“Wow! You fell like a commando!” Apparently when I caught my foot in a little pothole in the parking lot I did something like a duck and roll, so only my hands and knees got banged up and I spun around onto my back and was up on my feet in a minute. In a way I was proud of being praised for my instinctual survival tactics, and after that we went to Dalita on 146 Ben Yehuda Street where I allowed myself to pig out on their amazing cakes. Highly recommended.
If we could all reward ourselves eually for every little injury we sustain life would be a lot better.
February 9, 2012
The signs were taken down today – they were all over the Sheikh Munis hill overlooking the old Petach Tikva Road – that this was an area of munitions dismantling. And no one talked about the implications. We tend to forget why certain Arab villages were razed after 1948. And then the evidence comes up from under the ground.
“So how are you feeling?” The biofeedback therapist asks me as she’s putting the pulse monitor on my finger. I tell her about our two-day struggle to get the reasons the health clinic decided against paying for Ezi’s Zevalin, our need to consult other doctors to make sure this is indeed the treatment he must have, and the fact that we’ve missed the date for ordering the stuff for another few weeks. “And you’re not terrified about Iran? Lots of my clients are terrified over Iran.” she says. “I wasn’t until you brought it up,” I say, “but I’ll think about it now.”
Because I’ve seen “The Big C” and other cancer comedies, I know that getting medication and insurance and stuff like that isn’t easy anywhere, but I really wore myself out today racing around with letters and tracking down doctors. I was walking our suddenly crippled dog at noon, after a tough trek to the hospital, wondering how I’m going to get her to take the medication her vet gave me last night, when the doctor at Ichilov called to say the letter I’d left him was now signed and I could pick it up. (That was nice because there’s a strike today) So I dropped off said dog and raced back to the hospital. But I couldn’t bring myself to park again in that expensive underground parking lot and trolled around until I found a spot on Pombadita street. It didn’t take much trolling and I knew my luck was with me. Even the five minute walk to the ward went quickly and I was home in an hour. So I took out the dog again (her bladder is shrinking and shrinking as her heart gets more and more enlarged) and we all had a nice beer-improved lunch. Ezi made a few more insurance-related calls and now I’m off to take the afternoon nap that I truly believe everyone should have every day but never get to take.
A few weeks ago I wrote about Women’s Voices and here’s the clip. They made me do it in Hebrew do I couldn’t look up from the page – the whole thing is worth watching but if you’re only looking from me, i’m about 5 minutes into it.
I knew she wouldn’t let me take a picture of her, so I didn’t even try, but I was pretty sure that you wouldn’t believe that Bracha Kopstein, the Yiddish poet, is 102 from the way she looks. I stopped by yesterday afternoon while Ezi was sitting at Dr. Zachs with drops in his eyes, and she made me forget all our medical craziness for a while.
To Karen Alkalay-Gut
Our connections at Maccabi have warned us that Ezi’s Zevalin hasn’t been approved. They say he’s not desperate for it. So the hospital is protesting it and we’re petitioning to get it approved, but anyway the chances we’ll get approval to order it by tomorrow so he can have it by the 23 are slim. The next order is in 2 weeks and by then who knows if his cancer hasn’t changed form.
At least the dog should be well. So we took Shusha to the vet, who gave her a shot and stuff and even gave us some injections to give her at home. And as I was paying him i mentioned that he was nicer than Maccabi. Then the vet swung into action, calling his friends to see if he could help us speed up the process, and eventually getting advice from someone who knows about how to go about petitioning…
In the mean time I too swung into action, stepping into the shop next door and buying a coat…
And now we’re off to the eye doctor,to see if Ezi’s cataract operation has healed. What do I care if the weather is incredibly foul, dusty and rainy and windy at the same time? I have a new coat.
The breaking news: Iran – ‘Positive steps’ taken during visit by UN nuclear inspectors (DPA)
I am nurturing a little hope that we and Iran can work on a joint nuclear plan together that will make the entire Middle East blossom. It looks to me like this might be a vain hope, but what with the Arab Spring looking like a total drought for all those who had wished for a new world, it might be time to hope outside of the box.
I wandered lonely as a cloud…well, Ezi was with me and took the picture:
It’s black iris time in the fields by Wingate and the weather today finally let us out to go look for them. Heavenly weather, Heavenly flowers.
They’re building the new ecological center at the university overlooking the road. It’s where the people of Sheikh Munis used to shoot at Jews and today the road (my favorite road because it gives an incredible view of Tel Aviv Ramat Gan and points west) was closed after old munitions shells from the Mandate were uncovered in the ground. Lots of them. Let’s see what more they find there…
Oh, and I read a poem to the Russians:
A cousin search
It is an old desire
The hunger to meet
A face like mine
But somehow wiser
And if he is not wiser
And cannot provide
News from long ago
I will give him my stores
My memories, photographs,
And who knows
A smile
That reminds him
Of where
He came from
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Here is the Kotel:
Years ago, when I saw people walking backwards away from the Wailing Wall, I realized that we had become idol worshippers and that stone was becoming too important to us. Today at the Wall, I was angry. I remembered how important that wall had been to me the first time I saw it, how it recalled the longings of generations of exile, and the new freedom to rebuild. And I was angry that the new fanaticism had cheapened the genuine feelings.
I actually had a great reason for being there. Wait For Me the Russian tv program that looks to unite relatives, did a shoot with me in front of the Wall, as I made a plea to find my cousin, Alexander Kaganovich, the only surviving relative of my mother’s family.At the end of my little speech, they asked me to connect my desire to meet my family with the place where we were standing, and I, always willing to please, talked about how “here, where the Jews place their wishes and prayers, I wish to be reunited ….” Oy. I mentioned my brother, my family, my husband and son in the frame, and they did not break down with laughter. Neither did I. Even though my little shtik was exaggerated, and on the border of comic, there was something deep inside that was serious to us.
Maybe the first time we laughed was in Abu Ghosh on the way home when we had a wonderful lunch at Nura, ordered from the menu.
