As a summary, I put together some of the poems I wrote about the war. You can find them here.
oct 7 war poems
Poems – Dec 31, 2023 Read Post »
Family simches bring me to the synagogue now and then, and when it is an orthodox shul I always have a hard time. Sitting in the women’s section when I can barely hear and cannot participate always drive me wild, but today was a particularly difficult time because news broadcasts from the past months kept flashing in between the prayers. The guns of the soldiers below kept intersecting with lines like “He frees the imprisoned,” “He heals the sick….”
We keep talking about PTSD but i didn’t realize until this moment that I too am suffering from it.
prayers – dec 30, 2023 Read Post »
just a scene from every day life – haven’t got it perfect yet. I’ll put it away for a while and see…
The soldier before me at the pharmacists
shrugs his M16 further back on his shoulder
as he takes his prescription out of his fatigues
and hands it over the counter.
Mahmud examines the paper and says,
“It must really hurt, but I’m not sure we have
a cream with that degree of intensity.”
The meticulous pharmacist and the casual trooper
drop their voices and move closer together.
I can’t even hear that they whisper.
My turn is next, old-lady prescriptions
stocking up for the next 3 months.
“Do you really want all of this at once?” he asks
as if he fears I’m going to binge and kill myself.
I realize that I’m all disheveled and sweaty,
Perhaps seem even demented, and not in control
and he probably doesn’t even recognize me
from before the war.
The war.
I had forgotten for a time that there is a backdrop
to this scene, a screen behind us and a divide
between that makes even the simplest of encounters
obscene
draft – Dec 29, 2023 Read Post »
For the second time this year we went to synagogue at 7 a.m. on thursday to witness a grandson put on tfilim and prepare himself to become part of the male Jewish community. It was only announced the night before because thirteen year olds now have much more important things on their minds, but both of our kids proved they were at ease in the community, and remembered the prayers and what they were supposed to do.
There was dancing and celebrations – of course the women were watching from the balcony.
A grandmother would normally be sitting in the balcony enjoying the feeling only fulfillment – but I couldn’t stop thinking of the women in this war, how we are the victims in the balcony -and the men are making the decisions and determining our lives.
Of course that’s extreme – and the government we have now has lots of very vociferous women, almost all of whom I despise. But the women of Gaza are the ones above ground, while the men of Hamas are in the tunnels.
All right – I’m not making sense. I barely slept last night and I’ve spent the day keeping busy so I wouldn’t think about the internet and/or the war.
Just as I was about to press the last button that would finally fix my website connections this noon – after at least a month of chatting with servers and bots, watching incomprehensible videos for people with a language all their own, the internet failed for the neighborhood. The man on the phone promised someone would come to fix it shortly but the day has gone by and nothing has happened. Our afternoon and evening was constructed around staying home and rewarding ourselves with 2-3 netflix/Disney films/series. I had ordered groceries so I had to stay home. But now that we have called again to see why they have not come, they admitted that it will take time before they can make it.
You of course will know as soon as I get back online. I have – for the first time in a long time – written this offline and will post it. Even if it’s the middle of the night.
internet – dec 28, 2023 Read Post »
How can we take pleasure in the lessening of the rockets when we see the footage of mass graves in Gaza? It doesn’t ease our pain to know that every house there is filled with weapons of war. Who knows whether they were put there by the families, the kindergarten teacher or the doctors or whether they were part of the ideology of the household? Who knows if the body bags going into the ground are filled with people or rubble? who knows what the truth is? All I can know is that there are rockets that can kill us and can fall on us at any moment. So a moment free of that fear must be cherished.
And believe me, it is. Not out of self-induced ignorance but out of great appreciation of each moment of grace. So here today we sat at Manta Ray and ate fish from Jaffa and watched the waves and rejoiced.
pleasure – dec 27, 2023 Read Post »
I know it’s not over – but suddenly I wanted to find out how many rockets have been falling on us since it began in 2001. And wikipedia had the info
THAT MANY? How do they pay for so many rockets? How did we stay sane before Moshe Peres dreamed up the Iron Dome? As it is we get the shards that fall from the explosions, but somehow I trust all those boys and girls in the army who are spending years of their lives on keeping those rockets from hitting us.
Those kids are the same age as all those college students in the US demonstrating against us and calling for our death. How ironic.
how many rockets – dec 26, 2023 Read Post »
Christmas always reminds me of my childhood.
This year I remembered something about antisemitism.
My sixth-grade teacher, Miss Faye, was the perfect image of a storybook witch. She had dyed red curls, a long thin nose, and a wart on the side of her chin. But perhaps I am distorting my memory of her because she was the first antisemite I’d ever met.
In the class of about 25, there were four Jews. We were seated together on the side of the classroom near the back, and never called on even though we always raised our hands with enthusiasm. Since everyone was supposed to have a part in the class play, she had us learn a country dance with the music teacher and placed us at the rear of the stage so that we would barely be observed. No speaking parts, simple unflattering costumes, and hundreds of rehearsals that would take us out of the classroom during math. To this day I remember the music and every step, but I never learned long division properly.
Miss Faye stays in my mind – not because of her attempts to humiliate us, but because of her failure. We understood and accepted what she was doing and rode through it. The next year our teacher was a young man who opened everything up for us, as if he knew what we had been through. First, I learned that I had a voice. Mr. Cruikshank called on us, asked our opinions, and, when the class play came up, allowed us to submit proposals.
I wrote the play, with speaking parts for everyone.
a little antisemitism – dec 25, 2023 Read Post »
