Flying solo

May 2 (or 3, in Vienna)

I'm on a plane, heading for Vienna.  And traveling without Ruth. Or maybe traveling with her. I'll find out.

Why Vienna?  Short version: in 1938, following the annexation of Austria by Hitler's Germany, a Jewish family sent their teenage daughter and son to the States. After WWII the Austrian government returns the confiscated factory to the family, and sister and brother return to Vienna to run the business.The sister has two American-born sons, one of whom chooses to return to North America for university. He marries and has two daughters. One is Claire, my daughter-in-love, who married Elie in October. Claire has been to Austria many times, and phones her grandmother two or three times a week. Next week grandmother turns 90, and Elie & Claire plus all her family are going to the party. I'm family now.

But, of course, there's more to it than that. Because when Elie asked Claire to marry him, he proposed that the wedding be in Vienna so that Momoo (that's what grandmother is called. I haven't learned why) could be there. So Ruth and I gladly put our Morocco plans on hold and started fantasizing Central Europe. Yes, Vienna!  And then what? Ruth said "I want to take you to Prague. It's beautiful and you've never been there." And after Prague? Berlin! And after Berlin?...

It's easy to plan and fantasize when you don't know.  When you don't know the situation. When you don't know of the tumour already growing and perhaps already metastasizing. When you choose not to know how fragile life is. And how painfully quickly it can end.

But you have to make plans. You have to make guesses. And when Vienna in June was suddenly impossible for Ruth, then Vancouver in October seemed like a safe guess. So that July Ruth had the pleasure of helping to plan the wedding. The wedding she was never at.

Or was she? Wasn't she present at every moment of that weekend, right there beside us? Just as she is present on this airplane, right here beside me. And as she will be as we travel to Vienna. And then to Prague. And then to Berlin.

If you choose to read this blog in the coming weeks, you can come too.

AR




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