"A few days before he took his last, mercifully peaceful, breath, my husband, Ian Reinecke, looked at me intently and asked, Is there anything going on in the world I need to know about? No, nothing, I said as calmly as I could to the man with whom I had intensely discussed events in the world and at home for nearly 50 years."
"But the antisemitic massacre at Bondi beach, just a few hundred metres away from where he drifted in and out of consciousness, was too much. Please keep the TV off, I said to his carers. Don't talk to him about what happened. He didn't need to know that the place we had walked to several times a week, where he marvelled at nature's beauty and laughed with amusing people, had been desecrated."
A woman cares for her husband, Ian Reinecke, as he nears death, intentionally shielding him from distressing news. When he asks about events in the world she reassures him that nothing important is happening. She refuses to let carers turn on the television after an antisemitic massacre at nearby Bondi beach, wanting to spare him knowledge that the place they frequented had been desecrated. She experiences overwhelming helplessness amid global crises—violence in Gaza, war in Ukraine, Sudan's destruction, autocratic kleptocracy, and climate disasters—that make the post‑VE Day world feel like it is crumbling. The couple found small comforts in routine programs like PBS NewsHour.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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