Salon.com > Susanna Stromberg

Embracing death

Wed, 28 Aug 2002 19:19:00 +0000

It happened last December at a holiday party. I had mustered enough courage to go out into the world and meet new people. My fiancé had promised that if I started to panic, we could leave immediately. I took a deep breath, shoved my shaking hands into my jacket pockets and entered the party with a feigned smile.

In my previous life, before my baby died, I was a social butterfly. Now, as I stood in this dimly lit apartment, I found myself speechless and scared. What if someone showed up with an infant? After a quick survey of the room, I noticed that the closest thing to a monster was a heavily pregnant woman standing several feet away. My heart started racing but I decided to try to stay calm and wait out the evening. It had been months since we'd gone out, and I wanted to believe that almost five months after Anna's death, I could function in a social situation.

Everything that had transpired during my daughter's month-long life was still so palpable that I had difficulty stepping out of the nightmare and into the moment. Small talk seemed meaningless and false compared to the raw memories that I was still reliving: The sickening fear when I noticed she wasn't moving inside me. The emergency C-section when her heart rate decreased. The suction sound followed by silence as the doctors pulled my gray-blue unbreathing baby out of the small incision in my abdomen. The hushed whispers of the doctors as they worked to revive an otherwise stillborn baby.

To sir, with love?

Sat, 13 Mar 1999 19:53:00 +0000

"I fell in love with all of you." A candle in the middle of the table illuminated Professor Frankel's face, carving it with shadows. Closing his beady eyes behind thick lenses, he went on in a trancelike voice: "I feel like I know you better than you know yourselves. By reading your writing, I've stepped into the most intimate moments of your lives." His eyes opened. "I've walked around inside your minds."

My former classmates Astrid and Esther wore implacable expressions and stared off into the middle distance like wax sculptures. Professor Frankel -- whose name I have changed -- had planned a reunion for his favorite students and I had come to the restaurant hoping the other two would lend an air of normalcy to the evening. But I felt as uncomfortable with them present as I would have had Frankel and I been dining solo.

"Now, I am going outside to smoke," Professor Frankel said, rising from the table trailing his linen napkin, walking with the shuffle of an old man.

"He said that to me before," Astrid said, nonchalantly. "I just looked at him like he'd told me it was raining. I like to make him squirm."

This week in travel

Fri, 19 Feb 1999 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From the London Times
A group of tourists, fresh from the warmth of the Canary Islands, were detained in Britain for the odd souvenirs they had picked up in Tenerife -- more than 110,000 smuggled cigarettes. A few of the cigarette-toting travelers had gotten free vacations in exchange for their luggage space. The smugglers failed to declare their tobacco-filled suitcases, so now they have been ordered to pay 6,300 pounds in fines.

- - - - - - + From the South China Morning Post
The Berlin Wall was once a grim symbol of division, but to some it has now become a precious piece of history. A businessman named Erich Stanke is fighting with the city of Berlin to preserve the last remaining authentic section of the wall -- a 960-meter stretch he owns, which stands at the Potsdamer Platz border crossing. The city wants to get rid of the wall so an access road can be built. "The wall must remain; this is my only aim," Stanke said. "I'm broke, but it would be my greatest triumph."

This week in travel

Fri, 12 Feb 1999 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From theTrip.com
For all those passengers who've been stuck on a plane that's just sitting on the tarmac, your day of vengeance may have finally arrived. After travelers were stranded on airplanes in the Midwest for more than eight hours this past New Year's, the chairman of the House Transportation Committee has recommended that airlines financially compensate travelers detained for two hours or more. The recommendation is the latest addition to a passengers' rights bill filed by Rep. Bud Shuster, R-Pa. The new bill would require airlines to pay passengers double the amount of the ticket if stranded for two hours, three times the amount for three hours, four times for four hours and so on.

This week in travel

Fri, 05 Feb 1999 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From the Gay Financial News Weekly
It seems almost inconceivable that a promotion for a free seven-night stay at a luxurious resort in Jamaica or the Bahamas could be controversial. But this week Expedia posted a vacation offer with the following restriction: "Sandals Luxury Resorts policies require male/female couples only." Within six hours, after heavy criticism, the Sandals offer was replaced with a United Airlines vacation package to Park City, Utah. "We had no idea about the language on Sandals or the promotion," said a spokesman for Microsoft, Expedia's parent company. "Rest assured we do not support companies that discriminate." Microsoft has reportedly pulled the links to Sandals and is in the process of reviewing its relationship with the resort company.

This week in travel

Fri, 29 Jan 1999 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From the London Times
Wedged in between the wheels of an aircraft, a boy survived a five-hour flight from Senegal to France at an altitude of more than 30,000 feet and a temperature of 58 degrees below zero. Doctors say it is a medical miracle that the boy, who claims to be 15 years old, is alive. "Normally, five hours of brutal hypoxia would be enough to provoke a coma, then a cerebral oedema and death," said Emmannuel Cauchy, a specialist in altitude illnesses. The stowaway was discovered last week, in the advanced stages of hypothermia, when the plane landed at the Lyons airport. He is believed to be in stable condition.

This week in travel

Fri, 22 Jan 1999 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From CNN
In the name of safety, the Federal Aviation Administration announced on Wednesday that a new air traffic control system will be installed in all 20 U.S. control centers by 2000. Those monochrome displays, known as "green screens," will be replaced with 20-by-20-inch color radar displays that are less vulnerable to outages. The projected cost of upgrading the 30-year-old system is $1 billion.

- - - - - - + From theTrip.com
In what could be a sign of the times, another airline merger may be on its way. United Airlines has expressed interest in buying America West Airways just a month after American Airlines acquired Reno Air to expand its competitive base in the West. If United pairs up with the low-cost carrier, it could cut into Delta, American and Southwest Airlines' share of the market. The two airlines both confirmed that they are in talks, but would not go into any details.

This week in travel

Fri, 08 Jan 1999 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From the Trip.com
In 1998, none of the 615 million passengers of U.S. commercial and commuter planes died in an accident. Aviation officials cite their continuing focus on safety -- and the Federal Aviation Administration's pledge last April to reduce the accident rate -- as having contributed to the "zero-fatality count." The news comes just two years after a public outcry about the safety of U.S. airlines following the TWA and ValuJet crashes, in which 340 people died.

- - - - - - + From MSNBC
U.S. citizens living in or visiting Egypt were urged to take caution this week, after the U.S. embassy there received information of "imminent, unspecific attacks." Americans are advised to keep a low profile, and to treat this warning as more serious than the general region warnings issued in the past.

This week in travel

Fri, 04 Dec 1998 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From the South China Morning Post
The third earthquake to hit Yunnan Province, China, within the last two weeks left 20,000 more people homeless and 8,000 buildings toppled. Although no deaths were reported and only a few people were injured, the latest quake dramatically compounded ongoing relief efforts to deal with the 4,000 injured and 25,000 left homeless from the two previous temblors. "What we are mostly worried about is the weather, because once it starts snowing, the road will be blocked and the people will have nothing," said a relief worker.

This week in travel

Fri, 06 Nov 1998 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From CNN
The controversial practice of attracting sharks so that tourists in underwater cages can see them is endangering surfers and swimmers off the coast of Cape Town, South Africa, according to an article published in New Scientist magazine. "The sharks are getting the opportunity to find out that every time they see a surfboard there might be food around," said a shark expert from the Florida Museum of Natural History. "One day they will find out there is a human on the other side of the sandwich."

- - - - - - + From the Associated Press
Anti-Semitism is on the rise in Switzerland, warns a report from that country's Federal Commission on Racism. "Comments by various politicians and a few flame-fanning newspaper headlines helped to heat up the situation," the commission said. Also heating up the situation were recent accusations that the country acted as a "banker to Nazi Germany" during the Holocaust. One-tenth of the population shares these anti-Semitic sentiments, according to the report.

This week in travel

Fri, 23 Oct 1998 19:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From the Rocky Mountain News
Stating that it was acting "on behalf of the lynx," an environmental group claimed responsibility on Wednesday for the seven fires that ravaged Vail Mountain, the country's busiest ski resort, on Monday, causing $12 million in damage to three buildings and four ski lifts. The group, the Earth Liberation Front, wrote in an e-mail sent to local law enforcement, environmental organizations and the media that it was protesting the resort's expansion plan because it would "ruin the last, best lynx habitat in the state. Putting profits ahead of Colorado's wildlife will not be tolerated," the group wrote.

- - - - - - + From CNN
Pack a peanut, go to jail. Well, it hasn't quite come to that yet -- but those small, round, crunchy vegetables have come under fire from allergy sufferers, who claim they can cause life-threatening problems. Since peanuts are standard snack fare on virtually all airlines, allergic flyers want to establish "peanut-free zones" on planes, a proposal put forth in August by the Department of Transportation. But peanut farmers aren't buying it, and Congress isn't convinced either: On Wednesday it passed legislation requiring a scientific study of the nut's health risks before any more federal money is spent creating the zones.

Maiden voyage

Wed, 07 Oct 1998 19:00:00 +0000

People get lonely on ships. People get bored cooped up on a floating island the length of a football field with 3,000 strangers. People get lustful sitting in the cocktail lounge, sipping their second Bloody Mary at 10 a.m., with nothing but time, watching the wistful blond gazing out the window onto the aqua-colored glaciers as the ship floats by.

"Would you like another?" the cocktail waitress propositions, coyly, handing you a third, fourth, fifth drink before you can answer.

"What the hell. Charge it," you say with reckless abandon, pounding your fist on the table for emphasis, flinging your room key toward her with a flip of your wrist. You've got nothing to lose. You don't know any of the other passengers -- you've taken a cruise to meet someone, after all. In all likelihood, you'll never see them again. Besides, you say to yourself, what's life if you don't live it?

People develop a false sense of confidence talking to the bartender in the disco, leaning across the bar, dipping their fingers into the bowl of maraschino cherries, dancing with men twice their age, exchanging flirtatious glances across the room with Paul, the ship photographer.

This week in travel

Thu, 15 Jan 1998 20:00:00 +0000

- - - - - - + From ABC News
Honduras' latest growth industry is a bit "macabre," but it might be just what the beleaguered country needs. Ever since Hurricane Mitch pounded Honduras in October, leaving around 5,660 people dead, the country has been experiencing an increase in visitors. While the notion of foreigners flocking to see areas where so many people died might be seen as sick, Honduras' tourism minister, Norman Garcia, sees it differently. "Honduras could benefit widely from this 'macabre tourism,'" he said. "And that is why we have already started to design plans so that foreigners who want to come could visit and help us with reconstruction."