1973. the perfect quiet. shattered. forever. we stood in the street. where to go. men disappear. women and children crowd into a tiny shelter i didn’t know existed. It’s over, I thought. today i suddenly had the same feeling for a moment. so hatima tova means much more this year than ever.
yom kippur – 20.9.26 Read Post »
Shabbat tshuva – the sabbath of repentance – and i celebrated it by taking a friend to a craft exhibit in the Muza Museum. She was delighted and Ezi was clearly bored. It wasn’t the art he was expecting – it was conceptual, ironic, and craft-oriented. A crocheted decoupage medieval tapestry depicting knights in battle, a roman-like mosaic of a woman snapping a selfie, a pile of walls of tiny houses entitled “displacement.” The humor was all over, as well as the tragedies.
Tomorrow I’m going to try to make another widow laugh.
Shabbat tshuva – 19.9.26 Read Post »
Today my role in the elections of october 27 was decided – when and how I can help out to ensure the voting is democratic. It’s a very very small role, but I love the idea of responsibility. And you?
elections – 17.09.26 Read Post »
first thing i heard in the morning was the discussion of today’s anniversary of the explosion of the beepers. The celebration in the voices of the little panel on the tv was apparent. “This operation will go down in history!” cheered the military historians. But after that there was no mention of beepers on tv. It was all about Netanyahu’s trial and the fact that the former attorney general, Mandelblit, had been called by the defence to testify. It is assumed that he’ll say that the police acted beyond his orders. So there was a celebration on the right. Then it was the turn of the left (and everyone I know) to vent savage indignation at the ‘settlements’ next to Arab villages in the north.
celebrations and anger – Read Post »
Sorry, I didn’t see the movie. and I didn’t interview soldiers about their orders so I don’t feel qualified to discuss Naza.
What my friends and I discussed today was ‘free will’ in Elizabeth Strout’s latest book, “The Things We Never Say,” and how much free will people have in today’s world. I was thinking about how I always felt safe and free in Israel when i first came. of course it was a delusion. But it was a sense of freedom.
Here is one incident I remember clearly. I was hitch hiking from Tiberias to Jerusalem and a man with his daughter picked me up on the road. As we drove we made small talk and suddenly he told me that is not a good idea for me to be hitchhiking around in Israel. Of course he was right. I don’t remember now at what point I realized he was Arab. But I have written about it at least once in these pages, it was the moment I realized I was taking my freedom way too far, that there are limitations we impose on ourselves as part of a dialogue with society.
But it has to be a reasonable society and there has to be a dialogue. And we have to know the rules. And sometimes we follow the rules for our own good.
Put this in the context of the movie.
disappearing – 16.9.26 Read Post »
Every since I’ve been in this country, the autumn has been full of surprises, most of them tragic. This year I am particularly on edge because I am aware of the past and terrified of the future. Yes, at any moment Iran could attack – and while I don’t like our behavior much either, I think of the clock that has long been in the center of Tehran that counts down the end of Israel.
And the holidays are particularly vulnerable.
At the same time the opportunity to see those we love and to have deep discoveries and discussions is amazing. Not the discoveries are always positive. Another friend has fallen into dementia and described to me what her life is now like, a friend who died in the past year left me her medications and through them I now understand what controlled her behavior.
I know I sound depressed, but I’m not – I’ve lived through another year in which I managed to survive a lot, and I know I can cope with a lot more.
But I really think we all deserve some good news, some happier friendships, some more love.
we really need a good year – 13.9.26 Read Post »
Did I forget to show you this poem of mine that is on the construction guard wall of the Weitzman Institute?
A birthday cake
Is a blessing
And a prayer
And a kind of poem;
Sweet words
Melting into
Each one of
those who share
In the joy.
Here.
Take. Eat.
A birthday cake
Is a blessing
And a prayer
And a kind of poem;
Sweet words
Melting into
Each one of
those who share
In the joy.
Here. Take. Eat.
אַ לעקעך צום געבורסטאָג
איז אַ ברכה
און אַ תּפֿילה
און אַ טעם פון א ליד;
זיסע ווערטער
מישן זיך אריין
מיט איעדן איינעם
וואס טיילט עוך
מיט פרייד.
נא. נעם. אס.
I wrote this in Yiddish first because a lekach in yiddish is a cake is also a lesson. The idea that the food you eat is also a means of communication is an important one for me. When today, for instance, we dip apples in honey, we are reminded of the necessity of actively making our lives sweeter through behavior.
This day of 9/11 is one too of the imperative of understanding our limitations and admitting to them. The fact that only now have we been given the truth about the ongoing damage to the air of the asbestos and other poisonous substances. We need to demand the truth for ourselves as well as for our government.
another chance – 11.9 Read Post »
So many friends have been expressing something close to despair at the state of the world and especially at the state of our country, and sometimes I agree. But then I think of the history of my immediate family, of how my parents escaped from Danzig by the skin of their teeth on the night before the invasion of the Nazis, of how my father probably had no hope or energy to escape after being beaten and left to die on the street. I’m sure my mother had to convince him that escape was possible, that another kind of life was possible. And they found themselves in England and were sent to a farm to raise pigs. The wonder and comfort he must have felt when the pigs learned to come to his window in the morning asking to be fed.
That moment of renewal – that is what I wish for all the world in this new year.
it’s relative – 10.9.26 Read Post »
