The Snowball_ Warren Buffett and the Business of Life - Alice Schroeder [461]
Gradually the wracking sobs spent themselves. Then he began to talk about Susie. He cried quietly, off and on, for about two hours. He was afraid of what she was going to have to suffer through. She was stronger than he; his main concern was the pain she would face. He was even more worried that she might accept death as a natural thing and not fight it as he would. He was terrified of losing her. Assumptions that were part of the very core of his being had been upended. He had always assumed that he would never be alone because she would outlive him. He had always assumed that he could count on her wisdom and judgment to handle any life-and-death decisions that might have to be made. He had always assumed that she would run the foundation after he was gone. She would keep peace within the family if he was not there; she would see to it that Astrid was taken care of; she would resolve any conflicts, soothe any bad feelings. She would handle his funeral and shape the way in which everyone would remember him. Above all, he had been counting on Susie to be there for him at the end, to sit beside him and hold his hand and calm his terror and ease his suffering when death was approaching, just as she had done for so many others. For the first time he had to contemplate that it might not work out this way. But these thoughts were so unbearable that he could only glance at them before shutting them down. He was sure that her doctors would take care of her and that she would live. By the time he left the office for his bridge game, he was in a somber mood but calm and collected.
The next morning he flew to San Diego. At the Buffett Group conference, he struck people as subdued but not despondent. He presided over three days of meetings that included a dinner at the Gateses’ house, a talk by Bill Ruane about his project to improve the schools in Harlem, Jack Byrne on management succession, and Charlie Munger on the life of Andrew Carnegie, the great industrialist, who had maintained that he who dies rich dies disgraced. Howie Buffett dropped in to describe the motivations behind the photographs in his book, Tapestry of Life, which showed scenes of human suffering in impoverished Africa; Geoffrey Cowan, dean of the Annenberg School for Communications at USC, gave a speech entitled “From Young Idealists to Old Bureaucrats,” about the aging of the so-called Silent Generation, those born in the 1930s and early ’40s, which comprised most of those who were in the room.11
While Warren was in San Diego, Astrid was at the Canyon Ranch spa in Tucson, where he had sent her because she was so upset about Susie that he wanted her to get away to a place where she might be able to relax. She had never been to a spa before and resisted at first. Pampering herself at a swanky hacienda was like attempting a triple lutz to a woman who had never so much as treated herself to a pedicure. Astrid had no vanity whatsoever; she packed just a few T-shirts for her week at the famous resort. Handed a turkey wrap for lunch on arrival, out of habit she began to badger the staff about recycling and Styrofoam packaging. At the reception area, a nurse took her into a small office to design a spa and wellness regime for her. When asked how she was feeling and what concerns she had, Astrid replied that her concern was her friend Susie. The nurse apparently recognized that she was dealing with one of those women who focus on everybody else at the expense of their own needs. Gently, she steered Astrid toward relaxing treatments, like “healing touch.” Astrid took a couple of yoga classes, went on a bird walk, took some cooking classes, got a facial, had a couple of massages, and learned some golf. She groused about being taken care of but, to her surprise, managed to survive it, and found that some aspects of it were not so terrible.
Buffett