( ), punctuated.

rediscovered

2009-02-22T13:18:00.000-05:00

A fall day in late October, riding the Pennsylvanian across the commonwealth’s rolling red-and-orange-and-yellow-and-brown-and-all-colors-in-between farms, listening to Simon and Garfunkel’s Greatest Hits. “This could be an almost perfect day. Enjoy it.”

thoughts

2009-01-18T15:09:00.002-05:00

(while practicing driving stick...)

first thought: I hate driving stick.
second (attempting positive) thought: I love working at Starbucks. I need to drive myself to work.
third thought: I really can't drive stick.
first thought: I mamash hate stick.
second thought: BE POSITIVE, SELF!
third thought: It's too dangerous! I can't even get into first gear!
second thought: POSITIVE!
first thought: I really really really really don't like this.
second thought: argh.

things overheard

2008-11-18T17:28:00.002-05:00

My Bubby, while talking about How to Find Me a Husband, on Dating:

"I don't know the hot-spots any more... I've been out of circulation for a while."

coffee shop

2008-10-30T00:03:00.008-04:00

(on how I think.)

The man in front of me (everyone is in front of me, I sit in the rear at the bar) wears an orange shirt. He is older, but cool. I know this to be true because he bikes (note right pant leg tucked into sock), shaves his head, and has checked both his gmail and facebook accounts thus far. He sits with a woman ("a writer") (overheard from conversation with another patron, a "'fiction' non-fiction writer"), who is looking quizzically at her book. It also seems that she knit her sweater (chenille, mock-turtle, multi-colored yarn).

At the table in front of this cool older couple is a kid, maybe my age, though it looks like he is graying. He is working on something very intently at his computer. I know this to be true because he has not once looked up at me, though I keep waiting for him to admire my cafe-beauty (selfish, we are).

In the middle of the room, sitting alone with a cup of tea and a wedding band, is an older Indian man. He occasionally watches the street, occasionally the tv mounted on the wall (CNN). He is tapping his foot (right) to the beat of the music.

And Along the Far Wall--
Another older man (it is late! shouldn't all the old people be at home? There is yet hope for my future!), documents open in much profusion on his laptop, keeps turning his head to an awkward angle to watch the tv (CNN reaction to The Infomercial).

There was a family of four on the lounge chairs at the front of the room when I walked in, playing trivial pursuit. Very beautiful. Kids my age, too.

The barista is behind me, standing unseen at the bar. She is "an actress." She has red hair (dyed), bangs, and wide hips.

(A commercial for Iron Gym cannot be that interesting!)

-and this is the part where I analyze the above.-
As I was sitting here reading Derech Hashem/The Way of God (yes, intelligent as well!)... well, I don't know how to continue that sentence without it sounding more pretentious than it does. R' Moshe Chaim Luzatto writes in the introduction:

"When an individual is confronted by many details and does not know how they relate to one another or their true place in a general system, then his inquisitive intellect is given nothing more than a difficult unsatisfying burden. He may struggle with it, but he will tire and grow weary long before he attains any gratification. Each detail will arouse his curiosity, but not having access to the concept as a whole, he will remain frustrated.

"If one wishes to understand something, it is therefore very important that he be aware of other things associated with it as well as its place among them. Without this, one's longing for truth will be frustrated and he will be pained by his unsatisfied desire.

"The exact opposite is true when one knows something in relation to its context. Since he sees it within its framework, he can go on to grasp other concepts associated with it, and his success will bring him pleasure and elation."

Thus, I come to the cafe to observe, to try to understand something of the human condition, to see how people relate to each other, to this space, and this bit of the world.

This being that I may attempt an understanding of human life--how it is we live this life.

and I find it so annoying when others do just this, but so it is.

2008-10-23T23:22:00.000-04:00

I am just a poor boy
Though my story's seldom told
I have squandered my resistance
For a pocketful of mumbles
Such are promises
All lies and jests
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest

When I left my home and my family
I was no more than a boy
In the company of strangers
In the quiet of the railway station
Running scared
Laying low, seeking out the poorer quarters
Where the ragged people go
Looking for the places only they would know

Lie la lie...

Asking only workman's wages
I come looking for a job
But I get no offers
Just a come-on from the whores on Seventh Avenue
I do declare, there were times when I was so lonesome
I took some comfort there

Lie la lie...

Then I'm laying out my winter clothes
And wishing I was gone
Going home
Where the New York City winters aren't bleeding me,
Leading me, going home.

In the clearing stands a boxer
And a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders
Of every glove that laid him down
Or cut him till he cried out
In his anger and his shame
"I am leaving, I am leaving"
But the fighter still remains

did you know, there is a song about me. exactly. really, it's about me. true story.

2008-10-23T23:19:00.001-04:00

Rebecca - Pat McGee Band

In vain I have struggled; it will not do!

2008-09-16T21:44:00.001-04:00

I watched Pride and Prejudice last night (the newer less-truthful one, sadly) and now life just seems so-- so regular! Clearly, I am Elizabeth Bennet in dire need of a Mr. Darcy!

it's friday...

2008-08-29T17:56:00.002-04:00

Once upon a time, my AIM away message read, every Friday, "it's Friday I'm in love." Some among us might recognize this as being the title of a popular early 90's song by The Cure. Others among us, my mother in particular, may not be aware of this cultural reference and think that indeed, rebecca is in love with someone. One Friday afternoon my freshman year of college, my mother called me. We had a normal conversation, talking about home, classes, etc., and then, as I was about to hang up, she asked me who I was dating.
What? I'm not dating anyone.

There you have it, ladies and gentlemen. Problems with Parents Using Technology.

In recognition of love and Fridays and parents, I would like to share this really happy song by Michael Franti with you. Enjoy!

my father.

2008-06-26T00:26:00.003-04:00

1.
email forward from my father today:

2.
script of a letter found in the envelope along with my paycheck:

Rebecca,
I believe i spoke to your father on the phone while trying to find out if you are in Pgh or [ ]. He was very funny.... Wanted to know where my name came from, told me about Japanese history, and tried to get your check depositted into his account.
Happy Summer,
Minda

late summer night

2008-06-23T22:46:00.002-04:00

1.
I haven't felt any urge to update lately. Maybe I feel my life is better kept only within myself, maybe I no longer crave the approval/adoration/simple readership that frequent posting bequeaths. Regardless, life continues to be lived and thoughts continue to be thunk.

2.
What is it with everyone (ok so of course not everyone but way more than expected)(especially when one's expectations are no one) doing drugs (smoking/pot/excessive drinking)? Is life not wonderful and challenging when we just live?

3.
I have a friend (American) who is thinking of getting a civil marriage with this Israeli she likes (who does not like her) so that he won't be deported.

4.
You know how TV sitcoms have, generally after every line, a laugh track? And the purpose of this pre-recorded laugh track is to imply that the previously stated lines were, indeed, funny? So whenever I heard this I took the lines and the laugh under consideration, judged the humor, maybe had a fleeting internal smile, but never ("never") actually laughed out loud. And because I reacted to the laugh track in such a manner, I assumed all people did. However, dear friends, this is not true. I recently was in the presence of someone who laughed, a real, genuine laugh, along with every single laugh track. I don't really know how to respond to this.

5.
I found this challah cover in a thrift store a month ago. Auspicious place for a challah cover...

and I can't get through

2008-06-16T13:58:00.001-04:00

trying to find my place.

things not to tell my mother

2008-05-09T08:58:00.002-04:00

that it is not yet 9:00 am and I have just returned from schlepping a new set of dishes and pots to the mikvah to toivel them.

[this is not a list] Cry, the Beloved Country

2008-05-02T10:43:00.002-04:00

For now, I have no time to add my commentary and disgust, but please read this article at JPost...

Here are some highlights:

the High Rabbinical Court of Israel has declared invalid all conversions performed since 1999 by Rabbi Haim Drukman, the head of the Conversion Authority. ...

a panel of three high court judges ruled that all conversions conducted since 1999 by Rabbi Drukman - who heads the Conversion Authority - and another rabbi, must be declared invalid.
They also ruled that it was permitted to retroactively cancel the conversion of someone who does not observe the Sabbath. ...
On the basis of the ensuing discussion, the judge ruled the woman's conversion invalid, and in consequence, that her children, who were born after her conversion, are not Jewish. ...

The verdict rendered the Jewish status of thousands of converts retroactively invalid, and required them to convert a second time.

April stress brings May excitement!

2008-05-01T22:45:00.001-04:00

the kabbalah of YOU!

2008-04-29T21:53:00.002-04:00

Last semester (last semester being this past spring semester, which has since past and left me no longer a student in the traditional sense) I attended a talk by Lori Palatnik titled "Kabbalah of You: Understanding Yourself and Others." Basically, there are three main essences or drives - חיים/Chayim/Life; ברכה/Bracha/Blessing; and טוב/Tov/Good.

These essences are evident in each person, and manifest themselves differently in a person's body and soul. Meaning, a person's body "relates" itself to an essence as does a person's soul. Knowing what "type" of person [I can hear Kate criticizing me already] we are, and what types our friends our, can really help us interact. Also, as was emphasized in Lori's talk, they really help us find our bsheret/soul-mate. Specifically, we look to marry someone with the things we are missing because we are yearning for the completion of one soul. (As reads my notes.)

Please find below a rendition of the three different essences as they apply to soul and body. Try to figure out which one you are. I, being a more complicated type of person, had to marinate over this for a few weeks before I finally became certain in which essences fit me best. (guess!)

חיים/Chaym/Life

Soul
- intellectually driven; bright; more "complicated"
- tend to be introverts
- out-of-the-box
- early memories; hold on to everything
- only "get" others of same type
- always thinking/trouble thinking
- minority in population (many Russians)

Body
- "thinking body"
- take everything in
- extremely intuitive, aware
- sense of people- beneath the surface, pick up on energy, "get" people
- often masquerade as ברכה/Bracha/Blessing body (i.e., sleep for escape; substance abuse possible)

ברכה/Bracha/Blessing

Soul
- tend to be extroverted
- optimistic; judge to good
- people-person--- people love because loves people
- adaptable
- trouble dating because likes everybody
- sees both sides of things- "sees the gray"
- "so busy having fun can miss out on depth of life"

Body
- pleasure body
- chill, laid back
- never get ulcers
- never, ever on time
- sleep in for pleasure of sleeping
- can be very lazy

טוב/Tov/Good

Soul
- pleasure doing what's right
- world of black and white
- loves rules, regulations, authority
- right/wrong
- judgmental/ non-judgmental (rare)
- very hard on other people, especially selves
- tend to be organized
- tough- strongest of three types; can handle more
- competitive

Body
- action, accomplishment-orientated
- always doing
- sleep as a necessary evil
- pleasure being busy

just a thought

2008-04-29T16:25:00.002-04:00

Life is a one way street and
If you could paint it,
I'd draw myself going in the right direction,
So I go all the way.
Like I reallly really know but the truth is-
I'm only guessing.

gnarls barkley

today, my friends sent me:

2008-04-24T23:57:00.002-04:00

this:
just friends

and this:

this is a poem I wrote for class three years ago.

2008-04-23T13:53:00.001-04:00

Rose of Pain

His big toe stared back at me,
a skunk wandering the road at night,
visible in its impending death.

I stomped on it, made sure to grind it into the soil
with my stiletto.
I removed my foot from the point of damage
and viewed my work,
satisfied at the new passage to China.

I hate your big toe.
You crack your toes.
It makes me want to kill you.
It smells like the fridge-
you forgot to clean it during a 3-month vacation in Brazil.

When we lay next to each other in the night
and you touched me, it was the feeling like
falling hard into the concrete
and scraping your entire body
after hearing your father died.

Your big toe.

It would taste like the moldy milk
you left in the fridge.

There is dirt under your toe nail.
The nail is jagged and chipped.
The dark hair curls.

I want to kill you.

The sound of your approaching footsteps
Is revolting in its dirty browns and yellows.

Jesus will never forgive you.
I thought it was just a stage.
I was mistaken.

I love every inch of you.

Love.
I told my mom I loved her every day.
I really did.

I don’t love many people,
because my mom said love is liberating
and I’m a conservative.

Pfth.

Our family isn’t normal.

It started when the sweet
orange of faith came into town.

You gave me a rose
and I didn’t like the way it smelled.

I watched you flirt
with the cashier at the food store.
You didn’t see me.

Invisible.

When you come home,
I’ll rip you apart.

Sweet trash of roses.

The window was left open
to let in some air.
but ended up destroying the wood.

Shema Yisrael.

The wood was old, and that final blow killed it.

Grass lies still beneath the breath of one word.

her heart glowed with a degree of happy assurance

2008-04-15T22:42:00.001-04:00

a word from our favorite modern philosopher, Martin Buber

2008-04-10T16:29:00.002-04:00

(from Two Types of Faith)

There are two, and in the end only two, types of faith. To be sure there are very many contents of faith, but we only know faith itself in two basic forms. Both can be understood from the simple data of our life: the one from the fact that I trust someone, without being able to offer sufficient reasons for my trust in him; the other from the fact that likewise without being able to give a sufficient reason, I acknowledge a thing to be true. In both cases my not being able to give a sufficient reason is not a matter of defectiveness in my ability to think, but of a real peculiarity in my relationship to the one whom I trust or to that which I acknowledge to be true. It is a relationship which by its nature does not rest upon 'reasons', just as it does not grow from such; reasons of course can be urged for it, but they are never sufficient to account for my faith.
...
The relationship of trust depends upon a state of contact, a contact of my entire being with the one in whom I trust, the relationship of acknowledging depends upon an act of acceptance, an acceptance by my entire being of that which I acknowledge to be true. ...It is obvious that trust also has a beginning in time, but the one who trusts does not know when : he identifies it of necessity with the beginning of the contact; on the other hand the one who acknowledges truth stands to that which he acknowledges as true, not as to something new, only now appearing and making its claim, but as to something eternal which has only now become actual; therefore for the first the status is the decisive thing, doe the second the act.

this is what I've been listening to lately

2008-04-09T09:49:00.001-04:00

pretty good, eh?

just, ya know, on me, on life, at this moment

2008-04-06T22:18:00.003-04:00

Julie: how's it?
me: horrible
Julie: WHY!?!?!?!
me: i am just really cranky and upset and overwhelmed and underwhelmed and saddened and too much alive
Julie: oh
no
me: whatev
me: i suppose this happens to everyone three weeks before they graduate and their lives as they know it end and they have no idea what they are doing next and just an inkling of what they want to do and too much school work to do to consider it all

but, it'll be ok, right? i'll just listen to some miles davis or some josh ritter and have a cup of tea and everything will sort itself out, right?

I collect quotes. I have books filled with them.

2008-03-31T00:45:00.003-04:00

I also collect books. Today I bought a book about Theodore Herzl in Yiddish. That, however, is irrelevant.

Please, enjoy this quote-

	'Why did you do all this for me?' he asked. 'I don't deserve it. I've never done anything for you.' 'You have been my friend', replied Charlotte. 'That in itself is a tremendous thing.' From 'Charlotte's Web' Written by E. B. White

i like to eat, eat, eat, apples and bananas...

2008-03-30T23:34:00.002-04:00

I tutor a six year-old in conversational Hebrew about twice a week. We've been going slow, learning body parts, numbers, colors, letters, whathaveyou. A few weeks ago I introduced the verbs "to eat" and "to drink." I used as examples words that she would recognize from English--- "shokolad," "tayh," "kola," etc. We do a little review and more examples and conversation every week.

Today she says to me, "Morah Rebecca, you sure do like shokolad and kola."

True, definitely true.

In other worlds, I graduate college in less than a month.

Friday afternoon thoughts from Maimonides

2008-03-28T14:58:00.001-04:00

"Were it not for the Torah, which is my delight, and matters of speculation in which I forget my grief, I would have perished in my affliction."

i'm gonna write you a letter

2008-03-24T17:14:00.004-04:00

this is an email my five-year old cousin Sean sent me on my brother's iPhone this weekend while sitting on his lap, across the table from me:

fbhgsjytefbd redslcxdvbrdfvcsdftrjfrfbvgtgu
hfhlgddbguffyhhkhju

q
dgftffffffffffdffdddgfhcvvvvbhfjvcgffftrrtfghgghhvgbbjtjkgygfrdggv
hyytfgvhufchhixkhnmij

Sent from my iPhone

---
sure does have a lot to say.

another rainy day in pittsburgh

2008-03-21T00:55:00.002-04:00

(looking at heinz hall)

oh, it took me a long time to come to this

2008-03-18T22:00:00.006-04:00

1.
Today (tonight) on the 61C there was just an ordinary girl, backpack, hat, blond hair, sitting in the front vertical row behind the driver. she was just an ordinary girl, and then she got off the bus at forbes-craig, crossed the street while the bus was stopped at the light, and ran* into the arms of a man standing in front of kiva han, a quick kiss and a caring hug, and suddenly she wasn't an ordinary girl anymore...she was a COUPLE! it seems to be a glorious thing.**

2.
my body isn't fitting me so well today. meaning, my fingers can't seem to fit well next to each other, the knuckles constantly fighting for air or space or whatever it is knuckles fight for, and my feet haven't been able to rest comfortably anywhere for more than five minutes since I got out of bed this morning.

3.
PURIM!

*ok, she didn't run, but as if
**just a lovely concept, not, dad, that I am pining away, weaving and ripping out my tapestry by day and night, while I bemoan my lack of couple-ness.

Opheila

2008-03-16T23:39:00.003-04:00

for every word I speak I feel two-thousand more.

________________

Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind.
"Pooh!" he whispered.
"Yes, Piglet?'"
"Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw. "I just wanted to be sure of you."

---Clint Echols

seems like you've mistaken me

2008-03-16T01:21:00.000-04:00

There's this lady around my way
Who sees me like every other day
Who swears and screams a name
She says "Randy where you been?
I remember you were my best friend
Me and you was in it till the end
You was like a son to me back then
You were the son that I never had
I've been huntin' you down man
I'll let you know about my foolproof plan
We can get a crew like we once had
And run from town to town
We'll never ever be found
Say Randy how's that sound?
When I was down
You were always around, I'm so glad
That I finally found you"

Mistaken me
It seems like you've mistaken me
See you've mistaken me
It seems like you've mistaken me, taken me

Say lady if I seem a way
If my enthusiasm ain't the same
It's just that Randy ain't my name
But I tell you this most every day
There's nothing I can say
To change the way
You're feeling about me
Try but you refuse to hear
Even when I'm walking with my lady
You say "How you doing baby
I like your new girlfriend
You've always attracted them princesses"
I wish I could pretend
I pray you find your friend
And all she said in the end
Is "Randy where you been?"

[Mistaken I.D., Citizen Cope]

Oh, what'll you do now, my darling young one?

2008-03-16T01:12:00.001-04:00

story of a Girl (in cell phone images)

2008-03-12T22:13:00.012-04:00

Ben, the love of Girl's life, goes for the phone.

Girl escapes, ends up on lawn of soldiers & sailors facing imposing edifice

and imposing stalwart statue.

Girl traverses about the city, finding herself seated at the ultra-hipster vegetarian cafe/restaurant/hipster lounge the quiet storm in garfield, where things are almost too hipster to be comfortable.

not-so-hipster Girl is skeptical, until

she sees the lemon-lime cheesecake.

on the Next Day's Adventure, all part of the Grand Plan, Girl walks in sunny (sunny?!) pittsburgh weather around oakland, campus-ville.

the indoor-courtyard of Girl's biopsych class building, frick fine arts, reflects well,

but Girl and friend Phd-Prospect decide da 'burgh's gots alotta love tah offer, so they

engage in a game of chess at phipps botanical gardens, where the air is fresh (fresh!)

and flowers nicely scented.

blues make Girl sigh with contentedness,

while Phd-Prospect grins and bears it.

there are words all about-
the bench speaks: thank god for a garden be it ever so small

and Phd-Prospect journalizes Girl's camus quote from yesterday and charts out the next prolific tournament with haprolificim.

:thank god for the sunshine that comes flooding it all.

Girl agrees, and decides she wants to get married (in general) in a space like this (or at least enjoy such a space).

but, Girl reMarks, she has grown and learned that fairy tales are true only in books,

and sighs as she sees her gleaming white horse amidst a bed of flowers, but no daring Knight.

Girl sees ladies walking on water

and decides that she too can be a

WonderWoman.

a great big pot of soup

2008-03-10T22:25:00.003-04:00

There's a lot to say.

On the attack at the Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva in Jerusalem I feel so much my words tumble over each other and become wet with tears and broken with hearts and clenched with fists. In the end, I am sad and silent and lost.

What to write after this?
In high school we read The Stranger by Albert Camus. I liked it but then attempted to lessen my liking for it because suddenly everybody* else liked it too and when we entered college (and later, got facebook) everybody else listed it in their favorite books. Must get over my aversion to liking what I like but disliking when people I shouldn't think like the same do like the same. hm. Regardless. Today I was sent a quote by Camus. It's good-

If there is sin against life, it consists in hoping for another life and in eluding the implacable grandeur of this life.

you, too, are allowed to like it.

Spring Break is this week. Watch for me on the next episode of Girls Gone Wild.** The show is trying out a different format, highlighting this week those meshugah females who remain at school and spend their spring breaks in the university libraries, writing...research papers. My life isn't entirely that boring. I have Grand Plans for break. A Fun And Exciting Thing To Do Each Day. Kant to read. Kids to be babysat (not part of the Grand Plans, but rather an enabler-money-enabling other Grant Plans to occur). Shabbat dinners to be hosted. Museums to be visited. Letters to be written.

Yesterday I made a Great Big Pot Of Soup.

Today I went to a Production, "Can You Imagine," about what life would be like after the Mosiach comes, put on by the local Lubavitch girls high school.

Tomorrow I conquer the world.

*a few people who I group together based on imaginary ties
** joke, joke, please note the sarcasm in my voice. also a joke. annnnnnnnyways.

chocolate

2008-02-29T08:46:00.000-05:00

In the end, what I have come to believe about God is simple. It's like this - I used to have this really great dog. She came from the pound. She was a mixture of about ten different breeds, but seemed to have inherited the finest features of them all. She was brown. When people asked me, 'What kind of dog is that?' I would always give the same answer: 'she's a brown dog.' Similarly, when the question is raised, 'What kind of God do you believe in?' my answer is easy: 'I believe in a magnificent God.'

Elizabeth Gilbert
From her book: 'Eat, Pray, Love'

(in case you were keeping track)

2008-02-26T22:56:00.002-05:00

Two men did two enchanting things today.*

1.
This morning, as I was walking into Posvar Hall, a man who had previously been walking behind me swept ahead of me, grabbed the door (a heavy door at that), and swung it open, ushering me in by a sweep of his arm and his words: "After you." My heart nearly melted.

2.
Tonight, as I was waiting for the 61c to take me home,** a man in a yellow fleece jacket approached the crosswalk on the other side of the street. He paused, scooped some snow up from the terrace next to him, and measured it out in his hand, weighing it, shaping it. He formed it into a ball as he walked across the street, and then, before touching down on the sidewalk, lofted it, fingers curling with the follow-through, into the air.

*it may be that more than two men did enchanting things today, but a) this is what I saw, and b) doubtful.
** it seems all I ever do is wait for the 61c to carry me home.

my carriage has become a pumpkin

2008-02-25T00:33:00.002-05:00

among the notable things that happened this week (Kosovo is now independent, Israel lost at the Oscars...), I turned 22. horrible, to be sure. while, having lived four full days at this age, I have much to say on it, I shall write none of them here. first, my apartment is horribly bereft of chocolate. secondly, I done some reading, and I done wants to share some lines here.

a. from The World of Jewish Cooking by Gil Marks:
"The destiny of nations depends on what and how they eat."
- Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, The Physiology of Taste

b. from this glorious book, A Pigeon and A Boy, by Meir Shalev:

"'What does a person need?' she proclaimed one day after the first spoonful of dessert. 'Not much: something sweet to eat, and a story to tell, and time and space, and gladioluses in a vase, and two friends, and two hilltops, one on which to stand and the other upon which to gaze. And two eyes for watching the heavens and waiting.'"

"Because that was what one did at home. One returned home, and said hello, and heard the answer, and entered. And then one had a bite to eat and was overcome with joy: we are home. From the hill, from the sea, from far away. That is what we love and what we know how to do."

"The Baby dared to speak up in order to point out that the participants were projecting a human perception of maps and directions and compass roses onto pigeons. But perhaps, he said, she is unfamiliar with all of these, understanding one direction only, and its name is 'homeward,' unaware that humans give this direction other names--sometimes 'southward' and sometimes 'eastward' and sometimes 'north-by-northwestward.'"

It is a very good book. You, dear reader, should read it, and we will leave discussing my old age for some other time.

eep

2008-02-21T08:29:00.001-05:00

Rebecca

Age: 22

a navigationable life

2008-02-20T01:50:00.003-05:00

1.
I have two 6-page papers due in...9 and 12 hours. amount written thus far: 4 pages. topics: Maimonides' basic views on the Land of Israel and economic and political inequality in America.

2.
the sidewalks at school were saturated with salt today. too bad it snowed for only half an hour. but I am glad to see facilities management is preparing for bad weather -- mayhaps it has something to do with the email I sent the provost?

3.
there is a major crack running down the corner of a wall in my bedroom--

should I be scared?

4.
I'm currently wearing a new scent, composed of the combined elements of sweat and coffee shop. hm.

5.
tonight, waiting for the 61c's last run, pick-up at 1:14 outside hillman, were in the bus stop:
- me
- two guys, one telling story of how he was picked up and spent the night in jail for being drunk. many expletives.
- a guy and a girl, kissing very loudly.
- me.
- a bench
- me
- 14-degree F temperatures
- me

anyways.
peanut butter and jelly solves everything.

mmm

2008-02-18T09:49:00.001-05:00

“Hope is a category of transcendence, by means of which a man does not permit what he senses and experiences to be the sole criterion of what is possible.”

David Hartman

i hear such different accounts as to puzzle me exceedingly

2008-02-12T01:22:00.000-05:00

my roommate turned the heat off

2008-02-10T23:48:00.000-05:00

and it is bitterly cold.
I have become wrapped in a blanket.

but, one must question (in all or somewhat seriousness)
why did God create the world?

thing one and thing two

2008-02-04T22:56:00.000-05:00

thing one.
Tonight sitting on the floor while playing with her delicious seven month-old son I told f about my Israel activities on campus.
I think Israel consumes me more now than it did when I was there, I say.
That's the way it's supposed to be, she responds.

thing two.
(later) tonight while doing the dishes I noticed that I was singing the children's rhyme, "do you know the muffin man" (he lives on mulberry lane). except instead of saying muffin man I was saying matchmaker.

-here is a bowl of fruit on the red table-

this really cool new voice

2008-02-03T16:58:00.000-05:00

tonight

2008-01-30T23:05:00.000-05:00

I thought I saw a shooting star but it was just the movement of the lights in the sky as I turned my head.

the broker informed me I'm broke

2008-01-28T23:03:00.000-05:00

babysitting tonight. eitan, aged 5 3/4, asks how old I am.
almost 22.
so now you are 21?
yes, but I turn 22 in a month.
you're almost 30!
!!! still a long way off!

and this little piggy made me cry

2008-01-24T22:27:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I sat in an armchair at the Einstein's in Posvar Hall doing reading before my seminar. I read through a codebook of the 2004 American presidential elections, in which respondents are surveyed on various things political from whom they voted for to opinion on health care. After many pages of questions came the respondent data, ie gender, age, marital status, geographic location, etc. I glanced over all of the data, looking at the spread of the 1,000 respondents.

marital status
xxx single
xxx married
xxx divorced
64 widowed

and I read this and saw sixty-four widowed and I started to cry.

ישראל

2008-01-23T22:17:00.000-05:00

on this question

2008-01-16T17:50:00.000-05:00

My closest friends and I met for lunch today. We were all pretty hungry so when the food came it was pretty silent until I realized that we were there to talk, not just consume in each others' presence. We discussed our futures, wondering which programs to do and where to live and where to go to school and what we actually want to do. I said that I was interested in a few different programs, but had decided not to pursue them because they would not lead (at all or soon enough) to my end goal, which is aliyah, moving to Israel. And that I must take everything on with a view of how it will impact my aliyah, or otherwise it will never happen.

And they, caring involved American Jews and fantastic friends, said that I shouldn't let aliyah or my dream of moving to Israel hold me back from pursuing these things. That moving to Israel will always be an option, at any stage (age) in my life.

But, the thing is, I want to live my life in Israel. Not just move there "someday."

אמא איפה את

2008-01-15T23:48:00.000-05:00

rest stop along Israel's coast

and another

2008-01-14T19:29:00.000-05:00

four.
I have a magnet I bought that is on the fridge, well the freezer really, in the upper-right corner by the manufacturer's label and eye-level (if you are 5'8") to the point of reaching over to open the fridge. it is one of those quote ones that I buy cards of for my brother every year. The magnet says:

do something today which the world may talk of hereafter (admiral collingwood)

and the thing is,
I don't know if I am.

Like, what have I done today? I met with my advisor for my independent study, wrote some emails, came home, put on sweats and tried to figure out my life for six hours while desperately craving a diet coke. maybe it is just because I am searching to find something fulfilling to work at and do and so it is especially emphasized that I am doing nothing now----but---argh.

one two and three

2008-01-14T13:31:00.000-05:00

one.
my nose keeps on running. i think i'm done with it, but no, out it comes, screaming a welcome-back to college.

two.
life is a lot of work.

and.
meaning just everything- plans future school studying money job friends food rent chapped lips.

three.
highlight from my shabbat-
walking to mincha with F. (F=friend; numerous people have tried to set us up, but no.)
somehow shietels - wigs that married women wear to cover their hair- come up in the conversation.
I say I don't think I'll wear one.
F says (something like), who knows? maybe you'll wear one when we are married.
I say I don't think we are going to get married.
(glad we cleared that up)

three.one
I don't like the new beit habubot album as much as their first.

bright colors and squares

2008-01-11T16:12:00.000-05:00

goats in the shomron.
delicious goats-milk yogurt.

sun setting in itamar.

boy with his blanket.
(a hilltop settler)

sun and a flag
(marat hamachpelah)

thorned flowers
(looking into jordan)

return (again)

2007-12-24T00:59:00.000-05:00

Israel tomorrow.

I'm excited, but I'm not so excited. I mean, wasn't I just there yesterday?
But, sof-sof, it is good to return. Because the longer we are away from something the more we forget that which made it special.

on hanukkah and other subjects

2007-12-12T01:50:00.000-05:00

A.
The 59U went by as I was walking to the bus stop at Hillman and I slowed down, dejected at the prospect (we seem to write this often, but do we ever speak it-- "the prospect of x..."?) of waiting for an inordinately long amount of time (all time seems inordinately long when waiting) for another Murray Ave-bus to appear. But, then, right then, the 61C appeared. What hope! I alternately cursed and prayed for the light to change so that I could make it across the street to board before the bus pulled away. And I did. It was a big double-bus with a teacup in the middle. The woman in the aisle across from me was asleep, and there were two guys a few seats up talking to each other. They weren't sitting together, but were on opposite sides of the aisle, a seat back- meaning that one could have moved up a seat and they would have been closer. I found this very strange. They talked the whole way home, though I do not know on what because today, for the first time all year, I listened to music on the bus. I was so proud of myself for abstaining and told myself that I enjoyed the complete bus experience and world experience (of sound!), but today seemed so much calmer without bus talk.

I had been wanting to tell a 61C story for a long time; there are so many; it has been pulling at my heart; I did not know what else to write. I can tell more. I can write a book. I could draw pictures, too, though they do not shout as much as words.

B.
The apartment is sooo clean! Don't worry, dad, I am doing a great job of studying for finals. But oh how clean it is! Quite enthralling. enthralling. Proper lighting, accent lighting, has a great affect. As does sweeping and straightening.

C.
Hume, everyone's favorites commercialist modernist political theorist, often wrote essays titled "on x." I borrow the idea from him. Do not believe he ever wrote on Hanukkah. I confused Rousseau and Hobbes on my political theory final. Their considerations of man in the state of nature, at least. Haval haval haval.

D.
Tonight is a summer night. Mad, I know! But true how true! Still in the 60s in Pittsburgh and it is 2am. I live for nights like this. Other things as well, but how powerful of a sentence that is!, even if on first read we know it cannot be true. It sounds like it should be in a movie. Or maybe it is.

E.
Hanukkah. Beautiful. Two memories: leaning over menorah on dining room table at home and getting hair caught on fire (did it actually catch fire? or did mom just shout to be careful?) and making shapes with the melted pool of wax. Here, in this place where I live, it is almost more Jewish than Jerusalem. Only five businesses on Murray Ave had any sign of Christmas, and one was Starbucks. So few homes have lights, which is empowering and sad because lights are so beautiful.

A lit menorah in the window of Gino's Barber Shop.

Eight night of Hanukkah in our apartment. My 20-shek menorah from Mr. Zols on the left.

comment

2007-12-09T18:54:00.000-05:00

"A Case of You" by Joni Mitchell is one of the most beautiful songs ever written.

and also

2007-12-05T21:51:00.000-05:00

This is what I saw yesterday upon* leaving my History seminar and walking to Starbucks to meet Sam. This is what I see everyday. oh, the beauty.

Also, I was gchatting with my madrich (the high schooler that assists in my class Sunday mornings) and alladasudden he asks how "my boy stuff" is. awk awk. I state, as has been proven, that there are no good men. He gets genuinely upset on my behalf, writing that
"ur nice to me and ur fun from what i see so u should be able to find someone... and when u find that guy u will honestly be so happy."
Yes this is true but I don't need/want/argh relationship advice/questions/remorse from a high schooler! Or anyone, really.

Can't these things just happen?!

oh, and it snowed today. That made me really happy.**

Anyways. Really going to work on that paper now.

*I write upon but I would never say it. awkward?
** I know you were all wondering whether today's snow made me happy, so I felt I should clarify.

quiet town

2007-12-05T20:56:00.000-05:00

listen to: Quiet Town, Josh Rouse

As it turns out,
I want to open a kosher cafe/bakery/bookstore.

1. I had a meeting with a career counselor today.
Scary things, careers. I've been a student for so impossibly long I fear I won't know how to operate outside of a classroom. Also, I study history. And I don't want to go to law school (yet). Or any graduate school (yet). And I know many things that I like to do but none specifically that I want to do. Hence, career counselor.

2. So Strong says
In my Strong Interest Inventory I scored highest in Social (helpful, collaborative, cooperative), next highest in Enterprising (fast paced, assertive, influential) and third highest in Artistic (creative, flexible, self-expressive).

My top five interest areas are teaching and education, religion and spirituality, social sciences, visual arts and design, and management.

I should find the following careers appealing: college instructor, school counselor, operations manager, paralegal, foreign language teacher, HR manager, social science teacher, special ed teacher, community service director, top executive.

I like to work and learn by: interacting with others, learning new ideas to apply to abstract problems, assuming leadership and directing others, playing it safe and making decisions carefully, and independently- responsible for my own work and achievements.

I would be a horrible: athletic trainer, medical illustrator, physicist. (sorry, dad.)

3. I'll Briggs your Myers
My reported type is: ESTJ. Extraversion, ~Sensing, Thinking, Judging.

My most attractive job is in the protective services, closely followed by work in production and manufacturing. ESTJs frequently work as: managers in small business or sales, purchasing agent, teacher (technical), factory supervisor, public service worker, social service worker.

4. I can see clearly now (the rain is gone)
It is clear that my ideal job is owning/working in a cafe/bakery/bookstore.

5. Questions/considerations/statements
Simple Treat, Pittsburgh's last remaining kosher bakery, is closing because the owner is retiring.
The community* needs a kosher bakery.
I like bakeries, I like to bake, I like decorating, I like being busy, I like talking to people, I like feeding people.
I should open a new kosher bakery.
Coffee is important. I like coffee. I love cafes. Cafes are wonderful and worldly.
I should make it a kosher bakery cafe.
Books are life. Books will look good on the walls and add an academic feel. Tmol Shilshom is successful.
It will be a kosher bakery-cafe-bookstore.
Dependent on space (preferably two Murray-Ave storefronts), the pick-up bakery-counter will be in the front left, with cafe and seating to the right and extending back. Natural woods and warm colors will be used.
The name I am not sure of. If a porch space were involved, it would be called The Front Porch. Possibly Punctuation, though that is more cafe and less bakery. Possibly MaTov, meaning "what is good" and alliterizing with the Hebrew word for sweet. Possibly Rebecca's. Possibly Rugelach.
I know nothing about business or operating a business. I have no capital.
I would be very happy to be doing this.
If I did this, I could not move (soon) to Israel.

listen to: All My Days, Alexi Murdoch

I should write my paper.

* it seems I have elected myself to speak for the needs of "the community"

if I hide myself wherever I go

2007-12-02T22:37:00.000-05:00

a most fitting playlist:

For You, Barenaked Ladies
Journey to Eretz Yisrael, Shlomo Gronich and the Sheba Choir
Comfortable, John Mayer
Bright Smile, Josh Ritter
At This Point in My Life, Tracy Chapman
אודי, בין השמשות
Under the Weather, KT Tunstall
Come and Find Me, Josh Ritter
סיגפו, בית הבובות

though I'm here in this far-off place

2007-12-02T22:01:00.000-05:00

"I read by candlelight at night now. It's just enough to see but not enough to startle or keep me awake. I've been choosing pocket-sized books and Plays as they're easier to stuff in my suit rather than have to carry a bag. But I'm finding great joy in the moving in and out of stories and characters more quickly. Though I always wish I were as brave or as wild or lost as everyone I read about. I want to explore every place and live in every era. Sometimes this delusion gets me down about the state of things, vaguely, the world. But candlelight inventory keeps me in check before bed." Jason Mraz, from his fb blog
(but it could be me)

The day is almost over and I am starting to breathe. I lost and regained my cell phone. But (as I keep telling Kate and she keeps telling me I already told her) I don't lose things. Physical things, at least.

But now it is raining (we love rain when proper footgear is involved) and I am having soup and Tracy Chapman is on and I am starting to breathe.

best soup ever

2007-11-30T00:11:00.000-05:00

This really is the best soup ever. I've made it for two Shabbat dinners and my friends keep on asking me to give them the recipe and telling me how poor their imitations of it are.

Cook, share, be happy.

Lentil Barley Soup
3 Tbsp olive oil
1 large onion, 1/4 inch dice
2 cloves fresh garlic, coarsely chopped
2 carrots, cut into 1/4 inch dice
2 stalks celery, 1/4 inch dice
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp dried thyme
1 (28-oz) can diced tomatoes (we've also used peeled+chopped fresh)
1 (10-oz) box frozen chopped spinach (also used chopped fresh)
1/2 cup dried red lentils
1/2 cup dried green lentils (I just use one color because Pittsburgh doesn't like options)
1/4 cup dried pearl barley
8 cups chicken or vegetable stock, more for thinning (we once used a boxed chicken broth and another time the stock powder thing)
fine sea salt
freshly ground black pepper

- heat oil in large pot on medium heat. Add onion and garlic; cook 3-4 minutes, until shiny and translucent.
- Add carrots, celery, oregano, basil, thyme. Stir + cook 3 minutes.
- Add tomatoes and spinach; stir.
- Add red lentils, green lentils, and barley. Add stock.
- Cover pot and simmer over low heat 45 minutes. Thin with extra stock as needed.
(I like to let it sit overnight so that it really gets a great flavor)

בתיאבון!

pressing

2007-11-28T16:31:00.000-05:00

I think, nay, I have decided, that what I need are more people who are real.

by the way

2007-11-18T21:36:00.000-05:00

In two days, a few hours after the bus ride home with Eva listening to her iPod and musing together, and a few more hours after I've turned in my term paper, my dad will sit me down, probably in the living room. I'll take the blue fleece and wrap its soft warmth around me, my legs tucked under me and knees sticking out, sinking into the couch. Dad will sit, or more so lay with the pretense of sitting, on the blue arm chair with his feet (sneakers still on, but to be untied and taken off in the course of the conversation/lecture/discussion) pressing into the leather ottoman.

Dad will turn to me and pelt me with a series of questions (I know you will, don't deny it, daddy!): What do you want to do when you graduate? Where will you live? Where will you work? How will you get a job? How will you pay off student loans? What are your plans for the next five years? Next ten? How will you find a husband?

I know he will ask me all of these questions because he tried to once in September, over the phone, and I said that this (this = Rebecca's life) would be better discussed in person. When would that be? he asked. I told him I assumed that Thanksgiving would be the next time I would see him. Well, then, he said.

So that'll be, like I wrote, in two days.

These are clearly important questions. Clearly clearly. I know this because: I think so and am therefore trying not to think about them that much; everyone I meet asks me them; everyone whom I go to for Shabbat meals asks; and my dad would not sit me down in the living room in such a manner for unimportant questions. Important questions include: did I like his song about fried bananas, why I do not let him eat more uncooked chocolate chip cookie dough (pre-adding chocolate chips), etc. :). Being clearly important questions, they all deserve serious consideration and thought and discussion, which, I understand, is what certain people blog about. I, however, am a quirky individual, and prefer to diplomatically skirt around all clearly important questions I do not definitively know the answer to. (I mean, if I knew how I were going to "find a husband"- dad's phrasing- I would have done so already, no?)

But it is indeed this question that has been at the forefront of my life lately, so I shall make a few diplomatic skirts around it in a pretense of not at all answering it.

First, an excerpt from Kate's blog on the topic:

I think it's important I say something about basherts. All my friends, probably because we're graduating college this semester/year and are all single, etc., seem to be obsessed with the idea of meeting our "soulmates."

For clarification, I'll say here that I don't believe that there is one person special and intended for another person. However, I think that to find someone who you can be compatible long-term with is difficult and perhaps even the work of years. I use the term "bashert" mostly in jest, to mean someone who I would consider dating. And dating I suppose with a view to marriage, meaning I could in some sense see myself long-term with the person.

I was telling Wendy today that I don't think that people should draw up a set-in-stone list of qualities for their "basherts," because someone might come along who makes you see things differently, who doesn't fit the mold and who actually turns out to be right for you.

Maybe I'm too naive, maybe people don't come along and surprise you. Maybe I'll end up all alone and have to marry a snake...

No comments on Kate's post because her thoughts, on this topic, are my thoughts.

And an excerpt from quirkyalone:

For the quirkyalone, there is no patience for dating just for the sake of not being alone. We want a miracle. Out of millions, we have to find the one who will understand.

Better to be untethered and open to possibility: living for the exhilaration of meeting someone new, of not knowing what the night will bring. We quirkyalones seek momentous meetings.

Right? This speaks to me. This is me. So it is fine I am here now, where I am. I'm just waiting for the right one. Or, until Dad sits me down in two days and asks me what I plan to do about this.

west of here

2007-11-15T07:35:00.001-05:00

I dreamed I was coloring, then my alarm went off and I colored outside the lines.

eh?

2007-11-08T17:17:00.000-05:00

What American accent do you have? (Best version so far)

Neutral

You're not Northern, Southern, or Western, you're just plain -American-. Your national identity is more important than your local identity, because you don't really have a local identity. You might be from the region in that map, which is defined by this kind of accent, but you could easily not be. Or maybe you just moved around a lot growing up.

Click Here to Take This Quiz
Brought to you by YouThink.com quizzes and personality tests.

יש לי סיפור קטן על ישראל

2007-11-02T16:15:00.000-04:00

יש לי סיפור קטן על ישראל.

בארצות הברית, כאשר אמבולנס נוסע ברחוב, כולם אומרים "אוו וה ווי, מה לעשות?! מה קורה?!" וכל המכוניות מפסיקות עד האמבולנסס עובר.

לא כזה בישראל. בישראל, אף אחד לא עושה כלום כאשר אמבולנס נוסע ברחוב. המכוניות לא מפסיקות, הן לא נוסעות לאט, כלום.

בישראל, האנשים מרגישים, "מה, יש לך בעיות? אתה חושב שיש לך בעיות? אני אגיד לך..."

I have a small story on Israel.

In America, when an ambulance drives down the street, everyone says, “Oy vay voy! What’s happened? What can I do?” and all the cars stop and pull aside until the ambulance passes.

It is not like this in Israel. In Israel, no one does anything when an ambulance drives by. The cars don’t stop, don’t slow down, nothing.

It’s like in Israel, the people feel, “What, you’ve got problems? You think you’ve got problems? I’ll tell you what problems are…”

all gone to look for america

2007-10-29T22:46:00.000-04:00

As a little girl in Norway I often, too often, heard my mother say to my little brother and myself, 'If you do not behave properly, we will just have to send you to America!' This threat would bring us to line. During the long summer holidays with my kinfolks on grandmother's mountain farm our fears of America would be re-inforced. Mother's younger sister, Tomine, would walk around ghost-like, never speaking to anyone. She was very pretty, but she made us all sad.

'America did that to Tomine,' master Rina used to say. She was the one who had brought Tomine back to Norway with her.

She was only 17 when she emigrated, gay and strong--the things I could tell you. Melancholia the doctors called it. But we all know it was America that killed her.

שאלות שלי שהן לא כל כך שאלות

2007-10-29T00:03:00.000-04:00

it is 39 degrees fahrenheit in pittsburgh
where the sidewalks are covered with leaves
that are slippery when it rains
make me happy and clear.

my toes are cold but i cannot sleep with socks
confine and forbid and my toes prefer freedom
, locke argues, is man's right to live in security with his property.

b'shaim hashem is the song of the moment
magazine is a bit pretentious
is a word that we pretend we know the meaning of
life.

i want to write a post on israeli ambulances
remind me of hannah
is the name i give to females in my hebrew homework
intimidates and affronts with no concern for personal space
is also pretentious.

i cannot write like ee cummings ( )

—tommorow is our permanent address
and there they'll scarcely find us(if they do,
we'll move away still further:into now

fear that i am giving what i should be taking
accounts, taking back, taking life, taking away, take
it from me.

the girl i tutor does not understand
hebrew question words
in hebrew have greater value in the language of my brain than those in english
lit 0580 intro to shakespeare next term
s you use to define me, you define me? in america i have become defined and identified and delineated.

three things that frustrate
---no answer
---lousy moral/civic arguments
---lack of morality

(רק צל של מה שרציתי לומר)

The Quest

2007-10-23T22:06:00.000-04:00

A video taken over the summer of Young Cousin Sean's Quest to Find a Friend at the Jersey Shore.

Cute, eh?

loud prints

2007-10-20T23:39:00.001-04:00

had some friends over for shabbat dinner for parshat lech lecha. told the story of the prince who thought he was a rooster (or a chicken, depending on your hashkafa). served homemade challah, vegetable soup, israeli salad, lettuce salad, long grain rice, ratatouille, and chicken. teambuilder- how everyone knows me/favorite rebecca story. (feel free to share if were unable to make the meal for reasons of being in different countries, eg samoa, israel.) was really nice to host. my method of introducing people to each other: "this is t. he is canadian. t, this is s, she has been to canada." it has been pretty successful, though the people may talk about how crazy the introduction was than the actual subject that brought them together.

here is the table, set in the sunroom.

but he talks like a gentleman

2007-10-16T23:56:00.000-04:00

monday, 8:32pm, leaving hillman library with friend f (non-Jew, friends with many Jews), a nice-looking man in khakis and red button-down shirt approaches us with palm cards.

man: I would like to give you some information on this event.
(I see the palm cards. they have a cross on them.)
me: oh, no, thank you.
man: But it's actually about Jesus.
me: I know.

(walking away)
f (loudly): what, you don't want to know about Jesus?
me: no, not really.
f: are you Jewish or something? (knowing very well I am Jewish.)
me: Pretty much.

(walk across Forbes Avenue. encounter ends.)

days like this

2007-10-11T23:16:00.001-04:00

(days like this)

make me :) deep down.

the wind blows and we dress warmly and drink tea and cappuccinos and listen to yummy music and sit cozily and give warm hugs. the wind wakes me up and i smile and laugh.

[edit]
this- the above- isn't exactly what I wanted to post yesterday, but I couldn't figure out how to post what I wanted to post but I still wanted to share the general idea so that is what came out. what I really want to figure out is how to upload just audio files - like this. any ideas?

recipes

2007-10-07T21:46:00.001-04:00

I started writing a recipe book during my long summer at home, during the endless meatless Nine Days. There are many meat recipes in the book. Friend A had a recipe book at Hebrew U she made with her mom, basically a photo album with the recipes written on index cards for viewing and sliding-out ease, arranged by food type. It was a good idea, so like other good ideas, I took it.

iHo slipped me some of her favorite recipes on white index cards, and rl shipped me some via email, and I copied many from my momma's cookbooks and the recipe card index I made her one year for Mother's Day. Fifth grade, I think. (Feel free to post your own recipes and I'll write them on the pack of multi-colored index cards I got from RiteAid to study for my Geology exams. do it!!)

I like recipes. (What a sentence, Rebecca. Really says a lot there. Phew. Better go take a five minute break to consider that before I keep reading.) They provide good combinations and fresh ingredients and ingredients I have never heard of or considered as ingrediable before. When I don't cook using recipes (meaning when I cook using just my mind) things happen. Things generally do happen, yes. So either I end up making delicious pasta primavara or I saute strawberries with zucchini and mushrooms. There are many ideas and recipes in my head waiting to get out and be made and sometimes they get made together in what in my head seems like a swell idea but on the plate not so much. So I occasionally progress from the strawberry/zucchini madness and look up a series of recipes online for the same dish- like mushroom barley soup- write out all of the elements I like, and piece together a new recipe from that.*

On Wednesday-- well, some background first. Life has been extremely hectic for the past four weeks because of all of the Jewish holidays- Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, and most recently, Shmeni Atzeret and Simchat Torah. The holidays are great, to be sure, and I __ (connected?benefitted?felt?grew?), especially after spending last year in Israel and having time to digest and internalize all I learned there. All of the holidays (excepting Yom Kippur, which was over Shabbat) fell out Wednesday night- Thursday- Friday, leading right into Shabbat, Friday night-Saturday, thereby creating a "three-day yom tov," three days on which all of the laws regarding Shabbat (electricity, writing, etc) except cooking are in place. Meaning, synagogue every morning +, eating out for every lunch and dinner (for three days in a row, with yummy holiday meals at each gracious host, even this gets exhausting), and no class or doing school work of any manner. I missed my Thursday classes for three weeks, but I told the professors, and they, unlike Kate's evil Hebrew Scripture's prof, are really kind and understanding. This past week I had some midterms (though a few of my syllabi say there will be "two midterms" so I assume I'll be suffering again soon enough), with a test Wednesday in class and an essay due and a test scheduled for Thursday. I turned in the essay and took both tests Wednesday, and babysat in the morning, so when I got home my brain was pretty much absent. Hannah (roommate) and I had decided that we would have Shabbat lunch just by ourselves, and I elected myself to make some kind of side dish.

So, on Wednesday, an hour before the holiday started, I decided to make rl's "fake sesame thai noodles." We don't have any noodles, so I put some orzo on to boil (messing up the directions for that) and just tossed an unidentified amount of peanut butter with hot water and oil and other flavoring liquids I thought would go well. The peanut butter sauce covered the orzo by a three-to-one (whatever that means) ratio, but there was hope that "something" would happen in the fridge and it would better itself.

Hannah had made chicken salad for lunch, which was a good thing. We tried a spoonful of the orzo-peanut butter and then put it back in the fridge, to be improved upon.

Which brings me to now. I decided to tackle the thing (well, at least, avoid wasting a whole bowl of orzo and peanut butter) and sauteed some veggies and tossed them with some heated orzo/pb. Turned out pretty well. יש תקווה, יש תקווה.

So, סוף סוף, (finally), what I actually wanted to share was my trip to Phipps Botanical Gardens today with E. Dale Chihuly's glass exhibit grows between the plants and trees and butterflies there. I took a few pictures with the cell phone, which is a phone and therefore not the best camera, so do check out these websites for better images. (My favorite is the Float Boat.)

The glass is planted in the middle of the gardens, growing up from the soil, wrapping around plants and trees.

The echoes of the plant movements and color changes in the glass bring attention to the natural beauty of the plants themselves.

Standing on a bridge, looking down at a stream boarded with glass plants and green plants, the eyes focus in on the color and abnormal presence of the glass.

I wonder first what my world would be if this fantasy were real- if I could walk through a dark green forest and happen across beautiful fairy tale creations of bright yellows and blues and oranges growing from the ground.

Then I realize the glass draws in the eye. Our eyes focus on its colors and curves, and as we gaze we start to pick up on bends and hues and life of the green plants surrounding the glass, and slowly realize the beauty natural creations around the glass, which were really there all along.

It's like that catchy song from Love, Actually.

So what I am trying to say is that this is a really good eye-opening feet-tiring exhibit that you should see. Come to Pittsburgh. I'll make dinner (no experiments). Or if you're here, I'll go with you again. Life is good. Do the better things more than once.

(what a post this is! so varied in its form and function. not at all what I was expecting. and much longer too. the end attempts to be so...inspirational and wise and the beginning witty and clever. long night, folks. recipes and visits please.)

*itunes surprises me. sometimes, when on shuffle, I hear a song, and am like "woah! what a cool song! whose music is that?" then I realize it is mine and brush my shoulders off. A blues song- "Smokestack Lightnin'" by Howlin' Wolf just came on, and, well, my shoulder needed some brushing. (damn now I sound conceited. well, it is just a blog and I am projecting myself as clever etc etc...)

על החיים

2007-10-02T17:52:00.001-04:00

"They always say that time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself."

Andy Warhol

lack of focus

2007-09-24T23:27:00.000-04:00

leaning over my biopsych book and notes right now to type this. good sign, eh? i am v. bad at reading textbooks- especially science books- and listening to people lecture. my roommate gave me some silly putty so sometimes i play with that during class and it helps me focus, but otherwise i draw pictures and make lists and doodle.

this is my modern britain professor, dr white. he has a big flop of white hair. pretty perfect. he also has arms, though not in my sketch.

this is my political theory professor, dr whelan. he lectures with his tie tucked into his shirt and a big pocket protector in his pocket. i think it might actually just be a pencil case. he never takes his tie out.

i got a lunch bag! mom said i couldn't take tuna fish, etc to school because it would go bad after a few hours so i had to buy a bag. the store didn't sell ice packs ("seasonal item"), but they did have back-to-school lunch bags (for elementery schoolers) on clearance. only $1.72 for this beauty!

(look! i've read already ten pages in my book tonight!)

desk lamps and green tea

2007-09-23T18:03:00.000-04:00

I am very much in the mood for watching Jerry Maguire tonight. חבל (haval- too bad) that my roommates are no longer my roommates and their DVD's are no longer in the bedroom next door. But I have hours of reading and learning and memorizing to do* so God (or fortune, call it what you may) worked it all out.

* I often forget that being in college actually entails reading and taking exams and writing essays. The woman I babysit for told me that each three-credit course is equivalent to six hours of homework a week. Six hours a week! When do I spend six hours a week on all of my classes? Aye, there's the rub. Midterms next week. Three exams, two papers...

yom kippur

2007-09-22T21:53:00.001-04:00

phew.

that was intense.

the ten days of posting

2007-09-19T23:33:00.000-04:00

strange, eh? i'm working on the תשובה - teshuvah- repentence/return- part of it as well.
but god gives life and thus i live.

these pictures are of an afternoon.

beloved front porch- bench and facing chair.

notebook in the slated sun.

roses on the piano.

moses on the porch with the two tablets.

me with sleeping baby.
:)

open arms

2007-09-18T21:18:00.000-04:00

these are things i see and things i live and these things make up my life (and make me happy too :) ) .

this is a bench at carneige mellon. eva and i walk around cmu sometimes and pretend we are smart and studious and go to school there. we also like the campus (an actual campus!? you mean a college can have its own campus?!). this is a nice bench. (a nice bench, rebecca? use your words, use your language! how is this bench nice? benches can't be nice! people are nice. benches are hard or well-placed or delightful. ok, well, this bench lifts up the corners of my mouth in a smile. tov?)

this is where i live. one of the many places, i guess. and i don't live on the river. i live- family home is- a block away from the left shoreline. this is the delaware river. new jersey on the right, pennsylvania on the left. taken when mom and i were driving home across the rickety bridge. sunset is mmm.

this is a bench, like the other, except i knew it first and it is closer to pitt so i love it more. it is part of the new (new? already three years old) schenley plaza where my friends and i lunch on mondays at noon and eva and i lay in the grass. lowercase lettering is greatly admired and loved.

this is the sunset from the columbus airport. my flight was delayed for five hours so i wandered around the terminal. the end was deserted so i hung out there and read and watched the sun set. two janitors came over and spent their break talking to me. the man sang gospel music- "wade in the water" - at my request.

this is the most beautiful and most favorite building of learning. the cathedral of learning. the words, the meaning of the words! a holy place of learning. in the commons room (favorite place to study sophomore year) a quote by robert bridges reads: "here is the eternal spring; for you the very stars of heaven are new."

view from forbes ave (cmu) down to the cathedral of learning lit by the setting sun.

(fall is my favorite season.)

fast car

2007-09-17T23:07:00.000-04:00

this waiting and not knowing and apprehension is making me argh.*

explain yourself, life!

one way or the other or no way at all this hiatus is too much.

There are three things to do when the kettle boils. First, pay no attention to it, and so waste the energy. Second, clamp the lid so hard that there is an explosion. Third, invent a steam engine or make some tea.
Clarence R. Skinner
"Fashions in Revolution," March 1918

*college students have advanced abilities at expressing themselves.

things I found in an old notebook

2007-09-16T18:02:00.000-04:00

distracted notes I took during social theory class three years ago.

I see the things on my desk and I file them away into a drawer, out of my sight -- I get the emails and put them in the appropriate folder.
my organization is cluttered in itself.
I cannot clear my mind so instead I put away the laundry that has been piling on the purple chair.

just once--to talk to someone when the moment strikes.

when you are in jerusalem, when do you stop and sleep???

the dustiness of my room

how I avoid doing my work forever

excitement and smiles at connection between two people with the warm autumn air flowing between.

שנה טובה

2007-09-11T07:19:00.001-04:00

the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe

2007-09-02T22:49:00.000-04:00

(on being back in pittsburgh, at school, after a year in israel.)

I feel like Lucy from The Chronicles of Narnia. She steps into a wardrobe while playing Hide and Seek with her siblings and enters another world, where she has great adventures and meets wonderfully exciting creatures, to find her way back out of the wardrobe, back to the professor's house, to find that no time has passed, her England is still the same, her siblings are still the same, and only she has changed and experienced Narnia. And no matter how she tries to tell her brothers and sister about what she discovered, she cannot make it real for them. It existed for her, and the longer she is away from that wardrobe filled with fur coats leading to Narnia the greater the risk is for her, too, of forgetting or of disbelieving all that happened to her in that other world.

Change some of the pronouns and this story is me.

multiple choice

2007-08-27T12:23:00.000-04:00

I woke up this morning

a) when the alarm clock went off
b) to the sound of someone blowing a shofar
c) naturally

Nice RAK, Pittsburgh

2007-08-24T18:19:00.000-04:00

When I moved in on Sunday it was wicked rainy and tempers were high (as can be expected in a move-in in the pouring rain with a lot of things to transfer). My dad and I recruited one of the Chabad rabbi's sons to help us move things, which was helpful, until we attempted to move this huge overstuffed couch that is somehow in my possession. It wouldn't fit through the door of my apartment building, and my dad, rain-drenched and otherwise bursting, wanted me to give up and just donate the thing to Goodwill. I really liked the couch, but how does one say such to a father when can't push the thing into her apartment?

In the middle of making a decision as to what to do with the couch and midway through the door, a car stopped on the street and a man got out, strolling over to us and saying that it looked like we needed help. Clearly. He then took charge, have us move this way and that and take the feet off the couch and push it such a way up the stairs, and leading it all the way into the living room of my apartment.

My dad offered to pay him, but the man refused, bringing God and acts of goodwill up, and my dad said that God also created money so that we could thank people, and gave the man ten bucks.

Now I have a beautiful overstuffed couch in my living. It's uber comfortable, if you are interested in stopping by to try it out.

Nice Random Act of Kindness, Pittsburgh.

(If it weren't so hot here I would love you even more...)

hardwood floors and arched doorways

2007-08-21T12:18:00.000-04:00

The new apartment in Pittsburgh is amazing. Huge, beautiful, bright, clean, with hardwood floors and an arched doorway. And a sunroom!!! mmm.

This is a view of the sunroom! from the living room. The curtain I found in Israel at the thrift store on French Hill. It is huge wonderful orange British design. Thinking of flanking it with some sheer curtains.

This is the view of the living room from the sunroom!. The door leads to my bedroom (huge) and the doorway (arched!) to the washroom, kitchen, and roommate's bedroom. Still working on the layout a bit but the couch (free...) is uber comfortable. And I am borrowing someone's unprotected wireless. :)

inspiring movie moment

2007-08-17T00:42:00.000-04:00

in Jerry Maguire, Jerry at the sports agents convention in Miami, frustrated and fed up with the direction the business is in, sits down (well, generally) and scrawls out his Mission Statement.

it begins:

It's 1 AM and this might be the bad pizza I had earlier talking, but I believe I have something to say. Or rather, I have something to say that I believe in. My father once said, "Get the bad news over with first. You be the one to say the tough stuff." Well, here goes. There is a cruel wind blowing through our business. We all feel it, and if we don't, perhaps we've forgotten how to feel. But here is the truth. We are less ourselves than we were when we started this organization.

continues:

We are losing our battle with all that is personal and real about our business. Every day I can look at a list of phone calls only partially returned. Driving home, I think of what was not accomplished, instead of what was accomplished. The gnawing feeling continues. That families are sitting waiting for a call from us, waiting to hear the word on a contract, or a General Manager's thoughts on an upcoming season. We are pushing numbers around, doing our best, but is there any real satisfaction in success without pride? Is there any real satisfaction in a success that exists only when we push the messiness of real human contact from our lives and minds? When we learn not to care enough about the very guy we promised the world to, just to get him to sign. Or to let it bother us that a hockey player's son is worried about his dad getting that fifth concussion.

There is a good bet that I will erase all of this from my laptop, and you will never read it. But if you are reading it, and you're reading it right now, it is only because I was unable to stop. I was unable to forget the quiet questions in the hallways, when some of you, usually the younger agents, or interns, asked me on the side: "How do you keep all these lives, all these clients, separated in your mind?"

...

Somehow all this has been bubbling up inside me. A man is the sum total of his experiences. And it is now that I am interested in shaping the experiences to come. What is the future of what we do? Give me a goal, and I will achieve it. That has been my secret design for most of my life. Perhaps you are the same. We're all goal-oriented, so I hereby present a goal.

How can we do something surprising, and memorable with our lives? How can we turn this job, in small but important ways, into a better representation of ourselves? Most of us would easily say that we are our jobs. That's obvious from the late hours we all keep. So then, it is bigger than work, isn't it? It is about us.

How do we wish to define our lives? So that when we are sixty, or seventy, or eighty and we're sinking down onto that cool floor of O'Hare airport, with playoff tickets in our pockets, perhaps we too can know that we led A Happy Life? Is it important to be a Person and not just a slave to the commerce of Professional Sport? Do we want to be Remembered?

...

I have never been a writer, but I can see how this great lost art will never truly die. Putting words to paper is a sacred thing. It's more than a phone conversation, it is a document. It is something you are putting on paper. The relationship between a phone call and a letter is the difference between a magazine and a phone book. One you leave on a plane, the other you save.

ends:

Let us start a revolution. Let us start a revolution that is not just about basketball shoes, or official licensed merchandise. I am prepared to die for something. I am prepared to live for our cause. The cause is caring about each other. The secret to this job is personal relationships.

other inspiring movie moments?
mayhaps something from in the face of evil?

just on emails

2007-08-14T01:13:00.000-04:00

(a)
how frustrating it is to have someone respond to an email I just sent them within twenty-four hours of the time I sent it, thereby demanding an equally fast response-to-response on my part that needs to be witty, engaging, and clever!
it takes time, people! I can't just bang this stuff out left and right.

ex:

me: X keeps on responding to my emails within a day

Kate: omg

me: so frustrating

(b)
only for the important ones do people wait forever to respond to (HAVAL! AVOID!)

ex:
me: no response yet from X. i sent the email almost two days ago already!!!
Kate: lameeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

define: google

2007-08-01T12:52:00.000-04:00

Google, with apparent clairvoyance, has removed the Golan Heights from Israel and denoted it as Syrian territory in their maps.

listening to

2007-07-30T23:13:00.001-04:00

yosef karduner, shir l'maalot. (a song of ascents.)

I lift my eyes to the mountains,
from whence will come my help?

there is a blind dog on my lap.

2007-07-30T17:30:00.001-04:00

if

2007-07-20T12:37:00.000-04:00

sometimes I forget that there has to be a world outside of the books I read.

Jews and Chinese Food, and Other Stories

2007-07-15T22:59:00.000-04:00

Jews and Chinese Food
Today (tomorrow, actually, but we are American so we celebrate holidays a day before their actual date) is my bubby's 82nd birthday. We went out to eat, but, being who we are, had to drive 45 minutes to Cherry Hill, New Jersey* to eat at MAXIM'S glatt-kosher middle eastern restaurant, glorified and renowned by their weekly ads in The Jewish Exponent, Philadelphia's Jewish weekly. My mom was thrown by the Chinese-sounding man who answered the phone, but hey, this is America, anyone can answer a phone in a glatt-kosher middle eastern restaurant. My mom and I got to the restaurant first and were seated. We opened our menus and were shocked (shocked!) to find that MAXIM'S glatt-kosher middle eastern restaurant was no longer MAXIM'S, having been bought out three weeks prior and recreated in the form of LIN'S glatt-kosher chinese food restaurant, now bringing the total number of kosher restaurants in the Philadelphia area to ~11, of those, ~4 Chinese places. Seems a little exorbitant. Dear readers, what is the attraction between Jews and Chinese food? Is it Newton's unstated fourth Law of Motion?

Other Stories
1. 'Twas just me and me mum for Shabbat. Was sad and quiet. No singing.

2. Finished Gaiman's American Gods. Really enjoyed it. He is mamesh smart. Reminiscent of Joyce and Joseph Campbell. Now working on Reading Lolita in Tehran but looking forward to going to the library.

3. a snippet of tonight's gmail-chat conversation with kate:

me: did you like the part about rachel? [in the last post]

Kate: LOL yes

me: it would be so perfect

Kate: omg that would be great

me: it's perfect! they're american- baseball is the american national pastime; and have both made aliyah!

Kate: he's canadian

me: OH.

4. Currently learning how to drive. Beware, people.

* not to be confused with French Hill (Jerusalem) or Squirrel Hill (Pittsburgh) or Thornhill (Toronto).

shabbat and baseball

2007-07-13T12:04:00.000-04:00

I was worried that in coming back to America, Shabbat was going to be far less wonderful and shabbistic then in Israel, much like my general view of how life in America would be compared to life in Israel. I've learned that comparisons in this matter are worthless, not needed, and without contribution to my general well-being. (Which are basically three different ways of saying the same thing.) I've lost my focus of this thought* so shall move on.

Shabbat at home. Me and my parents.
On Friday my mom goes food shopping and gets the challah and then comes home and cooks it. We live about fifteen minutes driving from the nearest shul, so we stay at home. in the hour before shabbos starts I run around and put in the timers for the lights and tape the lights in the bathroom and make sure I have food and set the table. Before my mom and I light candles, I get changed and then we ask my dad to turn off the tv so we can light. My mom lights her big candlesticks and then I light my little candle dishes and we bless and hug. Then we sit down to dinner right away because we have no blech to keep the food warm. My dad ordered some NCSY bentchers from the ArtScroll catalog, and we open and sing Shalom Alechim. I sing the first part of Eshet Chayil (a woman of valor) aloud, and my dad reads it in English, pausing to analyze each verse and comment on how well it applies to my mother. It's really cute. Then my parents stand and bless me-- my mom's Hebrew is better than my dad's, so it sounds like a round when they do it-- and then they each kiss me and go back to their seats. I stand up and do Kiddush, the blessing over the wine, drink some, and pass the glass to my father. Then my dad and I get up to wash and he makes the blessing over the challah. Sometimes during the meal he'll tell stories about his grandfather, who fought with General Pershing against Pancho Villa and also was helped build the Lincoln Tunnel. When we finish eating, we bentch, saying the grace after meals. We do it all out loud. Then we try to sing some songs, but I am absolutely horribly tone deaf, my mom only remembers some songs from when she went to Camp Ramah when she was 13, and my dad didn't grow up Jewish so he has no memory to recall. We start thumbing through the pages of the NCSY bentcher, looking for songs we know or that my parents will be able to learn from me despite my lack of tune. I turn to "kol ha'olam," (all the world is a very narrow bridge), but my dad thinks that we should be able to know all of the songs and starts making up his own tune to the first one listed, "av harachamim." after a minute he gives up and consents to learn "evdu." When I try to teach my parents another song, my mom interrupts to tell me that I really should get voice lessons. (thanks ma.) My dad says, every week, that we need to make a CD with all of these shabbos songs so that we have a bigger repertoire for the next week. Finally giving up on singing, we retreat to different parts of the house and do our different things.

hm. I realized that I just about described the average Friday night happenings in a religious Jewish home, and therefore that this post may seem somewhat silly. But this is my house, you see! My house and my parents and my life and we are doing it together. We've done bits and pieces before, but never all this, and it is mamesh wonderful to be doing it all together with my parents.

(in other worlds)
My bubby called me a few weeks ago to tell me about an article she read in the local Trenton paper about Israel's new baseball league. It's a great thing, this Israel Baseball League. Interesting staff. The commissioner is the former American ambassador to Israel and Egypt, Daniel Kurtzer. Professor Andrew Zimbalist, the "pre-eminent sports economist in the United States" is on the Executive Board Committee, and Bud Selig, Commissioner of Major League Baseball, is on the Advisory Board. Besides boasting such a well-known staff, the League claims to be the "League-of-Choice for the premier international baseball player." Though the League focuses its recruitment efforts on Jewish ball players (players of "Jewish extraction"), men do not have to be Jewish to join up.

I enjoy attending baseball games and sitting in the stands and cheering on my team and always hoping that I would be chosen for the in-between-innings entertainment or that my seat number won a free car wash. However, these American games are lacking when it comes to inter-inning entertainment. My friend Rachel recently went to an IBL game at Kibbutz Gezer, near Laturn, and highly enjoyed that the 7th inning stretch was replaced by a 5th inning mincha break. I think I'll email Rachel's boyfriend and suggest that he take her to the IBL game with the "Wedding Day" theme, "when the baseball field plays host to any couple that wants to get married and the league provides the rabbi, the chupah, the wine, the glass, even a piece of wedding cake to all fans in attendance, ending with a gala fireworks display – all free of charge to the lucky couples." I mean, poor students, free wedding...

* Listening to the Matt Nathanson free-at-noon concert on wxpn. He's pretty funny. I was going to go- have ticket and all- except life happened and Dad got sick and the dominoes fell. Matt Nathanson's new song, "Car Crash," sounds a bit like Snow Patrol's "Headlights on Dark Roads."
I like listening to people talk. When my computer worked and I used itunes, I downloaded the great speeches in history podcast and would listen to them while I wrote essays on the Rambam's view of prophecy and India-Israel foreign relations.

these are the very words she uses to describe her life

2007-06-28T19:02:00.000-04:00

on saturday I read The History of Love by nicole krauss. she is married to jonathan safran foer, author of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and Everything is Illuminated. this is too bad. for me, I mean. however, this does not discredit any of their works. if anything, they will now be read for pure literary merit. which they should be. all being very good books. one might even call them excellent.* nicole dedicates the book to her grandparents (who taught her "the opposite of disappearing") and "for jonathan, my life". pretty sweet. I suppose they get along well. for a dedication like that, they must. unless she is hiding something. but that is doubtful. I imagine them sitting in their new york apartment, a view overlooking central park or a river of some natural landscape, surrounded by books and bookshelves and a modern painting or two and low-lying (?) furniture. they cook for each other (after all, they are married.) and read their books to each other and comment and cross out but avoid the use of red pens because they are too harsh. but that's just me.

their writing styles are very similar. maybe it is those late night editing sessions or being surrounded by someone so much you start to think their thoughts or even their attraction for each other and their similarities that lead^ to love. their writing is refreshing. a new fiction. as claire messud of LA Weekly posits, "alternately delightful and hilarious and deeply affecting." elizabeth berg, author The Year of Pleasures, calls it "a work that captivates, challenges, and consoles, all at once." these and other verbose and adjective-heavy reviews can be found on the first six pages of nicole's book. but what nicole herself writes is better than even what the Cleveland Plain Dealer has to say on it. it's uplifting. a good story.

here is an excerpt, from page 72 , "the age of silence":

The first language humans had was gestures. There was nothing primitive about this language that flowed from people's hands, nothing we say not that could not be said in the endless array of movements possible with the fine bones of the fingers and wrists. The gestures were complex and subtle, involving a delicacy of motion that has since been lost completely.

During the Age of Silence, people communicated more, not less. Basic survival demanded that the hands were almost never still, and so it was only during sleep (and sometimes not even then) that people were not saying something or other. No distinction was made between gestures of language and the gestures of life. The labor of building a house, say, or preparing a meal was no less an expression than making the sign for I love you or I feel serious...

the day before I read The History of Love I read New Face in the Mirror by yael dayan, daughter of moshe dayan. it was waiting on my dresser when I came home. from my father, who goes to goodwills and looks in the books for things that he might be able to sell on ebay. I didn't like yael's book very much. it scared me and I did not know how to react or what to think. yesterday I read The Last American Man by elizabeth gilbert. she is a brilliant writer. she just wrote Eat, Pray, Love; though the book is very popular and loved and universally admired and therefore there were no copies on the library's shelves. so I got her older one instead. it is a book about america and dreams and values and tradition and how we live. elizabeth describes the life of eustace conway, a man who lives in a "traditional" manner on his 1,000 acre plot in the woods of north carolina. he promotes life like this, living in a traditional manner, making buildings from the woods around him, eating the animals he kills, thanking the animals for giving their lives to sustain his, and so on. it's interesting. eustace works to spread this message, to become a Man of Destiny, to tell americans that they need to give up their materialistic lives and return to the woods. but, I wonder, wouldn't this destroy the woods if everyone returned? population problems? eustace is extremely impressive for doing and carrying out to such an extent what he so believes in. I could not do it. live in the woods, working all day, as he does. I do not think so.

right now I am reading American Gods by neil gaiman. I do not know what to think so far. it is like a scary movie you have just started to watch but cannot stop because you need to know what happens.

please, dear readers, recommend me some books to read. I am home for a month with naught to do.

harold and maude is on. must go. happy independence, my dear america.

* there is a wicked storm out. sheets of rain. pounding pavement. streaks of lightening. thunder that shakes the window frames. the works. it's pretty frightening, actually. i wonder how my dad will make it home from work.**
** as anyone who's read the pennsylvania learner's permit handbook knows, one musn't drive in thundering downpours such as this, and certainly not in the first 10 minutes of one when the roads are slickest. one should pull over, preferably into a parking lot, turn on flashers, and wait it out.***
*** I just read the book. that's how I know. not that I memorize seemingly random yet important facts such as these and recite them ad hoc. I passed the exam. thanks for your support.****
**** ok, the thunder is getting very loud and close and long now. I blame it on the river. the river (the one washington crossed) is down the street. I suppose I should turn off the computer and light some candles and read. just in case. of a power outage, that is. not of a reader's knowledge championship.*****
***** five stars seems a bit excessive. too bad blogger doesn't have superscript. the storm ended. i mean, it's a week later, baruch hashem it ended. we lost power for a few hours. there was no flooding. now it is july 4. but blogger puts the date as to when the post was started, not posted. haval.
^ I'm not sure if this is the proper spelling of this word. this word (and others, like lie/lay, choose) confuse me tremendously. I'll leave it like this, without checking it, so you will see I have some imperfections and believe in my humanity.

on returning home.

2007-06-20T14:59:00.000-04:00

there is a blue ceramic vase on top of the smaller bookcase in my room. i made it during freshman orientation, at the free arts classes offered at the carnegie. it has traveled with me from school to home and back again, but has rarely been used for flowers. never at home, where there are other vases that are easier to wash. and school in pittsburgh was eons ago. there are no places to buy flowers in oakland.

in french hill, in the concrete plaza between the mister zol's food store and the bank, stand a few benches and a planted tree. on fridays they are joined by a french man in his 60s, wearing a wool golfing cap, a collared shirt and bow tie or vest, and jacket. he is surrounded by buckets of flowers. there are cheap carnations and roses (sure to lose petals that afternoon) for ten shekels. more colorful overflowing bouquets are marked at 25 or thirty shekels. the french man sells to everyone who walks by, overloaded with shabbat groceries or picking up challot from the neeman bakery. he tries speaking to me in french, then hebrew, then english. he waits while i fumble for a response in hebrew (refusing to speak in english and not knowing a word of french). he asks me about the week. seeing me hug and kiss a friend, he asks why i do not do the same for him. he tells me that my mother must have beautiful eyes, looking at mine. when i am away for a few shabbatot he asks me where i have been.

i buy my flowers, sometimes a bouquet or sometimes two different solids, pick up the weekend edition of the newspaper (both haaretz and the jerusalem post- heaven forbid i should miss an interesting story in one by only buying the other), and stumble back to the apartment before my arms become dislocated by the weight of the groceries. i trim the stems, de-leaf, and arrange in the kankan/vase i got from a small stand on a side street of the shuk, with the flower overflow delegated to a series of empty wine bottles.

my mother has a garden. she spends hours every weekend kneeling on her green garden pad, weeding and transferring and trimming. when she is done she calls me out to look at her work. in elementary school i used to bring my teachers flowers from my mother's garden, wrapping the stems in a wet paper towel and putting aluminum foil around that to keep the water in, before running off for the bus.

i do not know what i mean to say by all this. i made a vase once. it sits on a bookshelf, shrouded in the dust of disuse. there is a kind old french man who sold me flowers for shabbat. my mother has a garden, which we walk around to look at but do not often pick from.

i can write it all out. i can tell stories. i could probably make a picture book, but i am unable to write, to express, what is deepest felt.

my return has been easy. my parents take care of me, feed me, and give me yard work to do. everyone speaks english. the sign in the newark airport reads: "customer service is our top priority." people ask questions, commiserate, and talk about the sopranos. bathrooms have only one flush. white clouds dot the blue sky. the grass is shockingly green and requires a weekly mowing.

it has been too easy. it does not hurt enough. where are my tears, my disgust, my anguish, my yearning? it is as if life in america is too easy. too perfect? no, this is not it, nothing is perfect. i watched the news last night: america is not perfect. it is as if it is too simple to exist here.*

in israel things matter. really matter. the price of vegetables, the latest political move, the weather! every cloud, every clear blue day in israel is a miracle to be celebrated. the land. every inch of dirt (speck of dirt?) is treasured. shabbat. it all means more.

life means more.
and this is what i miss.

*for me, i mean. i do not generalize. i live in x, z has been my life, and y is how i feel.

jerusalem (rav kook)

2007-06-16T23:43:00.000-04:00

יש אבנים ויש אבנים
יש לבבות ויש לבבות
יש לבבות שהן אבנים
ויש אבנים שהן לבבות

there are stones and there are stones.
there are hearts and there are hearts.
there are hearts that are stones.
and there are stones that are hearts.

My mind's distracted and diffused/My thoughts are many miles away

2007-06-12T21:34:00.000-04:00

in america. real life too, not just the movie. computer and i have not yet updated our clocks to reflect this. it is nearing 5am. strange to be here. not strange enough. more when the rain stops.

carpeted floors and chirping birds

2007-06-03T04:03:00.000-04:00

well, folks. one week left in this holy land.

two+ suggestions from each of you on things i should do before i leave, please.

men?

2007-05-31T19:07:00.001-04:00

why, yes, they are all stupid, thanks for asking.

ישראל שלי

2007-05-30T16:49:00.000-04:00

היום הייתי בספרייה של מרכז טרומן. אני חוקרת את היחס פוליטי בין ישראל לבין הודו בישביל כיתה אחרת. בספרייה הזאת יש המון חומר. כבר ישבתי בספרייה הזאת יומיים בחדר קטן, עם רק ארבעה שולחנות ומדף ספריים עם ספרים בעברית, ערבית, אנגלית, ועוד שפות. הספרן הוא קצת מוזר אבל הוא עוזר לי המון ובן אדם משעשע. היום בספרייה דיברנו על ישראלים. הוא אמר לי שישראל כל הזמן משתנה ובימים האלה אף אחד לא דואגת לא משנה על מה שקורה לשכן שלו. הוא אמר שעכשיו תל אביב בדיוק כמו כל עיר בעולם. אין אהבת חינם בישראל בכלל. בעבר, הוא אמר, כולם עזרו לכל בן אדם והייתה אווירה קהילתית בארץ.

היום גם הייתי באוטובוס, בקו א4, ממרכז העיר לגבעת הצרפתית. ראיתי ארבעה אנשים שהציעו לעזור לאישה עם תינוקת לרדת מהאוטובוס.

ישראל שלי? הישראל שלי היא ארץ מאוד מבולבלת. ישראל שלי היא הארץ של התנ''ך, שאלוהים נתן ליהודים, ארץ קדושה מאוד. אבל הישראל שלי היא גם מדינה עכשוויתית, עם הרבה בעיות (ולא כל כך הרבה פתרונות), מדינה של היהודים וגם של הערבים. ישראל שלי היא דומה למה שהספרן אמר היום בספרייה, אך הוא גם המציאות שחוויתי בקו-א4.

qed