Friday, February 18, 2005

Quiet times...turbulent times.

Quiet times recently: a week ago I had a tooth extraction, and have had a terrible time for a week, lots of pain, just feeling awful. I had forgotten what a shock to the system a dental extraction is - like an assault. Today, for the first time since before the event, I have energy enough for anything else than trying to manage the pain. I was able to read a short book, "Rain" by Kirsty Gunn, and listen to some music, Brahms' First Symphony.

This is a piece of music forever associated with my last year in high school. I heard it first while lying in the Botanical Garden in Wellington, New Zealand, in August 1968,just when the Russian tanks moved into Czechoslovakia. I was in Wellington for a selection course for the New Zealand Volunteer Servce Abroad [VSA] scheme. Those seemed like quiet days in turbulent times.

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