HOW I LOST YET ANOTHER FRIEND

“I won’t have anything to do with that vaccine,”

she complains, “Not just because I trust in freedom,

but you know I won’t put any substance in my body

that hasn’t been tested and approved.”

We are both old ladies. I don’t respond

with the same rapidity as days gone by,

and think first about how I used to admire

her wild way of being alive,

the liberty and ease of her ways.

And then I recall that at my age

I’m allowed to be rude,

And look down at my lap and say,

“What about all those guys you screwed?”

Today was the day I was planning to devote my time to organize my research and finally finish the paper I promised to submit about English Writing in Israel, make up for the glorious days with grandchildren But everything is down, even my email. Out of commission. I’m grateful that the university provides such protection – it is really needed these days. And maybe I can go back to my Arabic lessons.

I will return to this page when I see that my mail is back – just to let you know

Of course, I can’t figure out how in blazes President Biden determined the strategy of leaving Afghanistan, and how the evacuation chaos couldn’t have been foreseen. What worries me more is what is going to happen to the entire Middle East now that the extremists have a country of their own. And how we’re beginning to botch things up in the same way Biden did, letting out-of-sync people control our lives and future.

And Blinken is making a fool of himself trying to cover for his boss.

There was an NYT article the other day about how the vaccines have not cured covid in Israel, and we’re back where we started. I must admit I am more comfortable now that masks are back and everyone is being more careful. It was foolish to open things up totally, and it always made me feel more vulnerable. And stupid. I mean I was the only one not going out, fearful of meeting friends, buying only online. I don’t mind another year of being careful, but let it be a care that all of society takes.

On the other hand, we have to find ways to get past the sense of ageing and isolation that so many of my friends feel. Even my nephew today complained of the failure he felt for having to leave his father his dinner at the door of his house for the year before he died. How much did that age them both, do you think?

And now I visited with a friend who has been kept from her grandchildren for the past year. She has blown up and looks old and sad. “Will I ever return to myself?” she asked me. I looked at her and thought we have to find a way. A dance group, volunteer work, something significant… Any suggestions? Me, I’m getting a new car tomorrow. It’s my solution.

But the article in the Times is wrong. Things ARE getting better here, but we thought it was over and opened the gates…

I used to worry that our children don’t even want to learn about the history of why they are here. but when we mentioned the Palmach in dinner conversation we started to get speeches from the younger children about the organizations around World War one who tried to help the British against the Turks. Where did they learn it? Locked up on home with the internet and television.

a few months ago when Ezi and I were at Elma hotel in Zichron Yakov, we thought it so elegant and faultless as an escape from the daily problems that we brought the whole family there. The added safety measure was that for families there are these cottages separated from the main house, so the children, who had all been tested, would not really have much contact with the other visitors. And the food was as wonderful as I remembered. And the magical pool remained relatively empty, except for our kids.

The only problem for me was that I couldn’t connect to the wifi, except in public places, where I was happy to choose children over wifi. .and no one wants to hear a grandmother talk about grandchildren anyway, especially in this venue.

One of the things I was really looking forward to was taking the kids of the Aronson house. The history of the Aronson family is truly an amazing one – with many dramatic aspects. There was even an article in recent years with some of the details in Jewish week. And the boys knew so much of the background. But our guide, who we had booked in advance, turned out to be able to make the most fascinating story of the Aronson family into a speed course for remedial high school. It was like she took living people and buried them in rushed, boring sentences.

I guess history was just one other way we escaped this week from facing a world full of troubles. We didn’t confront the innovation, the heroism, the devotion to ideals that we so need to deal with the world of today. It was just another way to escape. I was so confused by the trivialization of the amazing people whose house we were visiting that I didn’t even have words to tell my children. These are people who tried to change their world, and to some degree succeeded. Even the tree that grew from the dates in Avshalom Feinberg pockets as he lay murdered in the desert or the poem he wrote to Rivka Aronson, “A Thousand Kisses,” show that the world can be altered even in failure. Just DO whatever you can.

Me, I’m going to start with this book about Sara Aaronson by George Wallace, The Woman who Fought and Empire.