SEE IT ALL STARTED WITH A PHONE CALL

A little over a week ago, my oldest son phoned and the conversation went something like this:
Him: Hi, Imma. I want to ask you something, but you can say no.
Me: OK
Him: We were thinking of going to Italy for a week.
Me: That's nice.
Him: We'll take the baby.
Me: Uh-hu.
Him: Its only for five days. Would you move in to our place and watch the kids?
Me: I think the answer is yes but give me until tomorrow night. I have to think a second. It means that I have to cancel my students.

Do I want to move in there with the babies for a week? Do I want to cancel my students? OY!

Me: Sure!
Him: You mean it?
Me: Yup!
Him: You mean it?
Me: Yup!
Him: She means it!

I said I'd do if for a gazillion reasons. I don't spend enough time with my babies. When they come home from nursery school and second grade, I'm still teaching and when I'm finished they're in bed.

I think my kids deserve some time off.

I don't want my babies with a babysitter. Too long and too scary. Five days isn't a couple hours while Imma and Abba are out for dinner or at the movies.

I can get away. A mini-vacation all for myself.

So, I cancelled my lessons...packed a little suitcase...took my knitting/ a new book/ the 155 page printout of The Sexy Ward (which is as far as I've gotten so far)/my mini laptop and off I went.

Now, don't think I've taken this lightly. It is a huge responsibility watching over a seven and a four year old. Being in someone else's house isn't a nice suite in a hotel room with room service, air conditioning, a mini bar and a view. This is serious stuff here.

Just so everyone would feel comfy and warm and safe we all piled into the big bed and fell asleep. She woke up in the middle of the night and cried for her mommy. I got her a glass of water. She cried. I told her it was all right but if she wanted to cry real loud she would have to go back to her bedroom so she wouldn't wake up her brother.

That stopped her! Ptew!

Then there is the hysteria of getting dressed and out of the house on time. Because her nursery school is too far away to walk, I have to phone a cab in the morning. Mornings are not great times for cabs. Well they are if it is before seven fifteen. After that you are up to here in traffic as every Israeli gets into his car and plugs the arteries leading to the heart of the country.

He is easy. Whatever you give him is fine. She is not so easy. This skirt isn't exactly what she had in mind. The cocoa isn't warm enough. She doesn't want her lunch in that box she wants it in this one. You get it. She is only four...well five this month. I shudder as I picture down the road ten years from now.

The good news is that he is in school until 2:45 each day. And she is in nursery school until 4.

The bad news is that he walks home all by himself now.

I forgot those days when I stood with my heart klapping in the window watching and waiting for my kids to come into sight after school. I forgot.

I forgot until yesterday. There I was standing in the street, in front of their house looking, praying and hoping that the kid comes home safely. Have you noticed that it is never your kid who comes home first? It is always your kid who is busy taking his time, checking out the world, happily chatting with his friends.

And, then, just when you are about to call in the Mounties...there he is!!! Thank God!!! See, that wasn't so terrible was it?

Then an hour later, there you are, back in the street waiting for the lady who is driving the little one home from the nursery school. Four oh five...four ten...four fifteen. What the hell was that lady's cell number. Thank goodness you wrote it in your cell phone memory bank.

What do you mean there is no answer? LADY PICK UP YOUR PHONE!!! WHERE IS MY BABY???

I phoned twice, and just when I was about to go back into the house to find the number of the nursery school, she called. Don't worry she said...we are on the way.

By the time I got the two of them back inside, I was a nervous wreck.

See, I don't want you to think I'm much better with my own kids. I still stand in the window of my mind worrying about them. But I have two safety valves. One...the cell phone. I call until they pick it up. And two...for those who don't live at home, I never phone in the evening as I know they went to sleep at eight o'clock and don't want to wake them up.

What time is it? Ten thirty? Damn! Too late to phone.

I promised the babies we would go out for dinner. I did that for two reasons. One, to make their first night with me special and two to kill time. Quick out for dinner...fill up the bellies...run home and take a shower...put on pajamas...climb into the big bed...turn on the TV and VOILA asleep!

I'm not certain who fell asleep first...but when the phone rang and I woke up to answer it, he was still watching some action movie on channel five.

Sigh!

Today is day two. Three more to go. Today we made it out and away this morning. I still have four and a half hours before I am back in the street waiting to greet him.

Tonight we are ordering in pizza. The fridge is full of wonderful food my DIL made and left for us. The cupboards are stocked and overflowing with stuff my son put in for us.

But pizza is pizza!

Tomorrow, he finishes at one. The plan for tomorrow is grab a cab, pick him up, go get her, off to the mall for a hamburger and chips, then back to my place where hubby and Joe College can take over for a few hours. We're also going to sleep at my place. Nice change.

That leaves Wednesday and Thursday until the kids get back in the afternoon.

I don't remember being this exhausted and happy in a long time. There is nothing like little arms hugging you and little wet kisses or little people saying 'I love you, Bubbie."

So it is all worth it.

Except. I forgot to mention. There are twenty-two steps from the downstairs to the upstairs. Steps I climbed yesterday a million times. Today I learned to shout, "Hey kids. Whoever wants some hot chocolate, COME AND GET IT!"

And, there are even more stairs to get from the road to the front door. Yesterday I climbed them at least six times. Today, I am staying home...downstairs...with my book, my writing, my knitting, a newspaper and my coffee.

Well, until 2:45 when I take up my post in the street.

Sometimes a Bubbie has to do what a Bubbie has to do. And, this is a win-win situation.

Memories. We build memories. And the truth is that they are delicious. It's just that the old grey mar, she ain't what she used to be. Sigh.

Have a great day...stay safe...and thanks for dropping in.

S'PLAIN ME LUCY

The entire country is reeling from the slaughter of the Oshrenko family A'H by some foreign hit man/men. Well, at least I hope they are foreigners. I don't even want to think that these murderers walk amongst us.

Six people were butchered viciously with a knife...
the grandmother/grandfather/mother/father/three year old daughter and four month old son.

I was going to write a blog about that but words escape me. It is just too big to grasp.

Then, we have the water problem...or should I say the LACK of water problem. If it doesn't rain soon and rain a lot we are in deeeeeeep doodoo. The Jerusalem Post today writes that our options include portable desalination plants or importing water from Turkey.

Turkey??? The country we put on the map??? The one we made rich when they opened their doors to Israelis and finally we had a neighbour we could go visit which we did and did and did again. That Turkey? The one when they had that terrible earthquake and we sent in team after team to find the survivors and set up hospital tents to care for the wounded? That Turkey? Or maybe it is the one that is now showing a TV series where IDF soldiers are shooting and killing innocent little Turkish children? We want THEIR WATER?

Do you remember the scene from the movie The Color Purple where Celie is bringing Mister a glass of water? And she spits in it?

No Mister Turkey. I DON'T THINK WE WANT YOUR WATER.

Are they nuts?

Then I was going to write a blog about how I am addicted to chocol...I mean books. I buy them. I store them. I stack them in the spare room waiting to be read.

But, when I opened my email this morning and read a post from my friend s.f.plangerl I know what I was going to blog. Here it is folks. From the Canadian Free Press:

First Lady Requires More Than Twenty Attendants July 7, 2009 Dr. Paul L. Williams
"In my own life, in my own small way, I have tried to give back to this country that has given me so much," she said.
"See, that's why I left a job at a big law firm for a career in public service, " Michelle Obama

No, Michele Obama does not get paid to serve as the First Lady and she doesn't perform any official duties. But this hasn't deterred her from hiring an unprecedented number of staffers to cater to her every whim and to satisfy her every request in the midst of the Great Recession.

Just think Mary Lincoln was taken to task for purchasing china for the White House during the Civil War.

And Mamie Eisenhower had to shell out the salary for her personal secretary. How things have changed!

If you're one of the tens of millions of Americans facing certain destitution, earning less than subsistence wages stocking the shelves at Wal-Mart or serving up McDonald cheeseburgers, prepare to scream and then come to realize that the benefit package for these servants of Miz Michelle are the same as members of the national security and defense departments and the bill for these assorted lackeys is paid by John Q. Public:

1. $172,2000 - Sher, Susan (Chief Of Staff)
2. $140,000 - Frye, Jocelyn C. (Deputy Assistant to the President and Director of Policy And Projects For The First Lady)
3. $113,000 - Rogers, Desiree G. (Special Assistant to the President and White House Social Secretary)
4. $102,000 - Johnston, Camille Y. (Special Assistant to the President and Director of Communications for the First Lady)
5. $100,000 - Winter, Melissa E. (Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
6. $90,000 - Medina , David S. (Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
7. $84,000 - Lelyveld, Catherine M. (Director and Press Secretary to the First Lady)
8. $75,000 - Starkey, Frances M. (Director of Scheduling and Advance for the First Lady)
9. $70,000 - Sanders, Trooper (Deputy Director of Policy and Projects for the First Lady)
10. $65,000 - Burnough, Erinn J. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)
11.. $64,000 - Reinstein, Joseph B. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)
12. $62,000 - Goodman, Jennifer R. (Deputy Director of Scheduling and Events Coordinator For The First Lady)
13. $60,000 - Fitts, Alan O. (Deputy Director of Advance and Trip Director for the First Lady)
14. $57,500 - Lewis, Dana M. (Special Assistant and Personal Aide to the First Lady)
15. $52,500 - Mustaphi, Semonti M.. (Associate Director and Deputy Press Secretary To The First Lady)
16. $50,000 - Jarvis, Kristen E. (Special Assistant for Scheduling and Traveling Aide To The First Lady)
17. $45,000 - Lechtenberg, Tyler A. (Associate Director of Correspondence For The First Lady)
18. $43,000 - Tubman, Samantha (Deputy Associate Director, Social Office)
19. $40,000 - Boswell, Joseph J. (Executive Assistant to the Chief Of Staff to the First Lady) 20. $36,000 - Armbruster, Sally M. (Staff Assistant to the Social Secretary)
21. $35,000 - Bookey, Natalie (Staff Assistant)
22. $35,000 - Jackson, Deilia A. (Deputy Associate Director of Correspondence for the First Lady)
This total damm near $1.6 Million Dollars, that’s just sick!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There has NEVER been anyone in the White House at any time who has created such an army of staffers whose sole duties are the facilitation of the First Lady's social life.. One wonders why she needs so much help, at taxpayer expense, when even Hillary, only had three; Jackie Kennedy one; Laura Bush one; and prior to Mamie Eisenhower social help came from the President's own pocket.

Note: This does not include makeup artist Ingrid Grimes-Miles, 49, and "First Hairstylist" Johnny Wright, 31, both of whom traveled aboard Air Force One to Europe .
Copyright 2009 Canada Free Press.Com canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/12652

Have a great day...stay safe...and thanks for dropping in.

WANNA KNOW WHAT I THINK ABOUT OBAMA GETTING THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE?

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
I'M SPEECHLESS...........

have a great day...stay safe...thanks for dropping in.

HALLELUJAH!!!

Wanna hear a nice story? I mean a really nice story? Of course you do!

About a month ago I got an e-mail from a lady named Donna. Now, my very oldest and one of my very best friends is Donna, but she goes by Sydonia. So, it couldn't be her. Besides, the first sentence of the email went something like this: "Hi, Marallyn, my son Lee is coming to Israel..."

God forgive me, but that is where I stopped reading, and thought Oh no! Another teenager on his way for a week or two in the Holy Land and I don't think I even know this kid.

Anyway, I continued to read--and lucky I did. You ready for this? Donna went on to say that her son Lee was being flown into the country to do the sound for the Leonard Cohen concert and was I interested in two tickets if he could get them for me.

Have I got your attention yet?

OHMYGOD! Who is this Donna and how did she find me and is this a prank like 'Guess what Marallyn, this is your lucky day. Your name has been picked from a gazillion people and if you only phone this number in the Netherlands, you will receive a swimming pool filled with money.' You know about those emails. I am ashamed to admit that once I really did phone that number. Sigh.

But, then Donna went on to say that she was really sorry that I couldn't make it a few years ago to the Walkerville Reunion. Walkerville? My high school? I remembered that Guy emailed me from California to tell me about it. And then I remembered that he told me about a 'kid' from his class, Donna somethingorother, who was helping to organize it!

That Donna! Guy's Donna! And she has a kid! And he lives in Nashville ( I forgot to mention that part). And he's being flown in to do the sound for the Leonard Cohen concert in Ramat Gan!

And do I want two tickets? DO I WANT TWO TICKETS?

Let me back up a second. I did not want a ticket to see Madonna...my kid, Joe College went to see her with the cheap ticket of 500 shekels. The Golden Ring tickets went for 2, 500 a seat!!!

I didn't want to see any of those guys. Well, maybe Elton John a few years ago. BUT LEONARD COHEN?


Both my friend Rena and I wanted to go and I did phone the ticket place but was informed that within 24 hours all the tickets were gone.


Friends, we are talking about 50,000 tickets...sold out in 24 hours and now a lady Donna has a son Lee who can get me tickets, if I am interested!!!


I quickly phoned Guy in California and he is still in contact with Donna from ELEMENTARY SCHOOL DAYS...and yes she is real and yes she is an amazing person.

I have not heard her voice in 47 years! Maybe even a year or two longer than that! This is not an old school chum or a family member who I've been in close contact with.


THIS IS A VERY VERY SPECIAL LADY...who, when her son came home to renew his passport and told her where he was going, somehow remembered that she has an old schoolmate who lives in Israel and maybe this woman would be interested in seeing the concert.

I wrote Donna and told her that, whether or not the tickets come through, the gift had already been given. I mean that. I am still breathless from this story.

I phoned Rena and told her to keep Sept. 24th open as we may have tickets to the...You could hear her shout in Tel Aviv!

In the meantime, Donna and I began exchanging emails and bringing each other up-to-date on what has been going on in our lives the past nearly fifty years! She still lives in Windsor, and I am planning to be back this summer. I cannot wait to meet her again in person.

The day before the concert I got an email from Lee that two tickets would be waiting for me and that the concert starts at 7:45 but we should be there a bit early.

Rena and I left at 3 in the afternoon. She has no sense of direction...I have no sense of direction. She called people...I phoned people...and we sort of knew how to get there.

Now you should know it is less than an hour's drive from Jerusalem, but we were going to hit rush hour traffic, get lost, and have to find a place to park along with 49,998 people!

We did get lost. A nice lady said, 'Follow me' and like the Jews wandering around in the desert, her headlights were like a pillar of fire escorting us to the Ramat Gan Stadium.

We got there! Now we had to park. Right next to the stadium is a mall and we started serpentining through the lanes looking for an open space. I didn't know if those parked were already at the stadium or shoppers getting in some last minute shopping before Yom Kippur on Sunday.

Finally we found a space and were about to move in when a lady with a cell phone at her ear informed us that she had this space and was calling her husband to direct him to where she was standing. Then, I noticed a bunch of other women with open cell phones running after people holding keys and walking to their cars. Within moments I saw a family walk to a car in front of us and before I had a chance to say anything to Rena, I jumped out of the car and stood my ground in front of this new space.

Ok. So, now we are in the right place...we have parked the car...we have almost three hours till the concert. The next question was, do we go inside the mall and use the facilities and maybe grab something quick to eat...or do we figure out how to get to the stadium and find our tickets.

Hands down we went to the stadium. I phoned Lee and he sounded like such a nice man. He had little time as they were doing all the last minute things that have to be done before a huge concert like this and the sound is the most important element. He phoned me back a few minutes later and told me where to wait for the tickets.

Just before the performance, the COMPLIMENTARY V.I.P. TICKETS arrived. While we were waiting we saw a sign that was posted informing late comers that there were still a few seats available on the grass from rows 100 till 200 and were going for a thousand shekels a seat!!!

Our tickets came. WE WERE IN ROW 31!!!

We made our way up into the stadium and Lee called to find out if we had the tickets and where we were seated. Ten minutes later there he was!!! What a very handsome, young man with eyes that sparkled and a smile that came from his heart. I couldn't stop hugging him and thanking him. His answer was, 'My pleasure. After all, you're family!'

That was the first time my eyes filled with tears that evening. But, not the last.

I do not know if I have the vocabulary to tell you what happened during the next three and a half hours. Nothing fancy. No fireworks, no people flying through the sky, no tricks.

Just a 75 year old man, wearing a dark suit and a hat. And a voice. And the sound that Lee had perfected which travelled over the 50,000 people in such a way that we could hear every strum of each guitar...every whispered note...as if he was sitting next to us in our living room.

One of the banks, Discount Bank put a zippered bag on each chair. Inside were a pillow and a flare. For the next three and a half hour those flares didn't stop moving. The stadium was alive.

I must stop here for one second, to say that Israeli audiences are wonderful audiences. I've been to many concerts and plays and I've always been amazed at just how receptive, responsive and intelligent the Israeli audience is.

But nothing was like what happened that night. Israel welcomed one if her own back and he thanked us by blessing us...with his voice...his songs...his love...and finally the Priestly Blessing that only a Cohen(priest) can perform.

I will never ever forget that evening. It was perfect. Just simply perfect. And I was lucky enough to be sitting there sharing and participating in one of the most exciting evenings this country has ever witnessed.


All because of a lady who remembered that she once went to school with a girl who now lives in Jerusalem!

The world can't be a bad place if people like Donna and Lee are part of it.

Thank you. Thank you so very very very much.



Have a great day...stay safe...and thanks for dropping in.

L'CHAIM!!!

Tomorrow would have been Bubbie Channah's 86th birthday. We both have/had birthdays in July. This is my first July without my mother and my first July without phone calls at seven in the morning wishing each other a great wonderful year.

As I still mourn her death I also celebrate her life. She had a great life.

For those of you who don't know, in my mother's later years she became a junk food junkie! Honest! All those years of making us eat vegetables and balanced meals went right out the window the day she met Ronald.

It was love at first sight. She was seventy-four and I don't know how old he was. He didn't have one grey hair in his head of red curls. He was always smiling and happy to see her. She walked downtown every day to go meet him.

I didn't know if I was happy that they met every day, but the walk was wonderful for her. First she had to go down twenty stairs and then cross Ben Yehudah Street and then walk for between ten and fifteen minutes to get to his place.

After lunch...it was always lunch, she would reverse her path and come home.

She always took her cell phone so I wouldn't worry. She was good about that.

Yes. My mother was addicted to McDonald's!

One day I went with her. Proud as punch, she passed the guard who checked everyone's purse but hers. He knew her, you see.

Then we would say hello to the group of four women who always showed up exactly at 11:00 every day for coffee and a chat. I think they were my mother's age, but they only spoke Hebrew and when they met me we sat for almost a half hour talking as I answered their many questions.
They were wonderful, interesting women who were frustrated that they couldn't sit and talk to Ma.


One day I walked up to the front to get our lunches and an elderly man approached my mother. He spoke with her for a few moments and then walked away.

When I returned to the table she told me that the man had asked her if she was all right. You see, he wasn't used to seeing her sitting there without anything in front of her. He was frightened that she was ill. Somehow she managed to convey to him that her daughter was with her and she was waiting for me.

Usually, when she walked in and approached the counter her food was already waiting for her on a tray. 'But I didn't order yet,' she said. 'Oh, madam. We know exactly what you want. You want a hamburger with the sauce from the Big Mac plus extra chips without salt and diet coke without ice cubes. You want mustard, extra napkins and a knife to cut your hamburger. And sometimes you order a chocolate fudge sundae for desert.

They knew my mom. They loved my mom. My mom was steady income for McDonald's.

I have a photo in my cell phone of Ma sitting in McDonald's happy happy happy.

So, tomorrow, if you don't mind. Go get a hamburger or some chips or a chocolate fudge sundae to toast my mom!

She would love that! Me too.

L'chaim!!!

Have a great day...stay safe...and thanks for dropping in.

AH SHANDEH

When I was growing up in Windsor, my parents had a lot of expressions they used when trying to emphasize a point. For example, when my Dad handed me my first set of car keys, he said, 'These keys are like a gun and can kill just as easily.'

That was it! I never went over the speed limit...I never drank and drove ( I don't drink so that one was easy)...I never...I never...

But the biggie was this one from Bubbie Channah A'H. No matter what we did or what we wore or what we said this one loomed over our heads...'Ah Shandeh fahr die goyim!' A shame in front of the gentiles. What gentiles? Our neighbours? The people in school? ALL GOYIM. THE ENTIRE WORLD OF GOYIM...STRANGERS...NOT JEWS.

OY!

I understood where my parents were coming from. And, funnily enough, all my Jewish friends heard their parents say the very same thing. We had to be careful not to shame ourselves in front of strangers.

When Kennedy was killed...ohmygod!!! then, thank God it wasn't a Jew!
When Martin Luther King was killed...ohmygod!!! then, thank God it wasn't a Jew!

Why? Because over the centuries we learned that any spark could cause a riot or pogrom to burst into flames and then came Hitler...yimach sh'mo...may his name be erased forever. Then for sure we learned how to walk close to the buildings and try not to cast a shaddow.

Now, whether this feeling is valid or not doesn't make any difference. Every Jew watches out for ah shandeh fahr die goyim.

And now we have New Jersey! Are they out of their minds? What the hell is that all about? Mayors and Rabbis and important people and New Jersey and Israel and kidneys? Old Rabbis with long beards being hauled away? Rabbis in handcuffs? Are they out of their minds.?!?

Not bad enough we have to live with Madoff now we have the Rabbis? Didn't their mothers warn them about ah shandeh fahr die goyim?

I understand hatred. I live with it every day. Hatred is easy. It is in your face. You can't make a mistake. You know who your enemy is and you learn how to protect yourself.

But anti-Semitism is sneaky. It isn't in your face. You can make a mistake and since you don't know who your enemy is you don't know how to protect yourself.

I experienced two occasions of anti-Semitism in Windsor and didn't stick around for the third. The first was when I was a teen and we were all out canvassing for World Child's Day. A young mother and her little child came up to me where I was standing on Oulette Avenue and came close to my face before she said, 'I don't support anything JEWISH!'

Jewish? World Child's Day? If I remember correctly it was part of a major program from the U.N. We didn't say World Jewish Children's Day....that, thank God, we always took care of privately by ourselves.

The second was even more interesting. Tenth grade. Walkerville High School. We were all gathered in the hall in front of our next class waiting for the bell and Mary Ann turned to me and smiling asked, 'Why do you Jews kill babies to make your bread for Passover?'

WHAT?

The hallway went deadly silent. Thank God, I had heard about the dead babies and blood and matzahs before so I wasn't struck dumb on the spot.

I replied something like are you out of your mind and who told you that stupid thing and why would you even believe something as dumb as that anyway?

The interesting thing was suddenly the football team gathered around me and when the bell rang they walked me into class.

Now you have to realize that that was almost forty years ago. Some things you never forget.

Want to know the best part of the Mary Ann story? Her full name is Mary Ann Martin and she is Paul Martin Sr.'s daughter and Paul Martin Jr.'s sister. And Paul Martin Jr. was Prime Minister of Canada!!! Wonder what other lovly things he learned in that house???

So now the Emperor is Naked. There we are all exposed in front of the world. And I think it is a collective shame. Am I my brother's keeper? I guess I am because I feel sick about this.

I wonder how long it will take before we hear the word Shylock? But, then again, maybe I am just over-reacting.

Bubbie Channah A'H had one more expression that was her litmus paper...'Is it good or bad for the Jews?'

Ma...I think this one is very bad for the Jews. Sorry Ma. Oy!

Shavuah tov...a sweet new week.

Have a great day...stay safe...and thanks for dropping in.

KHUTZ L'ARETZ...ABROAD

I love going abroad. I don't do it nearly enough, but whenever I do, I feel like a kid in Disneyland. Everything is so big, and so green, and so wet out there. And the people are all so tall. And they are all strangers. A person can hide well among tall strangers.

Not that I ever wanted to hide...what I mean is I can be annonymous--where you dont' have to talk and smile and be smart all the time. Where you can be alone with your thoughts and just watch mankind pass by and daydream and wonder about the people. Did you ever ride on a train and wonder about the families living in those houses you passed along the tracks? That kind of thing.

I did however want to be tall. All my life I wanted to be tall. Bubbie Channah A'H told me that her father told her that if God wanted people to be tall He would have made them a giraffe or a tree!

Honest! She told me. And when I asked her why my Zaidi would say that, she answered,'What was he going to tell his little daughter who was barely five feet tall? Besides, he wasn't so much taller himself.'

Where was I? Yes, abroad.

Whenever I get the chance to travel, I go 'home'...Canada/USA, where my family is. For me a vacation is the chance to reconnect with relatives and people I love so dearly.

Someplace in my heart I still yearn to get to Italy and Scotland. And I don't want to have to bump everyone off so that I don't feel guilty about not going to see them. Vey!

I wanted to go home this summer. But my DIL is expecting any minute now tfu tfu tfu and I promised I would move in with her and the kids for a week or two. She thinks I'm doing her a favour. The truth is how marvellous to be able to spend a week or two with my babies. We do have the best time.

So, khutz l'aretz got pushed back. I'm aiming for December. I'll let you know.

Why December? First of all I have had it up to here with the hot and hotter weather. I'm a Canadian for heaven's sake! Snow! Thunder storms! The Tunnel restaurant! Sigh.

I had these long conversations with myself trying to find a good time to get away. I thought when Bubbie Channah passed away I would be free to take off at a moment's notice and not have to worry about hurrying back ten days later just to make sure she is ok. (You have no idea how I wish I still had to worry about getting back to see how she is.)

Wanna know a secret? Every time I leave Jerusalem and go to Tel Aviv it is like leaving Windsor and going to Detroit. It's just across the way and a whole new world out there.

I always say that whoever lives in Tel Aviv deserves it! I let them fill in the blanks. But Tel Aviv has a lot going for it. And two days ago I decided to get the hell out of here and go sit on the beach and watch the water and write and relax.

I phoned my good friend Frances, who lives fifteen minutes away from Gordon and HaYarkon Streets on the boardwalk and three steps from the Mediterranean Sea, and made a date to meet her on the corner at 9:00 in the morning.

I left Jerusalem by bus at 7:30 and by the appointed time there I was shviting in the heat and mesmerized by the waves and the sound and the sand and the quiet.

Jerusalem is a tense city. For many reasons we have to be. And Tel Aviv is a whole new world. No one checked my bags...no one was guarding the LaLaLand Cafe...yup that's its name...and no one cared that we took up residence at one of the many tables in the sand.

I took my new MSI Wind mini 10 inch laptop and my external modum and put some extra money in my wallet and was all set for the day.

We sat in the sand on low tables and chairs. I don't remember the last time I dug my feet in the sand. How lovely. The entire area we were in was covered by huge umbrellas so we had the heat but not the direct sun. And there was a marvellous breeze coming off the Mediterranean.

And the sound of the waves and the children laughing and playing. We spent almost five hours sitting side-by-side writing and talking and drinking. And then it was time to leave.

How relaxing it is to watch and listen to the water. What a treat! Almost as good as being khutz l'aretz.

We are talking about doing it again soon. But next time we may go late afternoon and watch the sun set into the sea. And then have a nice dinner before I pack up and come back home to Jerusalem.

I always know when I am approaching Jerusalem. There is a change in the air the closer you get to the city. It is cooler and fresher and so very very welcoming. Ahhh Jerusalem. It is not an easy city to leave but it is sure a pleasure to come back to.

See, a vacation is only good because it is exactly that...a vacation. It has three parts...the planning...the doing...and the talking about it afterwards.

Thanks for letting me talk about it afterwards. If you want to join me just let me know. It's a big free wonderful beach out there. And all ours to be enjoyed.

Have a great day...stay safe...and thanks for dropping in.