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many years on. One of those moments of generational wooziness that come with having kids, like realizing there’s a part of their lives you won’t see.
     
    We landed under searingly vivid skies, something like what the blue tablet from a packet of Easter dye lets off. The land right around the airport is farmed; we saw a man plowing with oxen. The fertility of Cuba is the thing you can’t put into words. I’ve never stood on a piece of ground as throbbingly, even pornographically, generative. Throw a used battery into a divot, and it will put out shoots—that’s how it feels. You could smell it, in the smoky, slightly putrid smell of turned fields. More and more, as we drove, that odor mingled with the smell of the sea.
    This was the first time I was in post-Fidel Cuba. It was funny to think that not long ago, there were smart people who doubted that such a thing could exist, i.e., who believed that with the fall of Fidel would come the fall of communism on the island. But Fidel didn’t fall. He did fall, physically—on the tape that gets shown over and over in Miami, of him coming down the ramp after giving that speech in 2004 and tumbling and breaking his knee—but his leadership didn’t. He executed one of the most brilliantly engineered successions in history, a succession that was at the same time a self-entrenchment. First, he faked his own death in a way: serious intestinal operation, he might not make it. Raul is brought in as “acting president.” A year and a half later, Castro mostly recovered. But Raul is officially named president, with Castro’s approval. It was almost as if, “Is Fidel still . . . ?” Amazing. So now they rule together, with Raul out front, but everyone understanding that Fidel retains massive authority. Not to say that Raul doesn’t wield power—he has always had plenty—but it’s a partnership of some kind. What comes after is as much of a mystery as ever.
    Our relationship with them seems just as uncertain. Barack Obama was going to open things up, and he did tinker with the rules regarding travel, but now they say that when you try to follow these rules, you get caught up in all kinds of forms and red tape. He eased the restrictions on remittances, so more money is making it back to the island, and that may have made the biggest difference so far. Boats with medical and other relief supplies have recently left Miami, sailing straight to the island, which hasn’t happened in decades. These humanitarian shipments can, according to the
Miami Herald
, include pretty much anything a Cuban American family wants to send to its relatives: Barbie dolls, electronics, sugary cereal. In many cases, you have a situation in which the family is first wiring money over, then shipping the goods. The money is used on the other side to pay the various fees associated with getting the stuff. So it’s as if you’re reaching over and rebuying the merchandise for your relatives. The money, needless to say, goes to the government. Still, capitalism is making small inroads. And Raul has taken baby steps toward us: Cubans can own their own cars, operate their own businesses, own property. That’s all new. For obvious reasons it’s not an immediate possibility for a vast majority of the people, and it could be taken away tomorrow morning by decree, but it matters.
    Otherwise, our attitude toward Cuba feels very wait and see, as what we’re waiting to see grows less and less clear. We’ve learned to live with it, like when the doctor says, “What you have could kill you, but not before you die a natural death.” Earlier this year Obama said to a Spanish newspaper: “No authoritarian regime will last forever. The day will come in which the Cuban people will be free.” Not, notice, no dictator can live forever, but no “authoritarian regime.” But how long can one last? Two hundred years?
    Perhaps a second term will be different. All presidents, if they want to mess with our Cuban