Long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away.....nope
11 years ago today, Sgt. Pepper did NOT teach me to play....not that either.
Time is on my side, yes it is....nah, I don't think so.
If I could put time in a bottle....not that either.
Time it was, and what a time it was, it was a time of innocence, a time of confidences
Long ago, it must be, I have a photograph; preserve your memories; They're all that's left you.... Closer.
525,600 minutes, 525,000 moments so dear. 525,600 minutes - how do you measure, measure a year?...much closer
11 years ago today, it was Tisha b'Av, and I wrote my very first blog entry: Welcome To My World. To be honest, I thought it was going to be about moving through widowhood.
I've been under a great deal of pressure from several sources (you know who you are) to start a blog. Now, all things considered, this was Steve's gigue. He was Ziggy. Ziggy's Joke o'the Day was out there before there were blogs. ZJOD was, in its own way, legendary.
Night after night, yawning with exhaustion, I sat on the couch in his office, listened to him read "the intro," and then edit it on the fly. Oh, how we argued over word choice and sentence structure. The debates were grand, sometimes heated, but always ended with "gimme a kiss and get outta here so I can get this thing out the door." And every night, when he finally stumbled into bed, I would always be just awake enough to feel two pats on the butt, followed by, "You're a good ol' broad, y'know that?" And I always snuggled a little closer.
There are no more pats on the butt. And no one who is going to sit on my sofa and opine at my work. It's a dirty job, and I wish with all my heart that he was here to do it. But he's not.
Well, where to begin? What do I want to say? Oh lordy, such a fertile field and so many things on which I would like to comment. May as well just dive in and immediately get myself into trouble.
I thought I would write honest and wise things about the transition and the rest of that malarkey. I think that lasted about a week. Then I started opining. 575 episodes later, I'm still opining. And I've not missed a week. Okay, there was one "gone fishing" episode because I was sick, and a week of "greatest hits" but I wrote the intros for those. But who's counting?
In the blogosphere, this is considered to be a very long run. I've tried to quit several times, but readers have convinced me otherwise. Not a lot in the way of comments these days, but I get a pretty good dose of email from readers, so I know they're out there.
407,000+ hits as of today. That's about 37,000 hits a year. It doesn't quite work that way, but that's a good average for someone who does not monetize (accept ads) or advertise. Before the Cookie Wars began in Europe, I had a lot more recorded hits per day, but I don't worry too much. I'm not in this for a buck, I'm in it for the joy of expression.
11 years ago, in that first episode, I wrote about how the ultra-orthodox Haredim were a threat to Israel's democracy and to the state's relationship with the Jews of the Diaspora, of which I am one. At the time, I had been in Israel once, in 1969, and had spent Tisha b'Av in Jerusalem. That was a watershed experience for me.
Since then, I've been back to Israel twice and have visited Jerusalem both times. I've seen up close and personal what goes on at the Kotel. I've also witnessed in real time when I stay up later to daven with Women Of The Wall on Rosh Chodesh (New Moon). I've seen the gangs of haredi girls screaming at the women who are there to pray. I've see teenage boys throw trash at the Torah readers. This is how Jews behave toward other Jews? Apparently so.
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| Tisha b'Av 5781 - The Kotel - 17July 2021 |
[And here's a fun-filled factoid for those of you who think Israel is European: Mizarchi Jews make up the largest percentage of Israelis. 2018 numbers show a population of 4,000,000 Mizrachi Jews out of the entire population of 9,050,000. And if that's not enough, Jews make up about 74% of Israel's population. Of that 74% non-haredi Jews make up 63% and haredim make up 11%. Can you say "stranglehold," boys and girls?]
11 years, a new government with good intentions, and nothing has changed...yet. The same thoughts I had 11 years ago, I still have: that the diaspora is in danger of being splintered by haredi hate for the rest of the Jewish people. If you don't sign on to their brand (whatever that is) you are not a Jew. The State must come to terms with the reality of this sinat chinam...baseless hatred.
One would think that with everything going on in Israel, this would no longer be an issue. Ha! Back in 2019, I wrote an episode, Live From Jerusalem:
No, gentle readers, that doesn’t mean life is a Utopian paradise here. It doesn’t mean the government behaves well or that there is no strife. There is. Plenty of it. As I mentioned above, hate is universal and Israel has added a whole classification to internal hate. It has significantly less to do with skin than it does with how you believe. Hate flourishes on an inter-Haredi scale that is terrifying. I am equally as certain that G-d did not have this kind of incredibly poor behavior in mind when Torah was given. Nowhere in any of the canon does it say hate your neighbor, much less hate your fellow Jew. The Rabbinut has cornered that market on self-loathing and, as hard as it is to believe, antisemitism. Israel is supposed to be a democracy, and happens to be the closest government to a democracy in the entire Middle East. The last two Israeli elections have driven that point far enough home so that it is almost impossible to form a government. But that’s a different rant.This rant is about what it means to live here, in Israel, even if I am only a visitor. Just as I consider myself to be a New Yorker living in exile in Minnesota, I am also a Jew who lives in the Diaspora. There are more and more days I wonder if I could survive making aliyah. The thought is never far from my mind (especially these days) because ultimately, this is our home turf. Once you’ve walked on it as a Jew, you get it. It feels different. And you are never the same again.
I stand by what I say in that second paragraph. Jerusalem feels different if you're a Jew. The shit-ass behavior on display Saturday night does not negate that, it only reinforces the idea that the ideological war is not yet over. I wonder if it will ever truly be over, but I want desperately to believe that one day it will. I still believe despite our differences in prayer, observance, and custom, we remain one people. Am Echad....One People, one heart.
The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week
"If I forget you, o, Jerusalem, let my right hand lose its cunning.
May my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth..."
Psalm 137: 5-6
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