It’s very difficult to write about the self, particularly in these times.  So much has happened to so many people in this country.  So many tragedies, so much sadness on so many levels.  I feel the same closed tragedies I experienced with refugees I met long ago – refugees who didn’t experience the brunt of the holocaust, but – that inability to express what has happened to them.  It was like what Alona Frankel said about growing up in a closet – she didn’t know what was going on in the concentration camps, she only knew she had mice to play with and no one else for a few years.  

And yet with us the threat doesn’t end – our very existence is always under threat.  

So how can I complain about the fact that I don’t feel like cooking any more or my friends are getting old or something so banal?