Kevin Guthrie, “Haunted by Homer’s Sirens”

“Our son was in a tragic ski accident, and was in a coma for close to a month. And during that really painful time, we didn’t know what was going to happen. Was he ever going to wake up? Was he not going to wake up? I remember thinking about ‘The Odyssey’ and about the description of the sirens on the banks. Of Odysseus asking to be tied to the mast, and having beeswax in his sailors’ ears, and realizing I had these kind of spirits that were haunting me. In that context, I remember thinking very directly, ‘I know what those sirens are. I know what that’s about.’ At that moment, I realized the sirens were really from the future and from the past, and that in dealing with this situation with our son-the only way to deal with this-was by staying very much in the present.”
- Kevin Guthrie (Trustee; Founder/President, ITHAKA)