Why have I not spoken to many of my friends in the past year? Not only because nothing much happens to you that you can communicate, but also that talking to friends winds up being commiseration. And the commiseration turns out to be such mutual complaining that I wind up feeling sorry for myself. And there is no justification for self-pity when there are so many more serious problems to solve in the world. Let’s try to solve those problems instead of our own.

But what can we do? How can we help the people of Haiti or Turkey who need our help?

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Tuberculosis was almost totally stamped out before people started refusing to vaccinate their children. Now it seems that we’re going to have Corona with us for a long while because some people don’t believe in the vaccine. Some of them are in my family. There’s nothing to discuss because both sides are firm in their beliefs. One because of the body’s gradual natural resistance to disease and one because black people were experimented upon in the Tuskegee studies of 1932. I can’t really argue with the latter – it makes sense to be wary of a government that used a race for experimentation. (It also makes sense that everyone is getting the same vaccine so why not you) But the former one really scares me. There are too many things a human body does not learn to fight against. I keep thinking about Adelaide Crapsey, who was infected with TB at the beginning of the twentieth century. The cover of my book on her had the following poem

and if we want to go natural, we have to accept the fact that death is nature’s way of slowing us down.

My head is spinning from this government. I can barely remember what the ideology of this country was when I first fell in love with it. Sometimes it goes right, sometimes it goes left. Sometimes it is humanitarian, sometimes purely capitalistic. Sometimes we understand what we’re supposed to do to keep safe, sometimes it seems we are being sacrificed for the economy. No wonder people keep telling me we’re confused – we’re confused like lab rats always are. We know we’re being experimented on, and we don’t know what is going to be done to us, but for the moment we’re being fed well and it looks like we’re being cared for.

On the other hand, I know there are numerous inroads here towards easing the degree of the illness and minimizing the side effects – even though it doesn’t seem to be discussed in the news.

I never know what I’m going to write about before I start writing, and before I set down the title of today’s entry I had no idea that I would write about something so intimate and yet so universal. It began when I spoke with a friend I ran into that I had forgotten existed, and she too forgot that I had been involved in her life. And she had changed so much in the time since we met that we would never be able to connect again. At least not as we were.

And there are so many of us who are disappearing – losing connections that were important in our lives but have forgotten that we exist, just as we may have forgotten them. When we could have helped each other through so many of our challenges in the past 18 months. Let’s try not to disappear from each other – we need to stay together.

Even if we have nothing to say to each other, because nothing has happened today, we really need to keep the channels open. We need each other.

We don’t even photograph the sunsets. We’re so used to the amazing scene. My friends says our standards of fun keep getting lower and lower. So one Aperol spritz, hummus, and a salad — and my evening is made. Well, maybe watermelon and a little encouraging news – support to the medical staff, building permits for Arab towns, and few other perks that Bennet mentioned tonight. Maybe every little bit seems to help. But I cannot overemphasize how important that beach is for so many people at this moment.

My neighbor, the one I always identify in these pages as a graduate of Auschwitz whose degree was handed her personally by Mengele, constantly provides me with a perspective. Last night she was sitting outside as we came home from a very sweaty walk. Ezi ran upstairs to dry off but I always feel compelled to exchange a few words. Sometimes her psychotic fantasies are a bit frightening, and I tell her that even if this man comes out of her paintings and prevents her from painting, she is the one holding the brush and she can paint over him. But other times she is totally clear. Last night, for instance, she said – we really have nothing to complain about – it’s not like the Warsaw ghetto when they had to fight over a piece of bread and had nothing to keep out the cold.

I had been feeling really confined and depressed over the latest outbreak and Ezi’s lack of antibodies, but a few sentences with her turned my mood around. We’re okay – so far.

On the one hand, I am sure there are many people like us all over the world who have to be so careful they almost don’t leave their homes – so many people with the identical experience. On the other hand, our information about people even in our intimate environment has become minimal. We have friends who live two doors down and we can’t get up the energy to get in touch. Have you had that experience?

Even more, we are all dealing with climate changes, as well as some pretty extreme changes in government around the world. The fact that the Taliban are taking over parts of Afghanistan, that Isis is on its way back, and that Lebanon is falling apart and Jordan is barely hanging on. A little too much to take in one August.

And finally, if the half a million old folks in this country who have been vaccinated for the third time, succeed in proving that the booster works, we have hope for the world.