Small world

 

"Are you ok?" Eddy asked. He was calling me from Bonn Germany. I'd met him at a Ghana Embassy party and in a later stay in Bonn, Llara and I were guests in his home.

A World Airlines plane had gone off the runway at Logan Airport in Boston, where I was living. It was an airport I often used. I assured him we were fine, safe at home.

It's interesting, that when something happens far away, we immediately think of those that are nearby.

It happened last night with the Vienna shooting. My writing mate lives there. She was born in Austria, grew up in Australia, married an Austrian, lived in Paris and worked in Geneva across the street from me. For years, before she retired to Vienna, we never released any of our writings until the other had commented, sometimes working through the same piece several times together. I've visited her twice: once when it was so cold, it was possible to cross the Danube on foot or skate, once when it was so hot, we modified our activities. 

Before I could contact her, the message came through, "We are safe."

As a little girl who grew up in Reading, MA and seldom left even to go to nearby Boston, the idea of having friends to worry about all over the world was never in my imagination. 

Now with each attack in Damascus, I worry about my family of choice whom I've visited with but not often enough.

Paris attacks lead to wanting to check on the where-abouts of several friends who live there. London and the UK, the same.

St. Petersburg? Tatinia, who I met by chance in front of the U.N. led to her hosting us in the Russian city and giving us a perspective that would be impossible? Ukraine is where her father lives and a former colleague. 

Two former neighbors in Geneva, a mother and daughter, disappeared after the Haitian earthquake.

Sweden? Our ASM summer neighbor. And in another place in Sweden, Llara's school chum who joins us whenever we go to Edinburgh. 

In the States? -- Fires? Hurricanes? Virus? Former School mates, Colleagues? In times of crisis, their names and faces flash through my mind along with the fervent wish for their well being.

Maybe if I had never left Reading, these incidents would be less personal but remote events that were a "oh, that's too bad" feeling vs. "Is (    ) okay? 

This is not a complaint. Caring is the price of friendship. I am will to pay it.