Love

Today we had another fantastic day here in East Africa. We spent the day at our first distribution for one of the new parishes for the Carpenter's Kids. The village we visited was called Mzologe, and they are not yet linked back to a parish in New York. It was the first time that the children of this community received their school clothes, shoes, and mosquito nets.

Once again the community welcomed us with open arms, and we were greeted by virtually the whole community. Today's trek took us a couple of hours deep into the interior land along the Rift Valley. Upon arrival, we again were greeted by joyous song and dance. Everyone wanted to shake our hands and we happily took the time to meet each one. Young and old, the village excitedly swept us up into their music and dancing.

We later took a tour of the community including a giant windmill just outside of the boundaries. Unfortunately, it was a sad symbol of a government program in failure. The complete machinery was still almost entirely in place, but the long rods that extended down to the well below were broken. What had at one point brought water to the village, sadly lay broken and in disrepair, casting a sad shadow on the tiny country village.

Today we ended Faith’s life. She was, according to the records, 19 years old.

She had cancer and while still able to go up and down the stairs, take short walks, and eat two square meals a day (her favorite 8 minutes of the day), the tumors were at a point of not just being an annoyance. They caused her pain, and it was clear that as they were now spreading quickly, there was more of that in her future. And so we made an appointment and drove her to the Vet in the Palisades.  I was able to hold it together through the signing of release forms, and the initial wait in the entry, but when it was time to take her back, Gary and she went together for the last walk down the hall.

They tried to get her lay down on the floor, but she wanted to sit up, so Gary wrapped his arms around her and they administered the drug.  He said she peacefully began to breathe more slowly, until she was no longer with him.  He said she looked angelic.  The doctor left him alone with her and he said he lost it, beginning to cry, his tears spilling down onto the front of his blue t-shirt like drops of heavy rain. When he came out of the building, I was waiting in the car, and while we knew we’d done the right thing, the strong thing, the best thing for her – it was so incredibly hard.

In the French family, we sleep under quilts. Even when a duvet is involved, a quilt absolutely must lie atop it. We are used to the weight of them, and among the five of us, own around three dozen. Each one of these was handmade, stitch-by-stitch, by my mother. To get an idea of the scope of this, she quilts daily, and a single quilt takes over a year to complete. She does not believe in idle hands, or more precisely, cannot relate to them. Last year I found a melon-sized rubber band ball sitting on her desk, held it up to my brother and asked, simply, “Why?” “Because,” he said, “It’s what she does. She makes things.”

My whole life I have slept under one or another of my mother’s quilts, some of which were blue ribbon winners in the Bishop County fair. I dragged them to boarding school in Canada, college in Scotland, then Boston, and back to California again. During a Laura Ingalls Wilder phase, I began to pretend I was huddled up beneath one on the back of a covered wagon. I still like to imagine this when I can’t fall asleep.

You gotta love a guy like my friend Howard. On Memorial Day Monday at 10:30 a.m., I called him in Santa Monica from my bed in Sherman Oaks and said, “Whatcha doing today?”

“Don’t have anything until 4 o’clock,” he said.

“I don’t have anything till 6 – wanna go to Artesia and check out some of the Indian restaurants?”

“Oh yeah,” he said, “meet ya at the corner of Artesia and Pioneer Boulevards at noon.”

“Fab, see you there.” Jumped out of bed and hit the shower.

Next to the joy of eating a long, festive meal at a giant table surrounded by family and friends, my favorite culinary ritual is the food safari, an expedition off the beaten track in search of something new and delicious. My sister Jo will drive to the four corners of the earth with me to try a new pizza joint that we’ve heard is good. There was the 2-hour car trip up to Hartford with the old boyfriend, because we’d read great things about an old diner. And my very busy bud Peter managed to keep a lunch open last week so that we could go sample the hot dogs (five different ones!) at the new Papaya King in Hollywood.