Who Am I?

I am reading Tom Robbins' Skinny Legs and All

the way I like to read a book: slowly.

Sometimes one sentence in a day, and the sentence bounces around in my head, ricocheting off of the day's experiences, picking up layers of significance, unveiling truths, the fundamental truth being

that eveything
is like everything else.

I'm beginning to realize that Tom and I share a religion. A pure, unstructured truth.

How I cried when, in the book, a son who lived rich and arrogant fell from grace, and went to work long long hours in a kitchen. The mikveh of greasy suds was so purifying, he found his wholeness, came home to himself.

2010 had in it flights of illusory grandeur and a hard landing on sharp stones. Scraped, I purified by taking on all the hours offered to me, working with beautiful, holy, frenzied, hungry souls.

Often my work is one on one, and the sheer totality of my acceptance transforms each of them into the angel he really is.

Today, I had eight boys together. You see, the classroom teacher's husband surprised her with a special weekend trip, if she could get covered.

What a a rich day of learning it has been!

Eyes constantly on wiry brilliant D to make sure he didn't bolt suddenly from the school, as has happened. Daveedy can recite a whole movie in Hebrew and in English, but try asking him his name and where he is supposed to be.
D stayed with us today. That was my only concern. And he stayed with us.

But what I really want to process for myself was the morning meeting. I was intrigued that the boys weren't able to tell me the name of the school, and all the more, that they didn't know what Eretz, what country we live in. Can you imagine living in Israel, and not knowing it? It's time to work on a "Who Am I" Book for each boy, and a "We" book, establishing some sort of identity for this odd grouping of boys (to my view they should all be in regular classes with help, except for L. who can never, ever keep from singing, his open, pre-verbal voice vowelling loud through the thoughtscape until we all live in its power, without even hearing it, until I can still him for a brief moment and the silence is clear water.)

We took attendance, and stopped at the names of the two boys who were absent, to send , from our hearts to theirs, wishes for health and for a happy return to school when they are well. At each present boy's name, I mentioned a kindness, an act of helpfulness or sharing from the week.

A. was thrown off kilter by me talking with all the boys at once. He usually has me to himself. He started burping and putting his feet on the table and acting silly, and the aide made him go outside to think for awhile.

What a nice oppportunity, when he came back, to talk about the possibility of change. He went outside to think, and there he remembered who he is. He is A., a boy who takes part nicely in group meetings.
Let me too take time out when I need to, and remember who I am.

Later, during the kabbalat Shabbat, when we lit candles and blessed wine and challah, A offered me a piece of his cake. A pure act of friendship.
Throughout the morning we sang with the guitar, and especially as we welcomed Shabbat, we all sang Hine Ma Tov U Ma Naim Shevet Achim Gam Yachad.
And remembered who we are.
********************
Return again return again
return to the land of your soul
Return to who you are
Return to what you are
Return to where you are born
and reborn again
Return again return again
Return to the land of your soul

The Last Moments of 2010

Mmmmmm, I want to savour every drop. I want to save this day. 9:00 tonight dinner with the Uruguay Wolbromskis, the Netanya Wolbromskis that is.
Let me delight for a moment in the wondrous connection between Staszow, Poland, and Netanya Israel: that of Yerachmiel's children,
*Golda came to Netanya in 1930 to build Kibbutz Mitzpe Yam (Kibbutz Look-out-over-the-Sea) where they brought in refugees from boats in the dark of night, until they moved the whole kibbutz community to what's now Yad Mordecai.
*Ruchel had a store here in the 40's. Her granddaughter and family are at U of T, and visit with Mommy and Daddy in Toronto.
*Shimon went to Uruguay after surviving the war hiding in Staszow. All of his children, the gracious Yossi, Tola, and Flora, and their families, live in Netanya. And that's where we'll be dining tonight, bringing in 2011 with our mouths full of chocolate fondue with Israel's amazing red strawberries, our hearts full of gratitude.
*******************************************************************
Tomorrow, Kibbutz Beit Alfa with Uncle Abchu's children, grandchildren and greatgrandchildren.
********************************************************************

A Post-Geographical Decade

It has grown upon us gradually,
fires on sequential hilltops
relaying news of the new moon,
terse telegrams I still have from our 1973 wedding,
and now
cozy Skype visits
right into the living rooms
of dear far friends.

I must visit my next door neighbour one of these days.
But first, let me Skype with Jayda,
share coffee with her in her Calgary kitchen,
whisper soul to soul,
enjoy her eyes, her curls, the gentle music of her dear voice,
slip the surly bonds of place
in this new, post-geographic world.

Shareful Genes

Rosh Hashana is about mending our character, returning to our original ideal image, teshuva. But January 1's New Year's Resolutions have to do with being right here on this Earth, being fit, (which means letting just the right number of the universe's molecules be inside this skinny envelope), and apportionning time, letting our actual use of the hours match our spoken priorities. Often, we find out after the fact, what our priorities are: I discover that my dialogue with Mommy and Daddy, Susie, Janie and Randy takes priority over everything (not dialogue, my hexagolog, if you include me in the six, that jolly original six from 47 Bowman Street). And my dear, deep conversation with Adam and Yoni who are of me. Stephen Pinker notes that the prioritizing of empathy can be directly mapped onto the number of genes shared. I guess I just unintenionally illustrated that very notion, in the fact that I will drop any other activity in favour of connecting with these people who most closely share my genetic information. Shareful genes.

Becoming Semilingual: An Oreo Oratorio

In the literature on wordfinding, and tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon, we have the notion of plate-stackers. In a university cafeteria, the plates are stacked in one spot as they are cleaned, and you take the top plate, right? So students are always picking up the most recently washed plates. Plates at the bottom of the stack are rarely used. Ever thus with our vocabulary. Words we use often are easy to think up. But I'm trying to think of the word for a little musical advertisement song.

The post that comes after this, (since it was written before this one, for such is the sequence of blog posts; they grow taller each day like a plate stacker or tower of Oreo cookies, one on top of the other. The freshest one is on top) contains, perhaps for the first time in all the pages of all the blogs in human history, though I'd have to check, the terms "oratorio" and "oreo" in one sentence. These came together in my attempt to explain that there is no pure passive grammatical form in Hebrew. A (((((commercial ditty)))))) such as "Variety, nice in cereal, Variety, nice in a wife, Variety, nice at the breakfast table, Kellog's variety, spice of life". What is that called?

The words that come to mind are

slogan

chant

ditty

commercial

I'll keep you posted, as it were, as I think of the word.

caption? no

Three years away from the English speaking world, and I've become semilingual.

Mashiach from the pen of Handel

Does the language we speak affect the way we think? I haven't had a moment to read all the back and forth on this question in the New York Times Opinion pages, (though Shabbes-Christmas does not entail unusual preparation beyond other Shabbats, and I ran a barefoot Christmas-eve run along the warm sunny beach this afternoon, often dipping toes in the cool sea. We feasted on a whole fish from the Sea of Galilee tonight. And think about this. I am minutes away from Bethlehem right this moment.)
But here is my illustration of language colouring the way we think. There is no pure way of saying "by" in Hebrew, as in "we were brought out of Egypt by Moses", or "that fish was caught by Beno", or "a painting by Golda", or "The Messiah by Handel". You have to say, "at the hand of", or "from the pen of". You have to call this glorious music, "The Mashiach from the pen of Handel", as if to say the music is there, resonating through sea and palms, over forests and snowy mountains. The music was there from Creation (from the pen of Haydn, that one). Yes, the music surrounds us. The white noise of seawaves carries every Oratorio, every Oreo chant. The only question is, when will each of us hold our pen gently enough over blank, welcoming paper, and listen for it?
Now, does this humble quirk of the Hebrew language colour the way we think of human accomplishment? I hope so.

Toronto or Victoria? And the answer is: Yes!

After teaching me so patiently
that borders are arbitrary
that shoreline, horizon
are notions,
not stone,
liquid meeting sky
in an infinity
of infinite, intricate,
infinitessimally minuscule
exchanges,
liquid meeting solid
in similar infinities,
now he tells me
that in real life
we have to come down
on one side or the other:
I will be here.
or
I will be there.
Until we get old,
he says.
The graying of hair
brings with it privileges.
Black or white decisions
recede
to the gracefulness of gray
the grace of gray
Victoria or Toronto?
Yes!
Let the reach of my spirit's hands
grow as I age
Let me grasp surely
and loving,
both horns.
Let dilemmas
be possibilities.
Let me step on the cracks.
Let me say
a liquid, formless Shehechiyanu
on this summery solstice day
of winter

Sunrise Beach Walks With Daddy in Bradenton

The miracle happened
in the sock department at Sears.
Wake up! Wake up Daddy!
They couldn't find a pulse.
Daddy on the shoescuffed
department store floor,
just after Thanksgiving,
that moment when giftshopping
becomes
"Shop 'til you drop".
Dropped to the floor
and they couldn't find a pulse.

Wake up! Wake up Daddy.
Little,
I used to shake him from sleep
for a walk before dawn
on perfect beach sand,
five-year-old child in slept-on braids,
and my Daddy, who always woke up for me.
Only the sandcrabs were up before us
and the waves tickling beach.
Together we studied the boundary
'tween sea and land,
discovered there was none,
really.

And the sun rose gentle
over sea's distant line,
and Daddy taught me
that horizon was just a word.
There is no line
and there is a line
and we call it horizon.
He told me that the sun
didn't really disappear at night.
It was just the angle of our view,
the limits of our sight.
That there was no sunrise,
and that there was.
Neither of us invoked the word
miracle.
We'd go back for papaya and waffles
with Albert and Jane
(each papaya is not formally a miracle.
nor even is a papaya seed)

Daddy and Mommy
bought a lovely pair of shoes
and had just arrived at the sock department
when he fell to the floor
and they couldn't find a pulse.

He didn't explain to the ambulance attendants
about the boundary between sand and sea
or about sunrises.
He didn't talk about papayas.
He just told them he's a doctor
and knows what he's talking about.
He didn't go to the hospital.
Daddy and Mommy walked home.
And this is the miracle:
That Daddy walked home.
That the sun doesn't rise.
And that the sun rises.
That there is no line
between sand and sea.
And that there is.
And that Daddy is lighting the Chanuka candles tonight.

The Dolphin's Waterproof Suitcase

Sura Ettele, my Bubbe,
where are your shtetl albums,
the poems you stitched
to the updown rhythm
of a footpulsed sewing machine,
your knee beating updown time
to the threading of dreams?

I have no photo, no poems,
no dainty yellowing lace,
only this:

That you escaped Poland
crossing a river to dry land,
two-year-old Izzie
at first in your arms,
then up on your shoulders,
and then, as the waters deepened,
Izzie swimming along

beside you.
That you and small Izzie
touched the other side,
not with the shirts on your backs,
for even these

had turned to mud.

There's no suitcase to look for.
You started again

with what you had.

And what you had was neat arrays

of double helix symmetry,
collective memories

of an earlier journey,
the crossing of the Red Sea;
a shared family faith
in the inventive, energetic
bringing on of miracles,
the body rhythms

of your sewing machine's poetry,
the pulse of the Song at the Sea.

And what did Miriam, sister of Moses,
pack
when she, before you,
left in haste? Skin of a lamb,
wrapped around

some precious memento?
One item I know she carried:
Her tambourine. Necessity of life:
a rhythm instrument
to stir the women to wonder, rejoice
in the energetic, inventive
bringing on of miracles.

They arrived, feet dry,
at the shores of the Red Sea.
And here I snorkel
this sunrise morning
in blue waves of the Red Sea.

I swim alongside a silvery fish
masked in brilliant blue,
a sunyellow circle
symmetric round each eye.

We swim in rhythm side by side
til my fish darts deep.
He swims to the future
without a suitcase.
The symmetries of sunyellow, blue,
the silver swishrhythm of his tailfin
are the stories he'll carry forward
to his children's children.
No suitcase,wheeled or otherwise.

(Dolphins did not need
to invent the wheel
or the suitcase.
There is nothing they need to carry
outside of their skin.)

Sura Ettele, my Bubbe,
I have no photoes of your early days,
your mother.
My heart stitches rhythmic connection
to our shared great great grandmother
Miriam.

But where is your tambourine?

In the back seat of the car,
me a little granddaughter in braids,
you would tap a rhythm on my knee
for me to guess the song.
And I always guessed the song.

It is Miriam's song, the Song at the Sea!
It is the story
that needs no photographs,
the narrative of my pulse,
a rhythmic, durable,
waterproof faith
in the inventive, energetic
bringing on of miracles.

Pictures and Letters from the Old Suitcase

Sura Ettele
my grandmother,
where are your shtetl albums,
your photoes,
the poems you stitched
to the updown rhythm
of your footpulsed sewing machine,
your knee beating updown time
to the threading of dreams?
What did you write about,
and what did you sew?

I have no photo, no poems,
no dainty yellowing lace,
only this:

That brides used to come to you
to sew for them.
That you escaped Poland
by crossing a river to dry land,
with two-year-old Izzie
at first in your arms,
then up on your shoulders,
and then
as the waters deepened,
Izzie swimming beside you.
That you and small Izzie
touched the other side,
not with the shirts on your backs,
for even these had turned to mud.

There is no suitcase to look for.
You started again
with what you had.
And what you had was
neat arrays
of double helix
symmetry,
collective memories
of an earlier journey,
the crossing of the Red Sea,
a shared family faith
in the inventive, energetic
bringing on of miracles,
the body rhythms
of your sewing machine's poetry,
the pulse of the Song at the Sea.


And what did Miriam,
sister of Moses,
pack
when she, before you,
left in haste?
Did she carry a backpack,
skin of a lamb,
wrapped around a few precious items?
What did a slave girl own?
One item I know she carried:
Her tambourine.
Necessity of life:
a rhythm instrument
to stir the women
to wonder and rejoice
in the energetic, inventive
bringing on of miracles,
and at the wondrous arrival,
feet dry,
on the other side
of the Red Sea,

the very Red Sea
where I snorkel
this sunrise morning.
I swim alongside
a silvery fish
masked in brilliant blue
a sunyellow circle
symmetric round each eye.
We swim in rhythm
side by side
until my fish darts deep.
He travels into the future
with no suitcase.
The symmetries of sunyellow and blue,
the silver swishrhythm of his tailfin
are the stories he'll carry forward
to his children's children.
No suitcase,
wheeled or otherwise.

(Dolphins did not need
to invent the wheel
or the suitcase.
There is nothing they need to carry
outside of their skin.)

Sura Ettele,
my grandmother,
I have no photoes
of your early days,
your mother.
My heart stitches
rhythmic connection
to our shared
great great grandmother
Miriam.

But where is your tambourine?

And suddenly I recall:
in the back seat of the car,
me a little granddaughter in braids,
you would tap a rhythm on my knee
for me to guess the song.
And I always guessed the song.

It is Miriam's song,
the Song at the Sea!
It is the story
that needs no photographs,
the narrative of my pulse,
a rhythmic, durable,
waterproof faith
in the inventive,
energetic
bringing on
of miracles.









,

Festival of Flame, and Flame Ravaging our Land

What then, is fire?
Blessing or curse?
One tiny flask of oil
lit the menorah
for eight nights.
A Miracle!
A flame is a blessing, a glow, a warmth, a gentle whisper that the Holy One is here amongst us, lighting our way.
And right at this same time, as we light the chanukiah and watch its sweet flames, three tonight plus the shamash,
flames rage through this beautiful land
destroying the trees
the trees planted by generations
of those who lived their hope
by sliding coins into a little blue box
that would plant trees in Israel.
What is fire? A blessing or a curse?
Yes

This helps us know,
there is not
"This thing is good"
"This thing is evil"
But
"To every thing there is a season
And a time to every purpose under Heaven"

Beans

No time to write. No time to write.

But maybe to write is the most important thing.

To ground ourselves, steady ourselves,

To right ourselves.

To be written.

Rashi writes, "Accept with simplicity everything that happens to you".

And Daddy goes to have his corneas checked,

knowing that the checking won't fix the corneas,

and that accepting won't cure,

but will maybe heal.

Medicine in old age

and perhaps in birthing too:

to know when acceptance

is the gift we can doula the patient towards.

In the same movie that quoted Rashi's "Accept with simplicity", a student didn't understand the Uncertainty Principle. "Even if you can't figure it out, you're still responsible for it on the midterm".

And that's what I say about meaning, and about meaninglessness, and about just about everything:

Even if you can't figure it out, you're still responsible for it on the midterm.

And Spread Over Us Your Shelter of Concrete

Right from the start, in the 1930's, beauty was an essential goal and job description at Kibbutz Yad Mordecai, and at most times you see the the mature and gorgeous patternings of a landscape planned not just for harvest bounty but also for loveliness. Flowers for the bees for honey, yes, oranges, lemons, sweet clementines to feed the kibbutz and to market worldwide, yes, but also bouganvillea and palms just to make this place pretty. But right now during Sukkot, when the Children of Israel build scant temporary huts with sparse rooves of treebranches spaced so the stars can peek through, Yad Mordecai is under construction, each kibbutz house a mess of concrete foundation stone and building supplies. The State of Israel is attaching a heavy concrete safe room to each and every kibbutz home. No stars shine through these ceilings.

A Sukka is our declaration of faith that we are sheltered, that a little snow and wind coming through the roof, or even the intense hot sunshine that comes through the roof here, is okay with us. We are of this windy world, and our faith sustains us. Couple that, here in Yad Mordecai, with a faith in our own ability to build concrete kassam-proof rooves over each family's home. Spread over us your shelter of peace. And give us the strength and wherewithall to build concrete safe rooms. And grant us the wisdom to live in the balance between faith and self protection.

******************************************************

to explain:

*Kibbutz Yad Mordecai is right beside the Gaza Strip. From the cowshed (where Mommy's nephew Tomer just doulaed the birth of a new baby calf on the first day of Sukkot, Tomer being named after the date tree (Tomer) planted at his birth, beside his twin brother's Erez tree, 32 years ago, and the trees bring shade and beauty to Shlomit and Dani's home today) .....from the cowshed you see right into Gaza.

*Mommy's Uncle and Aunt Golda first joined the proto-kibbutz back in Poland, and came here to Israel to build the real kibbutz. The alternative was to stay in Poland with their brothers and sisters, who all perished between 1942 and 1945. Except of course.....................

*Yad Mordecai was built in the 30's and 40's. When the State of Israel was declared in 1948, Yad Mordecai was not within Israel's borders!

*Gained militarily, evacuated, lost, regained, it is now in the area where Code Red is heard at erratic intervals, and kassams fall.

*On a personal note, Yad Mordecai is where I, Nomi, waited for Beno in 1973, listening to shellfire in the near distance, until he could get leave to visit, following the Yom Kippur War.

*And when Adam first joined the army, the very first job he was given was to guard Kibbutz Yad Mordecai.

Every Home is a Sukka

I live my life in temporary dwellings,
always glimpsing a star or two
through cracks in the branches
above me.
Heifetz explained
why Jews play the violin:
you can run off with it
when necessary.
It's harder to lug a piano.

I am always almost packed,
and not yet unpacked.
I stand on one foot
ready to flee.
Dwellings for me
are temporary.

This year,
let me sit solid in the sukka,
let me build it sturdy,
and porous.
Let ancient guests and new ones
enter easy
to this joyous airy house.
Let light and wind
dance through.
Let me build it strong but trusting,
and know that that since nothing is forever,
and every home of mine
is a moveable feast
I can sit solid,
symmetrical,
in this present sukka,
two feet on the earth,
smell the etrog's fragrance entirely,
wave lulav evenly
to all the wooden corners,
to the earth below my bare feet,
to the stars calling down through grapeladen branches.
Let my voice rise
through spaces between the pomegranate boughs
to harmonize with my sisters' voices
in other lands.
Let my soul be large enough
to dwell squarely on the sukka's earth floor,
with roots in heaven.

How Was the Fast?

Slow.

Not fast.

***********************************

Spacious. Long enough to think many thoughts. Long enough to see a big picture.

***********************************

That opposites are the only truth, and contradictions create the world.

That Yom Kippur is the most solemn day, and the happiest.

Most solemn, because we ponder, examine, wonder why we missed the mark in so many ways this past year. If we have the courage, we talk out loud to the people we are close with, and repair our connections. But I also value the purity of the brief exchange with so many dear people this year, that simply affirmed that we are clear and clean and fine in our relationship, no need to bring out or reexamine this or that small hurt. An assurance that any smudges in our page are wiped clean now, that we can proceed from here fresh.

And so here were are! The happiest day in the year! A day that declares loud and clear that change is possible, that we can be new. No need to say, "That's the way I am. That's the way this world is." Yom Kippur says, "Imagine yourself. Imagine a world."
********************************
On Yom Kippur we are more angel than physical being. We wear white, fast, don't touch the ground. Eating and drinking and driving and working tie us to the physical world. On Yom Kippur we're all spirit. Hmmmmm. On Yom Kippur we are so physical. The last bites of food before the fast are so very delicious, so grateful, so beloved, so important, so noticed, so savoured. The last sip of tea. And then, well into the fast, how we fixate on that longed for gulp of cool water, the sweet first spoonful of cinnamon rice pudding, the feel of hot tea in our mug and on our tongue. How physical this body feels, all longing, all need, all thirst, all hunger.
Yes, opposites are the truth.
Happiness and longing
Spiritual beings in a physical world, physical beings in a world of ideas, concepts, natural laws, feelings, words, poems and air.
Opposites are the only truth. Before opposites, was to-u va vo-u, the void before creation.
And ceaseless creativity said, Let there be Light and Darkness!
Let there be opposites.
Let there be a world.
****************************
How was the fast?
Slow.
****************************
Rosh Hashanah, Head of the Year. Rosh Hashana is all in your head. But now the Yom Kippur fast, that most solemn and most happy of days. that day of envisioning how whole we can be, is done. Now we can eat and drive and get out our hammers and nails and schach and build a sukka. And a good world

A Good Fast

Minutes before the fast begins, a shared fast here in Israel, that good feeling that whatever I'm feeling here and now, everyone around me is sharing in. The highways and roads are absolutely empty. Odd that part of the population goes to Kol Nidre, and the other large part gets onto bicycles, tricycles, strollers, skateboards, walkers, wheeled playpens, and all kinds of wheeled but non motored styles of transportation, and everybody is greeting everybody else and strolling, wheeling etc. together. The key is the sharedness of it.

There is a sharedness to the fist gently pounding the chest, as we chant in unison, using the word "WE" and not "I". For the missing-the-mark we have commited by ignoring a person in pain, for the missing-the-mark we have committed by being too happy, not keeping a tiny tear-shaped space or broken-glass-shaped space in our happiness for the many people who are hurting at this same moment. For the missing-the-mark we have committed by not being happy, because we are told that even our hard work and our pain we should experience with joy. We are here. We are alive. That is a call to happiness. For the missing-the-mark will all commit by not being able truly to feel each other's feelings.

ROSH hashana it's called. For the intentions and promises and hopes for the coming year are in our Rosh, our head. Let us try to bring them into the world of action, over the course of the year. But the very fact that these hopes are in our head, for now, is a blessing.

Grateful

From this week's Torah portion comes the whole idea of blessing, which really means noticing how grateful we are for the bounty of the land and the connections between us and the land. What are we, if we are not intertwined with the land, the grasses and the waters and the trees?

Adam and Yoni

A midnight swim in velvet waves, warmer than the air.

Yosef''s clear joy, being with two grandsons.
Yoni's delight in a newfound collection of Staszow nigns, the old melodies that were sung at the table, or to lull babies to sleep. Or to pray. And what do we pray for. Just this. Just this.

Figs near Yossi and Sally's in Zichron Yaacov

Spring 2009

Spring 2009

2010-03-30

2010-03-30

Beginner's Mind

I want to see my face the way it looked the day the world began.

I want to look with fresh eyes, no preconceived notions, no expertise, a tabula rasa,

blank and ready to be written on.

I want to be an empty cup, spacious, willing.

I want to open the ears of my ears.

What if all of us were to come together with Beginner's Mind,

and build a world?

Creativity, Ceaseless Creativity

That "Creation" was a creative act: we must keep this in mind.
Why am I not seeing an initiative like this here in Israel? (Though maybe it exists and hasn't reached my ears). This Sunday at 7:00 p.m. people of all faiths will gather at Centennial Square in Victoria BC. Silently. Not to discuss rationally the best solution to the crisis in the Middle East. Not to convince each other of anything. Simply to BE together, "to come together and pray for quiet and tranquility to allow a new consciousness to emerge".
Any act of creativity, I imagine, requires a stillness, a quieting of the noise.
Healing, I am beginning to think, health, and peace, are each acts of concentrated, open, purposeful creativity. But not personal, rational creativity. More, an opening to the larger source, of ceaseless creativity.

Sweet Molly Ann

In moments when I question my value and doubt my possibility, I jot in the corner of my to-do list, "Molly Ann believes in me".

Wherever she is, Molly Ann convinces me that I'm OK.

Human Being, not Human Doing

At the Winnipeg Folk Festival, there will be an opportunity to take a 25 hour break to be a "Human Being", rather than a "Human Doing", and to see the world as fine, just the way it is, for a brief time. What a brilliant invention, though not new. Shabbat!

Extraordinary Dailiness

There was a time when long distance was long distance. Last night Janie and Sunny and I had a leisurely visit, Janie and Sunny in faraway Winnipeg, bright daylight, and I in the midnight darkness of Netanya, night envelopping the ripening mangoes and the song of the waves. We chatted and visited, savouring the silence between words, and the jingle of the ice cream truck that sent Sunny running outside for treats. And back again to the screen so that I could share in the yummy ice cream cone. The magical auntie tax. ("Modern technology", Beno just piped in."Soon we won't need people".) The yummiest treat for me is that I can be ordinary with Janie and Sunny. That's extraordinary!!

Eretz

Today's Hebrew word is "Eretz", also pronounce "Aretz" (though suddenly I am pulled magnetically to change this to "today's word is "tov", mistranslated as "good", so I'll do that one next)
Eretz: the land. In the beginning God (read as "the ceaseless creativity of the universe, whatever organizing force juggles or paints or mirrors this universe into being) created the heavens and the earth. The phrase, "the heavens and the earth", ha-shomayim v ha-aretz, can refer to "the spiritual world and the physical world", so "eretz" here means "the physical world". According to Judaism, the physical world is one tiny tiny fraction of the world. The vast vast majority is the shomayim part, the world of ideas, dreams, history, future, interpretation, spirit, fantasy, principle, emotion, thought, hope. Physical world? Tiny.
Eretz. Earth. Physical world. The word "eretz" also refers to the Land of Israel, Eretz Yisrael. You would never hear someone say they are "b'yisrael", in Israel. Only "ba-aretz", in the land. There are two places to be: ba-aretz, in the land of Israel, and ba-chutz la-aretz, outside of the land of Israel. Honest. People travel to "chul", a short form for 'outside of the land", and they come back to ha-aretz. They come back. They always come back. Even if it takes them 2000 years, they come back to the land.
Eretz: land
Eretz zavat chalav udvash: A land flowing with milk and honey

Packing for the Red Sea

Off to Eilat, for some deep sea snorkling in the Red Sea. Funny, packing so effortfully, imagining wardrobes, picturing myself in this bathing suit coverup, these sandals, this sunhat, just when Lil Blume has invited Jewish writers worldwide to submit to a collection of "Letters and Pictures from the Old Suitcase". This, for a conference in Hamilton, where I grew up. So many suitcases since Hamilton. Off on a midnight bus to the Red Sea tonight, with a small suitcase. But what did Miriam, sister of Moses, carry to the Red Sea? What did she carry through the Red Sea, crossing on dry land, crossing in faith, wonder, joy? While waiting for my bus tonight, I hope to vision Miriam's packing. Backpack? Skin of a lamb, dried and and wrapped around a few precious items? What did a slave girl own? One item I know Miriam carried: her tambourine. The necessities of life: a rhythm instrument to stir the women to wonder and rejoice, at the miraculous arrival, feet dry, safe and sound, on the other side of the Red Sea, the sea where I will go snorkling, in my bright yellow bathingsuit with the turquoise, yellow and pink coverup, and turquoise goggles, carefully packed in preparation for wonder. Oh, and a tambourine.

Living Between the Lines

To my merely not non-entry, "I'm here",
Susan Boron responded, "I'm here too. Nice chatting with you. Sometimes words aren't necessary. Love, S"

The soul is always praying,
even when we're too busy to listen.
The heart is always singing
even when we forget the words.
And sisters are always
holding hands.

It was not my wordy stories, my sunlit photoes, that brought my big sister Susie to reach out loud to me.
It was everything she read between the lines when all I could say was, "Here I am". My heart thanks you for here-ing me, Susie.
The little prince asked the pilot, "Draw me a sheep". The pilot, a grown-up, tried and tried, but no sheep he drew was just right. Finally the pilot drew a box, with small holes. "There's my sheep. Look, he's gone to asleep"

I'm here

plain, wordless, but here. I tell myself to show up on the blog, even when I don't have words to say.

We Are the Children of Israel

I just discovered a very beautiful beginning I made, a while back, to this project of bringing a taste of Israel to kids who are planning a trip here. Please look at the righthand column and click on "view my complete profile". In the list of all my blogs, click on "We are the children of Israel". I must have written it back at Rosh Hashana, and I like it. More in a sec.

Eretz

The picture shows the dividing at the creation of the world, of "Mayim", water, from dry land. And that dividing line shifts and sways where I live, by the shores of the "Yam", the sea, that forms one long and dancing border of Eretz Yisrael, the land of Israel.

"Eretz", the land.

"Ba-Aretz" means "In the land".

In the Torah, this land is promised to Abraham until the end of time, and his children and grandchildren will thrive there and become as many as the stars in the sky and as many as the sands beside the sea.

"Eretz zavat chalav u dvash" it is called in the Torah, a Land of Milk and Honey.

People here talk of the whole world as two places. You are either: "Ba-Aretz", here in the Land, or "chutz la-Aretz", outside of the Land (and this implies a "not yet" - you have not yet arrived in the Land")

Eretz Yisrael, the land of Israel.

Shalom

For Tala and Jayda, in preparation for your visit to Israel, let's explore a Hebrew word each day. We begin with the word "Shalom". The same word is used for "Goodbye" and "Hello", because beginnings and endings are one and the same, birth and death being passages that share more similarities than differences. The central meaning of "Shalom" is Peace. Peace in a positive sense, not just a lack of division or trouble, but a palpable, created substance. The Arabic word for this is "Salam", the same word. To ask someone, "How are you?", you ask "Ma Shlomcha?", "How is your Peace?" From the same root as Shalom, we have "Shalem" which means "Whole". So "Ma Shlomcha?" could mean, "How whole are you? Are there broken places? Cracks in your sense of completeness? Inconsistencies? How is your wholeness? What needs mending?" Let each of us mend our broken parts, create wholeness in ourselves. Broken, we use people to fill our broken places. Whole and wholesome, we reach out with logic and love. And create peace. Shalom. And let us be there for one another, for it is from our brokenness that we connect. Shalom. Hello, Goodbye, and Peace.

Metamorphosis

Last night I dreamed I was a butterfly.
Or, is it that I am a butterfly, right now dreaming I am Nomi?
There is before benino, and there is after benino. And what was benino? All of the dream projects over the years seemed impossible to me, and I learned to relax to them and ride high to the skies. I learned to believe in the impossible. Sometimes the dreambutterfly lands briefly on your hand, and you can actually feel its powdery wings. I really did taste all those delicious bites, see those lovely plates coming out. Don't try to explain why a butterfly flies off again. Look! There it is, far off again.

I Am Here

Let love triumph.

Zikaron

May their memory give us strength. For a child in Canada, Remembrance Day was always about old old men with foggy memories of faraway places. Here in Israel, the dates and places are here and here. So painful, the ceremony by torchlight tonight, so beautiful, so very very beautiful, the music, a flute, a violin, a cello and a piano, the buoyant and so Israeli melodies. So sad, and yet in some way I am strengthened tonight. The seder at the kibbutz celebrated coming home to Israel after two thousand years of longing. Yom HaShoah said, "Never again". Never again will this people be unready, unequipped. Tonight, the sad cost of never again. And all through the day til sunset, a palpable silence in the land. Traffic on the highway will stop still and drivers, passengers, will get out of their cars and stand together in the middle of the road, all over the country. And then, in one sudden switch, the land will break into singing and celebration. Someone said on the radio that this moment of changeup from sorrow to celebration is the true emblem of Israel, more than the flag and more than Hatikvah, that unison moment of change from sadness to dancing.

Making Room

Much talk of chametz these last moments before Pesach. Chametz, that leavened, overblown, blown out of proportion, self-importance. The very item we bless at other times, that interface between what we receive from universe (plain grains of wheat, rye or spelt) and that so human, so creative, so proud invention, bread. We clean our houses, make a little feng shui space in our homes and our bodies and our heads and our hearts and our souls at this time. Because if there's no space, how will we hear the hagaddah? Let's go empty to the seder, hear our story as small children, be new.
I am inspired by Tzvi Freeman's daily offering. Of course, "God" here will be reinterpreted as the ceaseless bounty, ceaseless wisdom, and ceaseless creativity of the universe. Ceaseless though each of us may cease. Beginningless, without form or definition.
Tzvi writes, and think ceaseless creativity here:
Making Room
He is a very big God. As soon as you take up any space at all, there is no room left for Him.
But take up no space at all, and He gives you the entire Universe.

In One Dewdrop

"The whole moon and the entire sky are reflected in one dewdrop on the grass" Dogen
"......the science of dynamic systems, not static entities, enabling us to track the delicate structures and unifying principles underlying such complex realities as the irregularities in crashing waves, dripping faucets, waterfalls, heartbeats, and the collective song of your neurons." Rico
Each moment contains all of the moments of our lives. I see it so clearly today. I'm seeing madness on the small scale of our own lives, finding madness in the newspapers. Wondering if the human race is a two-year-old who was given the keys to the car.

I Just Want to Come Home

Sometimes I want to untangle myself from all the linguini,
and come home.

The Soul is Always Singing

Felt a tinge of longing, while connecting by pelephone with the spiritual centre of this world, Winnipeg. That's how I feel, at times. That "chul", an acronym for "chutz la-aretz", or "outside of Israel" carries a vocabulary of prayer that includes a blessing for Israel. (I'm thinking about that evocative line in Joni Mitchell's Circle Game, "Though his dreams have lost some grandeur coming true".)

"Next Year in Jerusalem" has defined us for so many centuries. Is there an element of, "OK, now it's this year and we're here. Now what do we hope for?"? Is it the sheer weight of living here, that drains one of the hoping? I don't mean the weight of outside threats. These exist only if you have time to read the newspapers. Honest. Everyone I talk to is wrapped up in rent and taxes. Which brings me to the pictures I've shown above. Look at the salad. Look again. Can you see a saucy, cheeky martini glass? I never saw it, the whole night that I was working on the photo as a possible logo photo for Benino. And yet the martini glass has always been a kind of a trademark of ours. The subconscious is alert to so much that we miss. And so, in this time that seems so materialistic, so hereandnow, so lacking in Winnipeg Silkenwine spirituality, my spiritual cup is still overflowing with prayer and with song....they say the soul is always praying, even when we're not tuned to its channel. Maybe the heart is always singing, the feet are always dancing, and we are always in sweet and connected conversation with our moms and our dads and our sisters and our brothers. Maybe that's why the Shma begins, "Shma!" Listen!!!!! Tune in! You know about oneness and about the deeperness of things and about the triviality of the worries that separate you from other people and about the mainness of connection. Just listen, tap in, tune in, and you will see that your soul is constantly talking about the Important Thing. Even when you think you are alone.

Running in the Rain with Daddy

A particular rainsymphony resonated me right back to Brucedale, where Daddy

used to call out, "It's raining! Let's go for a walk." I loved walking in the rain with Daddy. And I loved how tonight's rain invited me to run in it. And I love realizing that when Daddy and I used to walk in the rain, he was thirty. And that Susie and I, the prairie flowers, are now, ourselves, twice that age. Rain rains, time flies, and our ears remember every drop.

Havayeda 2010

It was amazing, seeing Sharon in Israel. Since she lived here as a twenty year old student, filled with youth and possibility and love of the land and the dream, she took on that same youthful energy while she was here. My life is rich, for having shared in Sharon's last Israel visit. In this land, footsteps are never erased.

Be My Valentine

I love you

I puv you

and I love today's sorbetto, between courses: an oh so refreshing lime, basil and mint sorbet.

Can I pen a line that isn't about salmon steamed in a bamboo basket with a whiff of lavender, or chocolate souffle filled with a cinnamon and chili scented ganache?

Can I talk of something other than the sun bouncing off the fountains and onto our patio tables by day, or the gentle candlelight glow over white tablecloths at night, and the interesting people from all over the world who come in to taste our cicchetti?

Can I talk of love? Of the sweet voices of Mommy and Daddy on the phone today, of reductionism and of the microcosm? What if, like William Carlos Williams, I have figured out that everything really does depend on the splash of campari in the red grapefruit sorbet, and that I now know more and more about less and less and will soon see the entire macrocosm in a single prism of sea salt glinting from my foccaccia?

Quality

It's such an amazing experience, to see high professionalism in action. Last night I watched a small kitchen in efficient tripletime frenzy, handing colourful Miro-esque plates of food to alert, attentive servers. A dance, a theatre show, a thrill of flavours. And at the end of an incredibly challenging evening, serving the very guests that are most dear and important to us, did the staff go home? Let me tell you, they shined the place spotless, and then sat down for an adhoc, on the spot, self-declared staff meeting, chefs and servers and bartenders and team manager, to go over every grain of risotto, every bump and every perfect warm chocolate souffle with a chili and espresso ganache centre served with our own vaniglia gelato on a hill of caramelized walnuts.
If this were a Bat Mitzvah, we'd say, "Ah! It all worked", and go to sleep. But Benino Bistro now setting the tables for Sunday breakfast.

One

"All numbers are multiples of one, all sciences converge to a common point, all wisdom comes out of our centre, and the number of wisdom is one".
Paracelsus
Listen!
Shma!

Parallel Worlds

26 below in Calgary. 26 above in Netanya. I guess it evens out.
Rona in Calgary is teaching first person fiction writing. I'll try first person plural writing. There is Nomi1 who stays in Israel to doula Benino to its opening day, and Nomi2 who flies to Calgary to be with Tala on her special day. Surely both exist. I shall write the full and fictional story in first person bifurcated.
I'll spare the details of how they cloned me, a cell of the heart, or a fractal of the neshama, carefully duplicated, one of me dressed in a tank top and sandals, the other in winter boots, same eyes, same smile.
Nomi2 touches down in Toronto, walks with Mommy to bring tongue sandwiches to Uncle Izzy, compares mythologies with Daddy, and then flies to Calgary, where Tala sings and the angels smile. (Nomi1 sends a loving blessing by video, and receives a movie of the whole event). Nomi2 is so proud of how Jayda has mothered and nurtured and her beautiful Tala, and of how Tala mothers Jayda when Jayda needs a mother. And she is bursting with pride as she sees the wisdom and glitter of Tala, teaching us, delighting us, comforting us in the awareness that Jewish tradition will continue through her generation and on to the next. And then, while Nomi1 is busy in Tel Aviv, Nomi2 is singing with Janie, artsand crafting with Sunny and learning with Shlomo and Justin in Winnipeg.
Dear dear friends and family in Canada, I hope you will understand. It is probable now, that I will be postponing my Canada trip, in the real world. But the delicious planning we've done together, and gorgeous generosity of your welcomes to me, are as real as real.
Nor Skype nor phone nor email nor blog can come near the sheer and ancient power of loving imagination, to bring me right into your arms and into your warm and welcoming homes. I love you, and will see each of you in a not too distant time.

Writing First Person Fiction

Think about the concept. Fiction, written in the first person. "I" is a fictitious character of my own invention. '"I" is?' I must be forgetting my English! Help! I'm semilingual. Due for a trip to Canada. Or not. "I" is due for a trip to Canada. I am a strange loop. I am loopy. "I" is going nuts tonight. "I" is out of my mind.

My friend Rona Altrows is giving a course on writing first person fiction. We are currently booked to "go writing" together in Calgary on January 29.

I booked my Air Canada flight way back in the summer. What prompted me was Tala's teacher's comment, "When Tala sings Torah, the angels weep". Jan 21 to Feb 10 was far enough in the future to be abstract, fictitious. And then Benino was conceived, with a projected opening date of December 15. Could I leave Beno and Benino alone a month after opening? I would decide, closer to flight date. And then the opening was postponed to who knows when. The place looked upside down, all sawdust and dream. This restaurant will never open, it felt to me. I'll fly to Canada and fly home to Israel. ( Did "I" say "home to Israel"? Has it happened? Oh, home is where "I" is. I am able to say, "I'll fly home to Canada for three weeks and then come home to Israel".
Now, suddenly, the restaurant is set to open on January 21. Maybe.
"Does that mean you're not coming? " Oh my. I'll sleep on it tonight. Air Canada tickets are changeable, with a small fee.
So here's where the first person fiction idea comes in: in the event that I cancel my trip home to Canada because I have to be home for the opening of Benino, I shall write the trip as a work of luscious fiction, that sweet loving feeling I have when Mommy pops in to 2406 in the early morning, to see if I'm up yet, and to tell me to come over for branflakes and coffee and Globe and Mail and CBC. I love those mornings with Mommy and Daddy at the round table, glassed in high above the snowy world, looking down over the planetarium. I'll write the story of my first hug with dancy acrobat Sunny, my tour of Shlomo's coin collections, my walk in snowy streets with Janie. I can Skype duets with Janie, read the Globe and Mail on my computer screen, hear CBC by internet radio loud and clear. I can imagine my trip to ice and snow, picture myself in all the scenes, see Picasa slideshows of Bitsy's new house, send my love, as I always do, to Larry and to Izzie. I can write the fictional story of my trip to Canada, if I don't make it. It will be a beautiful story. But sad.

Dreams Have Lost Some Grandeur Coming True

The road not taken, the choice we didn't choose, always seems perfect. Adam

points out to me that it's perfect because it didn't have a chance to be played out, to touch air, to be tarnished. A table never eaten at has no winespills, no creases in the tablecloth, no crumbs. Yoni points out to me that that unborn, unrealized untarnished event exists perfectly in the conceptual world, the world of ideas.
At conception, Benino was all grandeur, delight, a clean,and perfect dream. The menu was limitless, an infinite and sumptuous feast. Where is Benino now? The dream waits somewhere, hiding from the bang of nails into wood, the daily hagglings over this permit and that one, the dilemmas and the delays. Reality, when its birthing time arrives, will be more tasty, more filling, than all the perfect dreams in the world.
I love the world of ideas, that uncreased place where everything is possible.
But the physical world is where we live.
Dreams will lose some grandeur coming true, and the physical will never ever be exactly the way the dreamplan blueprint promised.
But reality is tastier.
And quenches the thirst.