In Russia: part 2

From where I sit in the Harrisburg Int'l Airport, I can observe travelers getting in line for the security checkpoint. They seem to emerge mysteriously from behind a giant Christmas tree decorated in ornaments of blue, red and gold. From there they melt into line, dutifully check in their bags and head off toward their gate. I will soon join them. The boarding pass in the pocket of my fleece dictates that my journey will culminate in Russia.

Of course, it will not be my first trip to Russia, maybe not my last. But it is the first trip any of my family will make to a Russia without Shannon. Even though over the past 6 years we have learned to associate Shannon with Russia, and Russia with Shannon. This is the same for everyone who knows Shannon, who knew her - they all understand that Russia was the greatest part of her passion and her pursuit - and most of her life. This trip is intended to aquaint us with her family in Russia - those with whom she worked closely, the people whom she loved and who loved her in the same way we did - as a sister and daughter and aunt.

The remaining five of our family have dreamed of such a trip as this, but not under these conditions - and perhaps it is only these conditions that could unhinge us from our lives to such an extent as to make this trip possible.

In Russia: part 1

The first thing about Ulan-Ude, Siberia is the cold. We stepped off the S7 airliner into negative 39 degrees Farenheit. On the first breath in, the hairs in your nose freeze together. On the second you give a little cough. If you've brought enough clothes, the problem is not so much staying warm outdoors as it is, how do you cool down when you go indoors with 4 layers on? It seems like we spend half our time taking clothes off and putting them on.

The second thing about Ulan Ude is the fog. The city's heat is pumped all over town out of a giant coal burner. You can regulate it by opening the window in your bedroom. All the coal burning makes the air hazy and the snow a dusty gray. But if I lived here, I'd rather have the coal dust than no heat.

The third thing about Russia is that Shannon is not there. This trip is tough. My family goes because something is absent and missing - kind of like exploring the crater left by a bomb. We want to connect with what was and no longer is - in hopes of creating something bearable for the present.

Too Young, Too Old

It is a frosty December morning - Maggie (17 months) is walking on the sidewalk from the bustop to home because she is getting so good at walking and I'm getting so bad at carrying her weight. She is stopping to look at every little thing - part of a leaf that blows by her foot and gently scrapes the cement, a distant flock of geese cavorting about the sky - things that my eyes are too old to notice anymore. A tiny puddle of water enchants her and she crouches down to investigate, touching it gently with her finger.

I begin to realize why she prefers to walk these days, on our jaunts through town. To walk is an ultimate freedom - freedom to explore a vast world of mysterious objects. I am too old to understand this freedom, and too young.

It is a chilly December evening. We have eaten our fill of a holiday banquet and played silly reindeer games. We are standing around in our winter coats (dry-cleaned for the season, the cleanest they'll be all winter) when I get the chance to talk to Miriam who can no longer walk and for whom swallowing food is a daily miracle. Her eyes delight and disturb me at the same time. I get the feeling that there is so much I don' t know yet, am not old enough to know and have no right to know - about loss and freedom. Yet her beauty gives me hope that I may yet find it - that perhaps one day I'll know again how truly free I am to be able to walk on out into the night, under a cold black canopy that goes on forever, stepping lightly on a ball floating in space.