It is the first day of the New Year, 2016. Outside, the sky is the palest of winter blues. The air is freezing and clear. Frost covers the grass and the roofs of my
neighbors’ houses are white. I’m taking
the time that the holiday affords to reflect on the importance of family and
friends. I’ve not posted for a few
months due to a very busy fall. Now, at
the beginning of 2016, I am excited to continue sharing ideas about living and
loving!!
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| The Hall of Mirrors, Versailles |
Near the end of the holiday season,
the potential of the new year, with all its mystery and excitement awaits.
Three weeks from now, my husband Jeff and
I return to Brazil. Three weeks ago, I
was sitting in the waiting room of a hospital in Portland. Over the past three months, I’ve helped my
sister-in-law combat breast cancer. Thankfully,
her prognosis is excellent but the process of getting back to health is time
consuming and painful. It has required
multiple surgeries. While many other
family members and friends have helped her, I’ve had the privilege of being the
primary support person during her treatments.
One of the rewarding aspects of my role is how much closer we’ve become. I am lucky in being friends with my
sister-in-law and it has been very very good to visit her frequently. I am completely at home in her house and hopefully,
I’ve helped her through a process that we all hope no one else has to endure. Breast cancer is no fun. As my sister-in-law says, “I hope I’m taking
this one for the team!”
I'm someone with the life-long privilege of being
surrounded by amazing women. Some of
them are part of my family – my mother and mother-in-law, my aunts, my daughter
and daughter-in-law, my three sisters and four sister-in-laws, my and my
husband’s female cousins – and others who are close friends. Many of these women have been part of my life
since I was a child, or, in the case of my friends, for many years. These women
mean the world to me. Together they have
helped me in countless ways – everything from surviving tough
times; teaching me to cook and raise healthy children; to helping me become an
engineer and a successful working mother!
All along they’ve listened to my sometimes trivial, sometimes gigantic
problems and always helping without passing judgment.
What a privilege these relationships are. If you ask me what one of the best parts of
retirement is, I will tell you it is something I never expected. It is having time to be with these fantastic
women – a quantity of time that I simply did not have when I was working every
day. Time is a tricky element. Time doesn’t expand or contract. It is a physical constant. The length of one hour is always 60 minutes
and the length of one minute is always 60 seconds. But what you fit into an hour or a minute can
seem either expansive or constrained.
Who hasn’t spent “forever” waiting mere minutes for an eagerly anticipated
event? Likewise, who hasn’t experienced
several hours passing “in a flash” when on an excursion with close friends or
family? In both situations, the amount
of time seems to change with the activity.
But of course the absolute time hasn’t changed. What changes is one’s perception. In retirement, having more time gives me new
opportunities to be with the important women (and men) in my life.
The role that women have played in my life is extraordinary. I cannot imagine my life without their sisterhood. As a teenager and young adult, I attended an all female high school and an all female college. Single gender institutions are more rare in today’s world than they were in the 1960’s. But the chance to be in an all female environment that supported and nurtured female independence – at a time when women’s liberation was a very new concept – is one that I will always cherish. My family moved to the United States in 1964. I was just 15 years old. It was a turbulent time in history – the Civil Rights Act had just passed – and a turbulent time in my own life – who goes through adolescence without trauma? During those formative years I struggled with developing my identity and independence, defining a career, adapting to demanding academic institutions, a new country and a shifting culture.
The role that women have played in my life is extraordinary. I cannot imagine my life without their sisterhood. As a teenager and young adult, I attended an all female high school and an all female college. Single gender institutions are more rare in today’s world than they were in the 1960’s. But the chance to be in an all female environment that supported and nurtured female independence – at a time when women’s liberation was a very new concept – is one that I will always cherish. My family moved to the United States in 1964. I was just 15 years old. It was a turbulent time in history – the Civil Rights Act had just passed – and a turbulent time in my own life – who goes through adolescence without trauma? During those formative years I struggled with developing my identity and independence, defining a career, adapting to demanding academic institutions, a new country and a shifting culture.
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| Jeff in the Place des Vosges |
With
help and friendship I not only survived - I thrived. The support
of my female teachers and professors, my mother, aunts, sisters and girlfriends
made all the difference. When I moved to
Seattle in my late twenties to do a graduate degree in civil engineering, I
carried the mantle of these female mentors in my heart. I’m glad I had such role models since at
that time there were virtually no women professors or students in my
engineering classes – very different from the smart female professors in my all women’s high school and college. Years later, as a
working professional and as a mother, the support and affection of my
girlfriends, sisters and sister-in-laws carried me through many stressful
periods. I remember feeling close to
complete collapse, returning from a busy day of work to a full evening of
single parenting – my husband traveled abroad a great deal during our happy
marriage. On such occasions, I would often take my two kids and walk up the street to my girlfriend’s house. We would literally impose on her for dinner,
or a glass of wine or just a moment of relaxation.
Similarly, I recall sharing the challenges of
being a working mother with my sister-in-law and my younger sister – hashing
out our stressful schedules from the privilege of being together. Of course it isn’t just the women in my life
that gives it richness. Let’s face it, we
need men too – especially if they are good cooks and fishermen like my husband
and son!
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| Fishing in the San Juans |
In retirement, I have the freedom to spend time with the important (men and) women in my life – go for a walk with a friend, visit my sisters, or, as happened these last three months, help my sister-in-law recover from breast cancer. Time is a gift. I try to use it wisely.
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| The Sky Mirror |
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| The Other Side |
The end of 2015 was full of many journeys - in addition to my trips to Portland to help my sister-in-law. I went to my aunt’s memorial service in London and visited with my English sister and many other family members; with my husband, my sister and her husband, I visited Paris and Versailles – where we saw the gilt and glory of the Sun King and Anish Kapoor’s amazing Sky Mirror; thankfully we left the day before the terrorist attacks -- we were lucky; others, equally innocent, were not.
Less than a week after my return, Jeff and I
hosted a traditional Thanksgiving for six Brazilian scientists and numerous extended
family – introducing BBQ'd turkey and pumpkin pie to a whole new group of friends; we
spent Christmas on Lopez Island where we woke up among the giant cedar trees to
see Christmas lights twinkling.
One of
the Brazilian scientists visiting the University of Washington joined us for the
Christmas holidays. We shared our family
traditions of Christmas cookies and Christmas stockings full of goodies. We started a new holiday tradition – setting out
crab traps and catching fresh winter crab for Christmas Day. We enjoyed her Brazilian tradition also –
making a delicious chocolate confection called Brigadeiros. Brigadeiros are small, bite-sized sweets,
something between a candy and cookie. They are easy to make with three ingredients, sweetened condensed
milk, cocoa powder and butter. The
ingredients are cooked together until thick and then cooled prior to being
shaped into small balls. At that point
the fun begins as each ball is decorated with something yummy: chocolate
sprinkles; coconut; chopped pistachios; peppermint sugar or other tasty
coating. Once decorated the Brigadeiros
are placed into individual fluted paper cups – and then of course the best –
they are passed around and enjoyed!
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| The Witt Winter garden at Washington Park Arboretum |
