Blackbird singing in the dead of night

The first thing I thought when I saw him was,  "he's just a boy".  Being interviewed on Egyptian t.v., he seemed thin and pale, disoriented, but lucid. He seemed like anyone would seem being set free after 5 and a half years of captivity. He seemed real.


I didn't fight for Gilad Schalit. I didn't go to one protest, or step inside the tent set up in front of the Prime Minister's house even once. I didn't even take a yellow ribbon for him. This is partly because I don't do politics. I don't do slogans. I don't go to rallies, even when I truly and deeply believe in the cause. I hate crowds, and I hate dogma. But mostly, and shamefully, I didn't fight for Gilad Schalit because it was too painful. I couldn't stand to see his parents, his friends, his eyes. I couldn't fathom that this day would come and I couldn't bear the grind of days and normalization of the weight of absence. I couldn't stand the way the tent faded into the background, just another part of the Jerusalem landscape. 


The deal to free Gilad doesn't sit well with me. It doesn't sit well with anyone, I imagine. Its implications for the region are unsettling to say the least, not to mention the issues of ethics and justice. But then I think that human justice is so inadequate in any case; and that that the dead are dead, and nothing we do, or don't do will change that; and that I would like to think that the people I cared about who are lost to me now would rather Gilad alive even though they are dead. And isn't ironic that those who helped kill are now pawns in a deal to help save a life? May that stick in their throats and twist their stomachs and haunt them forever. And then I think, maybe there are some who are just going back to their families. Maybe they have mothers, and fathers and sisters and children. Maybe they have faces. Maybe they have room for peace in their hearts, no matter how unfathomable that may seem. Mostly, I think that life- a heart that is still beating- is always preferable. The world is so full of unimaginable things- both terrible and wonderful. We cannot know the future. We only have the world as it is. We only have a heart that is still beating. 


And I think, perhaps, that I prefer to live in this society- the one that took up Gilad's image as a symbol; the one the forced the government to keep its end of the deal- we give you our sons, our daughters, our fathers, our friends and pieces of our lives, and you give us the promise that you will do everything in your power to return them to us. I think I feel safer in a society that is willing to sacrifice potential safety for the real, concrete safety of an individual who paid way more than his dues. That's part of our social contract as well. Sometimes, we are not given the choice but to die for our country, but death itself is not a value. Sacrifice itself is not a value. Life is. But maybe that too, is dogma, and I contradict myself.


And then he stepped off that helicopter and I thought, "he's just a boy." He's just a too skinny, too pale boy.  But even that is patronizing. He's not a boy, he's a young man- a young man who spent too many years in the dark. He's not ours, and he's not a symbol. He's not justice, or injustice, safety, or danger. He's just him, whoever he may be, with his own hopes and dreams, his own terrors and demons; his own dark eyes. His suffering and his freedom belong only to him. I spent all day watching, thinking, isn't this a miracle, to see someone awake from the dead?  Isn't this a blessing, to watch a symbol become a person? This fragile thing. This life on shaky legs. We can stop watching now. The cage door is open. Let's let him fly free.

Don't know much about history

It's official-I have a master's degree in Jewish history. Graduation day isn't till June (Israel is weird that way), but who cares. I have that little piece of paper and that's all that matters. It's been a long road, and suddenly here I am. How odd. 

when will there be good news?

It's been a rough little while. But, there is good news. After over 6 months of radio silence, with me fearing the worst, I finally got an email from B. He is fine. His family is fine. They are overjoyed at the birth of their new state. Good news. 

Girl, you'll be a woman soon

I'm small. I'm  4'10" and weigh something about 35 kilo. Sometimes, this works to my advantage. In the kitchen it most definitively does not. Beyond the simple fact that certain things- like lifting pots and reaching the baking paper that lives on top of the cabinets- are more difficult for me, it also means that I have to fight for my womanhood. In the kitchen I am called- הילדה- the girl. Never mind that at 30 I am not the youngest woman in the kitchen by far. Exasperating the issue is the fact that though I am not the youngest woman, I am the only woman without children. Israeli society, more-so than American society from what I can tell- highly values motherhood and children. (This is not inherently a bad thing at all. Maternity leave laws here are head and shoulders above American one). When the rest of the women sit around discussing their kids, (and/or grandkids) the only thing I can contribute are niece stories and stories about my cat (which always makes me feel a bit like the crazy cat lady.) It leaves me a bit on the outside and a bit more vulnerable to being condescended to. 

In one of our first business management classes we were instructed to list our first impressions of our classmates and to say whether or not, based on those first impressions, we would buy from them. The point of the exercise, obviously, was to illustrate the way first impressions color our interactions with people. Upon further discussion of what we could do alleviate any negative first impressions that might keep people from buying what we're selling, I was told, point blank, by the teacher, "you need to gain 10 kilo."  I have had my cheek patted. Even the head of the kitchen, who I adore, upon seeing me in a skirt for the first time, exclaimed-"you look just like a doll!".


One would think that by this point in my life I would be used to this. But, up until now, my size has pretty not really been a factor in the work I do. Mostly I have spent my time using my brain, not my body. In the academy nobody is really interested in whether you have children or not. You could have ten, or none, so long as you get your papers in. So it took my a while to figure out how to deal with this new situation. I've come to learn that the way to deal with it is by working hard- by being the onion chopper, the potato peeler, the dole-er of food; by not leaving the kitchen until the last surface has been washed down, even after I've been dismissed. I try to be reliable, to be conscientious, to let the other women know that hey, this is my kitchen too. And paradoxically, by swallowing my pride and asking for help. I'd rather have someone help lift a heavy tray than spill it all over the place. I'd rather say, "I need to sit for five minutes", than do a half-assed job on the floor. I've learned to talk to myself in the kitchen like I talk to myself in the pool. Pace yourself. Pay attention. Breathe. 


It's a process, this.

Cubbie Watch: erm, we beat the White Sox once.

Book Rec: Faithful Place, Tana French

The Diameter of the Bomb

The diameter of the bomb was thirty centimeters
 and the diameter of its effective range about seven meters,
 with four dead and eleven wounded.
 And around these, in a larger circle
 of pain and time, two hospitals are scattered
 and one graveyard. But the young woman
 who was buried in the city she came from,
 at a distance of more than a hundred kilometers,
 enlarges the circle considerably,
 and the solitary man mourning her death
 at the distant shores of a country far across the sea
 includes the entire world in the circle.
 And I won’t even mention the crying of orphans
 that reaches up to the throne of God and
 beyond, making
 a circle with no end and no God.

-Yehuda Amichai (trans. C. Bloch)

Can I sail through the changing ocean tides? Can I handle the seasons of my life?

As the winter has progressed my life has settled into a predictable pattern. I spend a few weeks trying to juggle my various jobs, responsibilities, etc. until I finally manage to settle into some sort of schedule. Then I get sick. Then, once I recover, I scramble to play catch up, settle into a schedule... and get sick. I think this has been my sickest winter in a long while. (In fact, I am at this moment recovering from the cold from hell) Obviously something has to change, I'm just not sure what that might be. Right now I'm working  three jobs- two part time jobs (research and writing) and one uber-part time job (cooking- which is only 6 hours a week). Theoretically, if I work out my schedule right, I have time to do a number of things- swim, take care of my plants and kitchen and house. But of course that never really happens (see above) and I'm left wondering when I'm ever going to find the time to get my haircut, go to the dressmaker or host my friends for fresh pasta. The problem, I think, is not so much time, but the various stresses that come with each job. I am learning all at once to be a boss, a writer with deadlines and a feeder of people. During the course of one day I can go to work, make decisions about my colleagues' work (boss hat), field an email from annoying editor (writer hat) go home, write an article, (writer's hat, again) and then realize that the next morning I have to get up at 6:30 to go cook (thankfully that happens only once a week). Just writing about it exhausts me. I'm wearing too many hats. 
The boss job should probably go. It makes me anxious. I don't like making decisions that could potentially impact someone else's research and I don't like dealing with the higher ups. When I was just a grunt, I was just a grunt. The work I did got reviewed by somebody else (now, me) and the higher ups didn't know I existed, or if they did, they didn't care. Now, I've got vacation days and sick days, but I also have to worry about the fact that one day a scholar may call me up and tell me that I'm just wrong, or even worse, the dude in charge may call me up and tell me that my team isn't producing enough material, is doing a bad job, etc etc. The good news is that our funding runs out in September, and if on the off chance it is renewed, I run out in September, or at least that what I keep on telling myself. 
The writing and cooking are blog posts all on their own. In short, I think I like it. Both its. I'm learning to deal with annoying editor and I enjoy writing. Even silly inconsequential articles for kids have their value.   I'm also learning a tremendous amount in the kitchen - and not only about food. I'm surrounded by women whom I would have never met were it not for the fact that we work together. We come from such different socio-economic and cultural backgrounds. Mostly, I am very glad to have met them. Right now writing and cooking feel like the places I want to be. So I think I'm gonna stay.


Cubbie Watch: Spring training! Oh, time of eternal hope.


Book rec: Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell

Sometimes I get nervous when I see an open door. Close your eyes. Clear your heart. Cut the cord.

I had plans for my birthday. Big plans. Plans that involved not only celebrating reaching 30, but also the imminent conclusion of my thesis. It was going to be epic. (Ok, so maybe going out for drinks with a bunch of friends is not quite epic, but if you knew me you would concede- it was epic for me). And then. Then, I was sick. Miserably sick. Entirely too sick to celebrate. So, I canceled the party and crawled into bed, and thought, "well, fuck. What a year this is going to be."
I had a lot of time to think, lying in bed for the next four days. And most of what I had to think wasn't all that pleasant. Thoughts of my thesis made me feel anxious and thoughts of my future made me feel adrift. Here I was preparing myself to hand off 4 years of my life- a piece of my identity- without any clear idea of where I was going. Sure, I had ideas about what I wanted my life to look like in the future- but in terms of the next day- of, you know, the moment after I handed my thesis- I had no bloody clue. I was filled with this overwhelming fear that whatever I did the coming year would be as horrifically unbearable as my first year in Israel. I couldn't help but to anticipate that this coming evolution in my identity- from student to something else would be just as painful and lonely as my transition from America to Israel. So there I was, generally miserable and depressed, not sick enough to be unconscious and not well enough to actually do anything, meditating on the great wide unknown that was my life. 
Then I got an email a friend way across the ocean. (You know who you are). Masked as an email from the Chicago Cubs, it said: "We heard you had a cold on your birthday, so we went ahead and signed Kerry Wood to compensate."  I started to laugh and then to smile the way I hadn't smiled in days. Everything was going to be just fine. My boy Kerry was coming home and the world was right again. But more than that, absolutely more than that, the email was proof that whatever the year would bring, I was going to be ok because I have friends;  friends who would go out their way to make my world bright and steady;  friends who know what I love and love me. And when eventually I was well enough to celebrate I was moved beyond what I could express at all the people that came to sit with me, not only to celebrate, but just to be and to enjoy each others' companies and be friends; to fill each others lives. And that is a gift.
The email was also a reminder that the world is not quite as cold and confusing as I might  think. Yes, sometimes you send people you love back into the chaos that is Africa and you have no way of knowing if they are safe and well. Sometimes, whole forests go up in flames. But sometimes, a pitcher will turn down millions of dollars to come home. Sometimes, an organization will make room for that player, because it's the right thing to do.  These things don't always match up. They don't weigh the same amount in the weight of the world. A life weighs more than a game. A forest weighs more than a game. But, sometimes you are reminded in the small gestures of life that  the love you put into the world comes back to you. And that is a gift.  
These past few weeks of post-thesis life have been a gasping race of change. I have, in the span of three weeks (in this order)- taken a job writing for a small children's magazine, joined a micro-business program that helps women open culinary businesses, and accepted a (sort of) promotion at my current job. It's a lot and I'm terrified. I told a good friend that I felt like I was in one of those time-lapse videos that show a caterpillar turning into a butterfly is 30 seconds, and I'm pretty sure that doesn't happen in nature. I'm also pretty sure that my body is in an active state of revolt (don't ask me about my back). But. But. Come spring, (fingers cross, send a prayer up to the baseball gods.) Kerry Wood will take the mound at Wrigley. And as for me, I'm doing what I want to do. I'm cooking. I'm writing. My friends and family have my back. It's going to be hard, all this new, and it's probably not going to be pretty, or graceful. But it's time to fly.

By the way, dear, you know I"m never going to erase that email, right? Perfect. Absolutely perfect.


Book Rec: The Mockingjay Trilogy, Suzanne Collins

Cubbie Watch: Let's do this for Ron, boys

Thesis Watch

is done. 

I got a girl in the war, Paul, the only thing I know to do, is turn up the music and pray that she makes it through

After a little over 3 years here in Israel, B. and his family are returning to Sudan. Their decision to go home is a result of a number of things- the impending referendum on independence for Southern Sudan in January, some aid money from a charity organization, and the growing realization that they can't stay in Israel forever and that it might be better to leave voluntarily while the kids are still young than to be forced out when they are older. For a while I was angry at B. for taking his family back into danger. But it's his life, his family and his decision. And he  really believes in South Sudan and he wants to be there at its inception. It's his home and that's where he wants to be. Now, I am mostly very sad and scared for them. All the little (and big) things in my life right now pale in comparison when I think of this family I love making their way back to Africa and starting their lives there. B. believes that South Sudan's succession will go smoothly and even if there is a war, he will be far from it. I am not that hopeful. He also believes that one day it will possible for me to come visit them in Sudan and for his eldest daughter to come to university here in Israel. I can't imagine that future. Then again, there are many people who have, in their lifetimes, witnessed they never could have dreamed of. In the meantime, there's nothing I can do but pray. So this is my prayer:
I pray that your journey back home be without incident. I pray that humanity's capacity for kindness will win over its capacity for evil  I pray that you find your home as beautiful as your remember it.  I pray that the country you build will flourish and grow. May it be filled with peace and justice. May your rains come as they should and your sun shine on your faces. May you see your children be tall and beautiful. May you carry their children on your shoulders. And I pray that you will remember me and this country. Remember the bad- how hard it was to be asylum seeker here. And let that be a warning. But also remember the good- the kindness and community you found here and the laughter beyond words. I pray I will see your faces again. 
"I'll pray and then I'll sleep" (Marilynne Robinson, Gilead)

May all your wildest dreams come to pass.

 Music Rec: Girl in the War, Josh Ritter

Two hearts are better than one

This Thanksgiving I did not roast a turkey. I didn't make stuffing, or cranberry sauce, or pumpkin pie. My apartment was quiet and empty Thursday evening. Instead of hosting friends, this year for Thanksgiving I got all snazzied up, pulled on my slinky, sexy brown dress and with great joy attended the wedding of a great friend to the most gentlemanly man I know. It was a spectacular wedding- joyous and energetic and low key and suffused in love and good will.
So this year I am thankfull for friends, and friendship and love and the strength of will and conviction it takes to face the world with the absolute belief that goodness awaits.

Thesis Watch: In the hands of my adviser

Book Rec: Tender at the Bone, Ruth Reichel

When you're a stranger

When I first moved to Israel I was enamored of the produce here-tomatoes that taste like tomatoes! Cucumbers that taste like cucumbers! And most of all- seasons: artichoke season that comes along with fresh garlic and broad beans in the spring; two weeks of cherries and apricots in early summer; four months of strawberries and chestnuts in the winter. Then I went to Italy and bit into a piece of arugula and was spoiled forever.
I traveled to Italy in late July to meet my sister in law at the Jewish Studies conference she was speaking at in Ravenna. Theoretically, it would have been a good idea for me to attend the conference as well, but the idea of sitting and listening to people talk, even about subjects I care about quite a bit, just seemed like all kinds of wrong. So, instead, I did a lot of wandering, mostly without a map. I wandered through Ravenna, drifting into vegetable gardens and being gifted with a tomato straight off the vine. I ambled through Byzantine churches and Baptisteries, eyes upward to behold the most spectacular mosaics, shot through with color and detail and emotion. I spent a day at the beach (named, rather hilariously- Big Mama Beach- no, really.) and dipped my foot into the Adriatic, which I found to be disappointingly similar to the Mediterranean. (My Lake Michigan bred limbs are always bracing themselves for the shock of cold water. And I'm always slightly disappointed when it doesn't come.). I trekked into the heart of Pisa for a quick glance at that leaning tower and, when, after dozing off on the train ride from Pisa to Rome, I opened my eyes to such riot of bright colors and sea, I thought I had mistakenly wandered into a Monet painting. In Rome, having parted with my sister-in-law I met friends, and ate and walked and ate and walked and read and walked and ate and talked and walked and laughed and ate. Because, really, what else does one do in Rome?
I found myself, during all this wandering in a foreign country where I didn't speak the language, with a lot of space for my own thoughts. I did a lot of thinking. I thought about art. I thought about Moses's hand reaching down to stroke a lamb in the great mosaic at the church of San Vitale. I thought about how, in all of the mosaics Jesus' birth and death belonged to the women, and his return and kingship belonged to the men. And in the Galleria Borghese, I thought about Mary herself, the look in her eyes as she looked down at her son-full of surprise and joy and sadness- as if she knew from the outset what life held in store for her child. I thought about how moving I find religious art, despite the fact that I am not a Christian. And standing in front of Bernini's David, I could not help but smile, because I thought I recognized this David, with his concentrated poise and cocky frown, all drawn back and in mid-motion. This is the Goliath slaying David Michal fell in love with in the Bible. I thought about religion and power and exile.
I thought about myself away from myself. I thought, in a gray dress on the seashore, laughing with a sheepish, brown skinned boy as we tried to communicate with only a few words and our hands, that here I might be beautiful to someone, and more importantly, I might be beautiful to myself. I thought, running through the streets of Pisa with my sister-in-law, getting soaked to the bone by a summer storm, not wanting to say goodbye, that family is all the more precious when you are in a strange place. And, at the outset of our shabbat in Rome, during which we sat and read and ate and were quiet, watching the clouds and dusk gather over the rooftops, as my friends chatted in the dark room behind me, I thought, there is nothing more sweet than friendship. I thought that there is nothing more important than discovering who you are when you're not where you're from.
Last week, I traveled to Tel Aviv to take advantage of the mandatory vacation time that comes with the high holiday season in this country. I had planned on visiting the Museum of Art, which, to my great shame, I have yet to see, hit the beach and hang out with some friends. Instead, I ended up primarily seeing friends. It was lovely, in all the ways seeing friends are lovely, but by the end of the day I found myself slightly anxious and irritated and I realized that I had needed some time by myself, in an art museum; at the beach. I needed to be away from my life and all those familiar things. I needed to be in a foreign country for a bit and have that first sharp bite of arugula again.
On my way to Tel Aviv I ran into a guy that up until that point I only knew in the virtual world. I introduced myself to him and we laughed about the fact that despite the fact that we both live in Jerusalem and have many friends in common, we were meeting for the first time on a random bus in Tel Aviv. I asked him what he was doing in the city, and he said he was trying to find the beach. I told him that it's pretty easy- you just walk West- and we laughed about that too. Then I got off the bus and as I turned around, trying to orient myself, I thought, well, aren't we all? Aren't we all trying to find our way to that great, wide, open space?

Thesis Watch: Almost there, really

Book Rec: Beach Music by Tim Winton

Cubbie Watch: T. Colvin's scary vampire impersonation is pretty much symbolic of the whole season

What happens to a dream deferred?

The culinary course has been canceled. In fact, the whole culinary arts program at the college has been shut down. I'm not really surprised- the powers that be did delay the opening of the course three times before officially nixing it- so I caught on pretty quickly. To be honest, I'm not really sure how I feel right now. I suppose I'm angry at the college for slamming the door on a dream of mine. (Yes, there are other culinary arts programs in the country, but none of them are practical for my life right now). But mostly I'm feeling a whole lot of....nothing. I've been eking out the latest rewrite of my thesis, going to work, making my way through a large editing project I've undertaken and just existing, which is harder than it sounds. At some point I know I'm going to have to get off my butt and figure out a plan of action. One day my thesis will be done, the project will be finished and my job will no longer be relevant and I'm going to have to figure out where I go from here. Today is not that day.
What happens to a dream deferred? Who knows. But today I made roast chicken.

Thesis Watch: I'm entrusting you guys (by you guys I mean, all one of my readers) with the responsibility of never, ever letting me rewrite again. That's it. I mean it. It's the final rewrite.

Movie Rec: The Messenger. Ben Foster. 'Nuff said

Cubbie Watch: Erm, Carlos Silva?

can you hear the horses coming?

In a conversation I was having with a friend recently I described my emotional sense of self as being "like a cell waiting through osmosis" and I thought that that line was a lovely bit of unexpected poetry, but I had no where to put it. That happens sometimes. I had a snatch of something-"and all your colored horses come crashing to the ground"- rolling around in my head for years until it found its place. Writing's funny that way.

Thesis watch: I'd like to say it's done, but it's not.

Book rec: Lowboy by John Wray

Cubbie Watch: Yeah, I'm watching.

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree

This is my dream: One day I will own a little place called Innisfree. It will have a bright, open kitchen with a view of the sunlit garden. At the front, beyond the kitchen, it will be lined with rows and rows of bookshelves. There will be couches and chairs and low places for children to sit. In this little place I will feed people. I will feed their souls and their bodies. I will point them to books that I loved; that opened up new worlds for me. I will say, "Read this. Have an adventure. Fall in love with a fictional character. Understand the world just a bit differently." Then, I will hand them a sandwich, or a bowl of soup, or a plate of pasta and when they eat they won't think of Jane Eyre's Thornfield, or Hari's Damar, or Touqueville's America-they will think of no place but home.

In this past month I have taken the first step towards Innisfree. I signed up for a course in the fundementals of cooking at a local college. It's not culinary school and it's not a downpayment on a little bookstore-cafe, but it's a start and it's certainly a far-cry from everything I have been doing in my life up until this point. The reactions to my news from people in my life have been varied. I've gotten a "that's great. I'm so proud of you" (Surrogate mother, Carol.); a "I didn't know you were serious about culinary school" (real biological mother, Mommy); a "that's awesome, go for it" (sister, S. and friend, N.) and a "but you already know how to cook" (real biological father, Abba). For my part, I am excited and I'm terrified. Change is hard for me, especially when that change involves the actuallization of a fantasy. I'm afraid I don't have the financial wherewithall to pull this off. I'm afraid that I don't have the strength of character or stamina to survive in the kitchen. I'm afraid I will never learn a proper dice, overseason my stock, chop off a finger and burn the place down. I'm afraid I will fail. I'm afraid I'm not meant for this. I'm afraid of my own evolution.

So for the past few months as I have been contemplating this change in my life, I have been feeling alternately elated, and backed into a corner by my own fears. When that happens I often immerse myself in other peoples' worlds. I read a lot of blogs. I watch a lot of tv. I try to find places and stories that resonate with me so I can see some sort of reflection of myself. But sometimes the cacophany of other peoples' voices becomes too loud and it becomes difficult to hear my own. It becomes hard to express myself, to create my own narrative. So if I have neglected this blog, I'm sorry. I simply haven't felt the compulsion to write in a while. I have been too busy navigating the web of other peoples' words and trying to face down my own dreams.

Change is hard, man.

On to Innisfree

Thesis Watch: Evidently I was never taught how to properly write a paragraph.

Book Rec: Wolf Hall by Hillary Mantell

Cubbie Watch: Oh look, spring training! Oh look, we've lost Guzman for the season already. It's gonna be a good year. Sigh.

children get older, I'm getting older too

There's been a lot of change in the past month. I turned 29. My adviser returned my thesis to me. And my brother (plus sister-in-law and the four niecettes) moved to New Jersey. In the scheme of things it is probably my brother's move that is the most monumental, though it's difficult to feel from so far away and so far removed from myself. Birthdays happen and my thesis is inching closer to being done, just as it was a few months ago, but the change in my brother's life actually effects the makeup of our family. My parents are slightly hysterical about the fact that their grandaughters are now a two hour plane ride away as opposed to a two minute drive and I'm beginning to fear that Chicago as home won't be home without my brother, sister-in-law and those four little rascals there to greet me. I know I won't see them any less or be any less part of their lives, but I've always sort of taken it for granted that this story would play out in the place I know best and that home would somehow grow and age, but not change. The move necsitates a reimagining of the future and reevaluation of rootedness. As for my parents, this will probably change the way they relate to all their children. It is hard to know, now that we have all moved away from Chicago, whether we will be more adult in their eyes, or whether they will just hold on tighter. Who knows? I for one, am looking forward to now having to deal with my brother on his own terms. Until now family news has been, for the most part, filtered through my parents. Now, I'll have to get it from the horse's mouth. It will hopefully be a maturing of a relationship that should have grown up years ago.
As for my birthday, it was a birthday, low-key and friend-filled. There are more changes for me in the near-future. Once I hand my final draft of my thesis in, it's a whole new world- one that will hopefully include a job and culinary courses, but that's still over the horizon, west of the sun. One day at a time.

Book Rec: The Likeness, Tana French

Thesis Watch: There is nothing more tedious than editing footnotes

Thank you providence

I am pleased to report that this thanksgiving featured neither illness nor gas shortage; just good friends, good food and a turkey named Margaret (who, yes, was also good food, but since she was the main event I feel that she warrants a category all of her own).

As I said at the meal, I am thankful for thankfulness- that I have been instilled with a sense of gratitude that is not specified by its religiosity, but is rather secular and all-encompassing. Thankfulness is a great unifier. All of us, regardless of which deity or non-deity we believe in possess the ability to consider those things which we are grateful for in our lives. During my childhood thanksgivings in America, there was a sense (that is still with me today), that on this holiday as opposed to all the other holidays specific to us as Jews, we joined a larger mass of humanity in the celebration of thankfulness. And for this I am thankful.

Thesis Watch: It's in the hands of my adviser now

Book Rec: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Diaz

Stand in the place where you are

Every time I visit Chicago I engage in a small, personal ritual- the last day of my trip, sometimes just a few hours before I get on a plane I drive out to the lake and stand for 10 minutes, or 5, or however long I have, saying goodbye. The lake is always itself- shaded blue and green and brown under a wide American sky. On my left, to the north, the water stretches and flattens the horizon, reaching out to unseen places. And to the right, looking southward, the city is a grey silhouette, standing watch. I do not know how to describe the meaning of this ritual. It is inextractalbe from myself and without words. I leave you with pictures.

I'll meet you somewhere down the road

Last night I emailed a pretty much finished draft (sans edited footnotes and bibliography) to my adviser. Thesis watch: 72 pages including Appendix A. I am: relieved, happy, sad and considering having an identity crisis. What does one do when they've handed off two years of their life? Wait for feedback, I guess.
Now I am off to Chicago to see family and friends and to sit by the lake and watch the leaves turn.

Cubbie Watch: The eternal cry-Next Year! (can we have Kerry back please?)

Book Rec: The Miss Hempel Chronicles, Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum

walk through the fire

This is not the post I had intended to write. I had been planning to write about "Into the Wild" a movie that I thought was wonderful, but also scared me half to death. Instead real life came along and scared me half to death.
I can honestly say that up until this point I have never, in all my 28 years, found a reason to be scared walking alone. This past Thursday I especially had no reason to fear. It was bright bright Jerusalem morning. I was walking through a wooded area I know well, in a neighborhood that I spent many a childhood vacation exploring. Above me was a row of apartment buildings and the bustle of human life, below me-the main road and beyond it the parkland of the Valley of the Cross. I turned a sharp bend in the path to see a young man walking toward me. My first thought was that he didn't belong there- there was something in his manner and dress that was out of place. This was a path for joggers and dog walkers. He was dressed casually in a white t-shirt and aviator glasses, but he was too meticulous, too sterile for this little piece of nature. He stopped as I passed him and turned to ask me something. I couldn't hear him- the radio was blasting in my ears. I took out my earphones. He said, in Hebrew- how old are you? I must have smirked I was so taken aback. I put my earphones back in and continued walking. I walked a few steps and then glanced back, he too had walked a few steps away from me but then turned around and was hurrying towards me. I walked faster. I could hear the cars a few feet below me and see the the tops the edges of the apartment buildings through the trees above me, but at this point it was just me and him on the path and a long winding stretch of space until the street. He grabbed my arm when he reached me- not hard, but strong enough to make me recoil. Hey, he said, still in Hebrew, I asked you a question. I said, in English, I'm sorry I don't speak any Hebrew. I moved my feet. I kept on going forward. I asked you a question, his English was angry. I'm very busy, I replied. I'm on my way to work. He looked at me sharply then. He paused. He turned around and went the other way. I stumbled my way down to the street, glancing behind me all the while. There are numerous paths down through trees. Who knows if he would be waiting for me at the bottom? I almost asked the man I saw walking his dog, making his way up the path I had just come down to walk with me a few steps. I didn't. I kept to the main road. I called a friend. I made it to work.
Understand this- I am very small. Walking as I was, with a backpack on my back, I could easily be mistaken for a child. Understand this also-there is a school 1/8 of a mile down that path. And understand this-nothing happened. I was asked my age. My arm was grabbed-was touched. But in the space of a second I was a victim. I was ten feet in either direction from a road. I was a half a block from my adopted grandmother's apartment. I was isolated and I was completely vulnerable. There is so much unfairness in this-that with one question and one gesture I can become undone. I don't know what this guy was looking for, but I do know that he made me feel intensely unsafe. I was angry, at first, that someone could do that to me- that someone could take a childhood place and make it dangerous-that all my safety was just an illusion. By the time I got home later that day, I was scared. I jumped at every noise. I refused to be alone. I was told that leaving the house again was essential- like getting back on a horse after a fall. I've gotten back on quite a few horses in my lifetime. So on Friday I took a deep breath and got back on the horse.
I was considering going to the police- not for myself, but on the chance that he thought I was a girl, on the chance that its the schools he's interested in. But I'm honestly not sure of the reality of the situation. Maybe he was just slightly imbalanced. Maybe he was just really annoyed that I didn't answer his question. Who knows? All I know is that I was scared and I have never been before and that in and of itself is terrifying.

Thesis watch: 1.2 a chapter, footnotes and bibliography

Music Rec: Once more, with feeling- Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Cubbie Watch: I can't look.

In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee

August 22 was the one year anniversary of this blog. I seem to have completely let it pass me by, which is a testament to how preoccupied I am with other things (read: the rapidly approaching deadline for handing in my thesis). I do have a longer post planned, but that will have to wait. In the meantime happy anniversary, Innisfree.

Thesis Watch:Um, we're not talking about that right now, ok.

Book Rec: The Latke Hamentash-Debate

Cubbie Watch: And here comes the freefall, whee.