December 3, 2017
So our plans for the next two months have been cancelled. But we have plans for tonight. Ezi and his enormous heavy boot and I are going for a PET scan. Because we do it at night, we get quick appointments and we get out fast. Unfortunately, however, we lose half a night's sleep. This should be a very romantic date.
Now that Avi Biton is safely behind bars, and Bibi has backed off from the legal immunity he's been working on with his new law, and we have seen the unreliability of Kahlon in his support of this new law that won't go through, we can concentrate on some of the better things that are happening here. At the cash machine today, for example, I was rewarded with Leah Goldbergs. To see a woman poet on hundred shekel notes was a thrill I didn't expect. Even though I knew they were out, I was incredibly excited.
Who could imagine what will happen with these notes? The religious extremists - will they be able to use them, to touch them, to count them?
There is also Rachel on the twenty shekel note too! Will we begin to use her name as slang for the bills? "I'll give you five Rachels for a Leah." If we were following our bible it would be the other way around, no? 5 Leahs for a Rachel...
December 4, 2017
We arrived home at 5 and slept until 9. Then Ezi went back to sleep for the day while I ran errands. Most importantly i went to spread the news of Ezi's injury to the grocer who turn passed it on to the neighbors. Why? not only because i love to complain, but also because Ezi is a key figure in the maintenance of our building. he's the only one, for example, who understands the plumbing, who can fix the hot water, who knows what the ordinances are, etc. So it's important for some people to know they can't rely on him for at least a month and a half.
Ehud Barak's article blasting our government appeared in the times on Saturday - in the US. Because we don't get papers on Saturday it only appeared here today. "Why," said my friend in Boston, "Did he have to tell the world? Why not try to change the situation there?" Well he did. but do we listen?
December 5, 2017
Sorry to be so concerned with finances but I finally got to see the 20 shekel note with Rachel's picture - the back has a line from her poem "Oh my Kinneret, my Kinneret - were you real or only a dream?" Ezi looked and said - "she was right! it will be only a dream very soon. " the drought has had its effect on the Sea of Galilee, to the point where anyone may be soon able to walk on water.
We were at the hospital in Ashdod today. There was definitely something strange about that place. Everyone was polite. There was a little wait, but nothing serious, and we showed up early - before eight in the morning. By 11 we were home, reassured that Ezi's tendon was being attended to, and he would soon get a little scooter for his leg so he can move around the house sometimes.
of course we never would have gotten all set up like this without Smadar, who made us soup, picked up the scooter, and massaged my aching knee.
December 6, 2017
Jerusalem is now the capital of Israel. Many think this is wonderful, and I'm ready to sign a declaration of independence for Tel Aviv. It's not that I don't think Jerusalem is important to us, since we remember Jerusalem all the time in our prayers and ceremonies. But why stir up trouble now? what good does it do? this will create world peace? or total destruction for everyone? maybe that's why he doesn't care about saving the environment - we won't be around to see it disappear.
Agricultural regeneration - that's what we should be concentrating on now. After what we saw up north - the dried river beds, the erosion, the receding lake - we should be concentrating on how to make this desert bloom.
Wait! It's probably a bluff! We're dividing the city - so our Jerusalem will be the Jewish Jerusalem and the Palestinian Jerusalem can be theirs.
December 7, 2017
We wrote the doctor that Ezi was in pain. I picked up the perscription for a codeine-mix at a pharmacy on the way home from a proofing-visit to Rivka. For the first time in years the pharmacist was not Arab but Russian. Someone I've never seen before because I've never stopped into this particularly pharmacy. "Why are you taking this?" he asked. I explained that the pain has kept the patient totally bed-ridden all week. "Have you aired out the room? Are you feeding him? Is he moving around so he won't get thrombosis?" Perhaps another customer might be put off by this intrusion but I was thrilled that someone cared.
remember how in nursery one kid hits another and the third gets blamed and gets pounded by the other kids. well guess who's getting bombed because trump declared jerusalem the capital of the jews.
happy now?