Sometimes I think I should've called this blog Bed, Bath, and Beyond, though I suppose that's already taken.  There's plenty of beyond in my life--venturing out for meals, shopping (we picked out new tiles for the two bathrooms yesterday), visiting friends.  But bed and bath seem to be important markers of my day.  I've always liked a good siesta, but it wasn't as if I had to have one; now, when it's one o'clock or so my mind and body shut down for an hour or two.  And waking up, which has never been a struggle (I've never hit the snooze button in my life) becomes a long, slow slog.

Since, except for Mohamed, I don't really have any family, this is a time when friends are more important than ever and when friends have been unfailingly supportive.  Friends in Kansas City made my nine-day stay at KU Med full of good companionship and often good humor (at least as much as I could muster).  Jeanne, whom I've known for over forty years, flew to Topeka from Hawaii shortly after I got home.  American friends who live in Paris came shortly afterwards.  More friends came from California and Oregon. 

One thing that occurred to me in those first days was that there were a number of very important friends--not just casual friends but some of the most important people in my life--with whom the friendship was on "hiatus."  These were people whom I had shared years, decades even, with.  People whom I had loved.  And yet for some reason, our relationship had gone silent; sometimes 'hiatus' was an appropriate word, but sometimes, too, 'rupture' would have been more honest.  It had been easy to tell myself that I was a loyal friend who was still in contact with undergraduate and graduate friends, with students and colleagues from all the countries where I had taught, so that attrition in the number of friends was natural and inevitable.  But these weren't just any friends, and whatever the cause of the silence, it wasn't a good sign of my character that I let it persist, and not with just one or two people, but with five or six.  A few keystrokes, and the friendships were rekindled.  The conversations resumed.  Memories resurfaced.  There were new events and experiences to catch up on, but characters remained the same.  Loyal friends were still loyal.  Witty friends were still witty.  Conservative <shudder> friends were still conservative.  And all of them were still friends.

Whether face-to-face in visits to scenic Topeka or on the phone or via e-mail, whether friendships that date from the '60s or are more recent, whether close or thousands of miles away, friends have been the happiest of all my moments 'beyond' bed and bath.