supper at their truly lovely home in Cape Elizabeth. They were fun and friendly and the food was delicious. Their 15yo son, when he returned from a barbeque with friends, was adorable, showing me his gaming set-up which includes the computer he built last summer. It is difficult not to envy their domesticity and purpose: he’s an IT go-between for a large health insurance carrier, she’s an ER physician at Maine Medical Center. And both are parents of the 15yo and a daughter who is a sophomore in college.

Speaking of purpose, I’m looking for mine. My UNICEF gig ends at the completion of this month. I have offered to continue a consultation group for those therapists interested. I have also extended a similar invitation to my two child psychiatry training groups. I find that those in opposition to the military coup don’t want to be in the same group as those who are accepting of it (the minority), so I’ll do two different groups based on political opinions and actions.

While the child psychiatrists here are very welcoming, the child psychiatry fellowship at Maine Med has already assigned supervisors for the year so I’ll not find much to do there. I’m a little surprised because I suspect I am the most extensively-trained and experienced child psychiatrist in town, but I’ll move ahead deliberately and see how I can fit in.

Which leaves me seeking PURPOSE. I’ll keep my eyes open and, meanwhile, see if I can turn my Myanmar experience into something engaging for others to read. I suppose some might just enjoy the “Golden Years” and bless no deadlines or demands but I’m not cut of that cloth. I do look around and think, why am I rushing? I can spend every day exactly as I please, at the pace I choose. Unfortunately, it feels aimless to me, especially having just returned from helping to develop child and adolescent mental health services for an entire country. I suppose the sub-text is, also, I am without a mate to share the ease of this stage of my life so a good substitute is sharing what I have learned with a younger generation.

Speaker Pelosi’s skill and endurance in these toxic times is amazing. And Irish Joe not breaking stride, despite the provocations and temptations to fling down his glove. It would all be distracting from their important mission. And Zuckerberg stating he doesn’t value profit over children’s (or society’s) safety—who knew he had the capacity for such a wisecrack! And the earnest, moral, church-going mid-western politicians hiding the vast wealth of robbers from other countries in their states to provide…….what? Not a lot of jobs, I think. Maybe some bribes? Hoping some of that lucre will leak out?  Hypocrisy, thy name is Gop.  Really, I can think of types, not species unfortunately, of humans that I wish were extinct instead of the soft, harmless, seed-eating little birds we’ve deleted.

The Future of our Civilization, when I can bear to think about it, doesn’t seem rosy to me, although my immediate experience is very pleasant.

26 September 2021

[Above photo: Harvest moon rising, reflected in the harbor.]

Running last errands on shore this week I noted brilliant scarlet patches amongst the green of birch foliage and white spruce. Maples? Another year has passed and the gradual shedding of Nature’s cloak is beginning in Downeast Maine. There are so many reminders of time passing, including birthdays, that I want to hide all the clocks!  I’m 81! I don’t want to shed my mortal coil yet.

Three days ago I was doing a bit of desultory weeding in the garden when I heard a hummer over my back, very close to me. They have never approached me before and although they seem less skittish than at the beginning of the year, this was different. It hovered for a bit. I didn’t turn to look for fear I’d spook it. Then it was gone. And the same day all of the hummers left for Mexico; the feeder was vacated for the year. You may think this is sort of woo-woo of me, but I think the mom was acknowledging my steady hand in feeding her and her brood all summer. Saying goodbye, in a way. I’m a big one for not anthropomorphizing animals—or inanimate objects, like rocks—but I was moved.

I am probably ready to be moved, since endings are always a challenge for me. I attribute it to early endings in my life, like my father’s untimely death when I was 9yo. But, who knows the cause?  It isn’t unique to those with early loss to feel sad at endings.  I felt a single tear forming, which I squeezed back, when Chas and I drove away from 675 Bellaire Street in Denver in my 1936 Ford, “The Flower (of the Automotive World)”, leaving home for the first year of college. Incongruously, we had the radio on and a disc jockey was saying, in a break between songs, “Hey little girl in the high school undies”. (The correct title was “Hey little girl in the high school sweater”.) My loss at leaving home (and my mother) was soon forgotten at the prospect of meeting more age-appropriate objects of my affection. 

Leaving here, however, is leaving the only real soul-center of my family, since we have formed our own diaspora, including those departed for parts unknown. The tall spruce in the top of the meadow marks the site of the ancestors’ stones—my parents, my brother, my uncle, my aunt, my sister’s two husbands, her daughter’s husband.  It is grey and wet today, as it was yesterday, filling the rowboats and testing the shingles.

Michael and I pulled 3 of the 4 moorings, removed the pennants and mooring balls and tied ropes with floats to each, letting the chains spend the winter resting on the sea floor. We scrubbed the balls of marine growth before putting them in the field behind the barn. When we hauled the chains, they were heavy with mussels. Apparently, the green crabs don’t climb up the chains and eat them. It will be fun to set up a small, for local consumption only, mussel farm next year. Once set up, you do nothing until they are large enough to harvest, in perhaps 2-3 years. Mussels were abundant here until 5 years ago; small green crabs have efficiently swept the harbor floor and rocks nearby of what once seemed to be an endless supply. Steamed, with garlic, tarragon, and white wine, they are superb.

Next, we donned hazmat suits I purchased on Amazon, fired up our chain saws, and took down two large apple trees and three small and one medium-sized oak. All had been heavily infested with brown-tail moth caterpillars, giving those of us here in June and early July full-body itchy rashes. They are a plague on the Maine coast. The apples, by the way, are remains of wild root stock which had been grafted and planted here over 100 years ago. They were familiar and beloved by some, although not producing apples. But the caterpillars made them a hazard. I cut a small porch table for drinks from one log and carved a seat out of one stump for my 92yo sister to rest on as she comes up the hill for a visit next year.

I then cut most of the trees up for firewood. I was so exhausted that after tea and a piece of chocolate at 5:30PM, I showered and collapsed into bed. Awakening at midnight, hungry, I arose and toasted a bagel brought by my guest from NYC. Then slept another long dream.

The following day I spent a few hours splitting the wood with a maul and wedges, and stacked it under cover so it will dry, perhaps by next summer. Apple is beautiful wood, with a cream outer growth and a dark brown center; it is tough to split but wonderful for a fire. The oak split beautifully; I read it is better to do oak when green but most other woods when cured. It is one of those endless debates, however,—-wet vs. dry—with no end of experts, of opinions, or to the argument.

Ari came out for two nights with me. Ari has a generosity with food, leaving me delicacies and treats whenever she uses the house. She cooked a terrific chicken adobo for us one night. Then Jon and his collaborator on photography books, Jesse, with 9yo son, Rowan, were here for two days. They are from Wooster, Ohio, living on 7 acres with 7 or 8 different owl speces endemic. We zipped in Tern to Butter Island and climbed to see Tom Cabot’s bench and the view. Rowan was in his element, climbing the rocks like a goat.

Yesterday I kayaked to the rowboats and bailed the day’s rainwater from them. It was pouring when I did it, so I decided to enjoy the damp and circumnavigate in the little plastic kayak. The nearby islands were shrouded in mist; when they were visible it often was just their lower halves. The shores looked wild and serene.  I’m already thinking about next summer here, worrying that city lights won’t provide the view I desire.

A wonderful gift was the harvest moon, seen above, rising like a massive Valencia orange over a calm sea, another of Nature’s spectacles.  We are finally seeing documentation of how the oil companies—Chevron, Shell, BP— knew about global climate change and its causes 40 years ago, but hid the data. And their scientists’ predictions of the damages to come to the planet were spot-on. Shouldn’t the executives, those who made the final decisions about not sharing the information, be imprisoned? They have probably already killed many by draught and famine.

19 September 2021

[Above photo: Low tide at Harbor Beach under a dark sky.]

I retrieved Ari at Bucks Harbor Marina yesterday at 4:30PM. A group was filming a short feature at the dock so I had to wait a bit to land the boat. On our way out of the harbor, we could see that the sea was flat with no discernible wind, except that generated by Tern zipping over the water. Ari drove the boat.  The scene was beautiful and I felt so at peace, re-establishing my relationship with her and having the incredible luxury of travelling in comfort to our cabin on a lovely island.  Life can throw curveballs but this was a strike right down the middle. We combined efforts, making a delicious supper and talked and talked.

She is correct that my atheism left no room for the immense and astounding mysteries of life on our planet. While I cannot subscribe to a personal god who will respond to my prayers or my needs, there is so much beauty and intertwined complexity in our world, so much more that we do not understand than what we do.  I have often experienced an oceanic feeling when I am in Nature or upon hearing a particularly lovely piece of music. I cannot accept an anthropomorphized explanation of my sense of some greater intelligence yet something profound is at play. Certainly nothing that is spoken to a privileged few leaders in a church for interpretation to their flock. I can respect that others have traditions that are important to them, often passed down in families, that allow them to access a similar moved state. I guess it could be called “spiritual”.

Today is sparkling. A dry northerly from a cloudless sky is blowing into the harbor at 21 knots with gusts to 24 knots.  There is enough fetch so the waves are tall and breaking. The skiffs at the dock don’t have enough water to require bailing, which is nice, since my thumb is still sore from my last trip into the bilges head-first.  Ari and I walked around the island; Pearl, a friend’s dog, accompanied us. Pearl is quite a girl; there isn’t a stick or tennis ball she won’t fetch. She loves to plunge into the water and swim to retrieve a stick. She should be herding sheep amid the heather, as she is a border collie. Somehow, she has taken to water and is skilled in it. She is smart, as well, and loving of a challenge.

It has gotten cool enough that, despite abundant rains, the chanterelles are few. The birch are turning. The other night I heard an owl for the first time this summer. This morning the meadow and surrounding trees were flooded with songbirds, arcing about like bombs lobbed across a valley by opposing armies. It is a first for the summer; it has felt like Silent Spring here re. birds. Migrations must be underway and some of these birds are heading south from other islands. I hope my feeder, in providing an endless supply of glucose, isn’t delaying the hummers’ departure for the land of the loving tongue.

Ari is with me for a couple of days. The arrangement works well for us all. Next summer I’ll split my time between Portland and here, so the house will be more available for others.

As the civil war deepens in Myanmar, the National Unity Government having declared war on the Tatmadaw (military), I fear for my friends/students and all those occupying the moral high ground.  China has supplied the Tatmadaw with advanced weapons systems, including drones and surveillance software. Despite being only 5 ½ months out of Myanmar, my stay there feels like it was in ancient times.

As a result, I have decided to edit my Myanmar blog for publication. At least, I’ll go through it carefully and see if it seems of interest. Revisiting it will keep the experience alive for me. Writing seems like a useful winter pursuit. I feel some pressure to record the events of my earlier life, inner and outer, as well. It is amazing to have the time and leisure to do so.

As I prepare to present a bit about Orwell to the study group, I’m pleased to find my curiosity aroused. He was an amazing and complex man, stained with the well-known British prejudices—class, Jews, “Asiatics”, and others different than him—but struggling against them his entire short (46 years) life. That he died of tuberculosis in 1950 seems astounding to me, although isoniazid wasn’t introduced until 1952 and streptomycin only in 1949.  Reading Burmese Days for a presentation alerts me to new details and process, to aspects that I didn’t notice when I was reading it for fun about 1 ½ years ago while in Myanmar. It helps to have a goal, especially a public one, as an accompaniment.

It is a relief that Californians turned out for the recall vote. Our Supreme Court, generally held in high respect by me, is a partisan swamp. A significant number of low-lifes now inhabit those chambers. And why does one’s ego win over practical good sense, thinking of Justice Breyer and Senator Feinstein’s refusals to step down despite their ages and the stakes involved. Oh, we are a fragile, and selfish, bunch.