Here comes the SUN~!

Cairo Trilogy; Getting past trauma can be hard; Morocco postponed

We’re still waiting for the Sun here in Michigan. But no matter what the weather man says or what the weather does, I know we will have Sonshine and Happiness this afternoon and evening when our Brilliant Son, his Brilliant Kids, and the Brilliant SIL and her BH arrive at DTW.

Let the Holidays begin! And then on Saturday when my Brilliant Sibs and their families will be in town the skies will be Blue! We’re going to have a party! It will be so good to see everyone!

I don’t know what I was thinking when I suggested doing a big story on Morocco on December 1 in the midst of all the Thanksgiving Week excitement. But the technological glitches are making me reconsider my previous schedule. I’m still excited about Morocco. I’ve wanted to do a big trip there for ages. Just looking at the possible itineraries is a whole post! I want to do it right, though, and not rush it.

I’ve been studying the history and culture of Morocco. It’s a subject that demands respect. My friend Dave Letts has provided some incredible photos and others have such interesting experiences that I want to be sure to cover it with the diligence it deserves.

I should have foreseen the demands of the holidays interfering with my Moroccan plans. But what I didn’t foresee was my birthday present from the BW.

Credit Creative Commons

We’re heading to Egypt! More details later, but we will be celebrating New Year’s Eve at CDG en route to Cairo, landing just after midnight! So I hope to be live blogging from the Air France Lounge as 2024 fades away.

We’ll be in Cairo for 4 nights, then flying south to cruise the Nile for a week below the Aswan Dam. Our Brilliant TA has got us all squared away on a Pharaohs and Pyramids trip. Thanks Sonya we are so excited~! And Dear Readers, I hope you’ll be traveling along~!

The first thing I’m doing in preparation is reading Palace Walk by Naguib Mahjfouz, Volume I of his Cairo Trilogy, winner of the 1988 Noble Prize in Literature. First published in Arabic in 1956, it is an amazing work “rich in psychological insight and cultural observations”… “told with great affection, humor and sensitivity, in a style that … is always accessible and elegant.” Boston Globe and NYT Book Review cover quotes.

I’ve been deeply impressed with how the Muslim religion pervades every aspect, every word, and every thought of the characters. The love of God, and the quest for his approval and mercies is a constant theme throughout the dialogue. It makes the reader understand and appreciate just how important Faith is in Muslim culture. Not just Sunday School faith, but a constant song in the hearts and minds of the people, seeking God’s favor, asking his forgiveness, thanking him for every blessing.

Before we land in Cairo I want to immerse myself in the religion, culture, and of course history of this incredible Egypt. So I need to spend some serious time reading. I think the Morocco stories will fit in better after first covering Egypt. So don’t worry, I promise you we will get to Morocco!

Do you like podcasts? I’m a huge fan of Dan Carlin’s Hard Core History I want to go back and listen again to his series on the Ptolemaic Empire. Carlin’s latest, The Mongols, Terror of the Steppe, looks incredible!

And I plan to listen again to Paul Cooper’s Fall of Civilization series on the end of the Pharaohs.

But next I’ve teed up Egyptian History Podcast: Ancient Egypt from Creation to Cleopatra.

I’ll be listening to it as I make trips to DTW to pick up our dear Family.

In the meantime I’ll try to stay in the moment, not the past or the future.

Yesterday I finished planting the tulips and putting up deer guards on some trees, then walked to the small dam that forms our little lake. The dark brooding surface of the lake was calm, reflecting low dark sky like a huge mirror. Then a white line appeared along the south shore, as if a giant white pencil was drawing a line.

The artist was a lone muskrat, swimming parallel to the shore, the straight white line of his wake moving towards the dam. He disappeared from sight, the line faded, then she magically appeared on the edge of the dam. I could almost hear her giving a sigh of relief after that long swim. She carefully groomed herself, checking constantly for any hawks in the trees above, not noticing me as I stood quietly observing. After a moment of consideration, and some hesitation, she plopped down to the pool a meter below the dam, then dove below the surface, looking for a snack. Then back up the bank on the other side, continuing now away from me on the north shore, once more drawing a white line across the lake.

The muskrat is living in the moment. Her life passes her by just as the lake shore, as she swims along, a constant movie of her life, drawing a thin line on the surface that fades away.

We, too, pass through life, swimming along the shore, the scenery of each day present for that moment, then fading behind us into memory. But sometimes the images are so strong that we can’t get them out of our memory. We keep going back to that point in time, back to that moment of trauma, perhaps. We just can’t move past it, even though our bodies keep swimming forward into new terrain.

Chapter 13 of Palace Walk, gives us more information on the character Yasin. Yasin can’t let the past go. His mother was a mistress of his father, and he no longer sees her, living instead now with his father and stepmother. His memories of his mother consume him. His all-encompassing love for his mother turned to anger that she had abandoned him. “He gazed back into the past with intense hatred and revulsion, but found he could not fight it off.”

Yasin can’t live in the moment. He can’t let go of the past, no matter what. The pain is too great. Now he spends his life fantasizing about every woman he sees and drinking.

The story made me appreciate how trauma can fix us in time, preventing us from moving on, from living in the moment. After my father died, my mother could not accept that he was gone. She lived her last years still clinging to the idea he was still around. She would ask me when I would visit her if I could take her to see him. And she didn’t mean his grave. It was easier for her mind to accept that he was somewhere else than that he was completely gone.

I hope dear readers that if you have had a traumatic event in your past that you can let it go and live now, in this moment, rather than in the past. Every day is a new day.

Thanks so much for the wonderful comments here on Substack. Our conversations have really stimulated my thinking about these things, and empowered me to share my thoughts.

It’s easy to say, “live in the moment.” But harder to do. No matter how busy we are this Holiday Season we need to let go of the stress and just be thankful for our families, friends, and the beauty of life in the present.

Thanks so much for traveling along~!