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.

When the news this morning announced that the ‘green pass’ was being instituted, I hurried to update my pass on the phone, and print out a copy to show in case my phone goes out. But my first stop, the arches shop in the sports center, didn’t demand a green pass. In fact, as I walked in, I discovered that no one was wearing a mask. It was only me.

Well, maybe when you’re exercising or eating it’s allowed, I thought, but when I get to civilization I’m sure I’ll be required to show the pass I managed to obtain with great difficulty. So I put it on the car seat as I went to enter the university.

But there were no rules there either, and no masks. Only at the museum, the only place we remembered that served coffee, did we find groups of soldiers, masked, and I almost breathed a sigh of relief, until I saw all the little children running around underfoot. No one asked me for anything all the way to the cafeteria, and we took our coffee out to the balcony.

By the time I got home, I realized that the whole ‘green pass’ business is just for the news, not for the street. And this means we have to STAY at home. Because if the streets aren’t being kept safe, we’re in danger.

we’re beginning to see – so far- the vaccines are not sufficient to stop the virus, that we’re getting it anyway. I don’t know what will happen with the third vaccine, but certainly the second one is wearing off. We’re not going the way of Britain right now because of the time that has elapsed since the initial round of vaccines, and the fact that they are getting sick, some of them seriously.. All this keeps me from rejoicing in any way.

The medical staff is exhausted. They have been overworked for almost a year and a half, and their dedication is taking its toll. When you get your vaccine, be sure to thank those people profusely.

Every time I would hint at a question about the partisans in the holocaust to my mother’s cousin, his wife would start to answer and he would warn her to keep silent. I only understood after many years that he was worried that the bravery of the partisans would be inverted to war crimes. Seeing this film made me understand that silence even more. And the reason my mother always blamed the Lithuanians far more than the Germans.