It’s almost Shabbos and I have to be quick – I’ll write more tomorrow. This city is so remarkable in its diversity of people, ideas and lifestyles. Our kids thrive in the variety and we’re enjoying seeing them in their element. We got back so late though that that’s all I can write for now. More after Shabbos – tomorrow’s post, like this one, will go up automatically on a timer.
HEY MACY’S – ON THIS THANKSGIVING, THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES
When our kids were little we used to take them, in the freezing Manhattan November, to the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. For the twenty years we lived in New York, from Josh in a carrier on Rick’s back, to Josh on his shoulders and Dan in a Snugli, to the two boys worming their way past the grown-ups to stand in the front of the crowd at 75th and Broadway, to the years we went to our friends’ house overlooking Central Park West on Thanksgiving eve and watched them blow up the balloons — all the years of Columbus Avenue cocoa and popcorn, we were there. When they got older, the boys went together without us; the two of them joining the crowds (the TODAY SHOW just told me that this year there are 3.5 million people along the parade route) with the finesse of New York kids. I cherish those memories; I know they liked it but I don’t think as much as I loved watching them respond to the balloons and the music and the colors and the crowds.
If I weren’t in San Francisco without all our albums I’d scan a photo of the kids waving from the top of a newspaper vending machine, or on their dad’s shoulders, or looking up at the balloons with such magical wonder that I can’t describe it. But we’re here and no such photos inhabit my laptop, so I leave it to your imagination.
We left Manhattan for LA in 1992 and I haven’t been to a Thanksgiving parade since. I don’t even recognize all the balloons. Central Park West belongs to other parents and kids now; nobody who’s only seen it on TV can imagine the excitement, the smells, the noise, the freeeeezing cold and thrill of watching their kids wave to Big Bird and Bob IN PERSON!!!! I’ll always have a deep affection for Macy’s and the gift of that annual celebration of family, joy and, yes, thanks. Nobody can give a gift better than the gift of memories and they certainly have done that. Every single year.
YUP, THAT’S THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE AND THAT’S UNION SQUARE AND…
This is far from the prettiest part of this very beautiful city but it’s where we went walking today because it’s near our hotel. I’ll try to have better pix tomorrow. There is certainly lots of beauty here – down by the bay (as Raffi would say), coming in from the airport, atop those remarkable hills — here’s the way up on one of the ones we walked today (not so gorgeous either but for now…. that’s what we’ve got.)
Tomorrow is Thanksgiving – have a wonderful day. I’ll be back before Thursday midnight.
ISN’T THAT THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE?
We leave for San Francisco in the morning, I’m not packed, I have a class tonight and an appointment in 15 minutes. So this is a shortie. I’m so excited to see our kids and, as usual, nervous in advance. Last year I wrote a post called "I Don’t Want To Be a Turkey on Thanksgiving." Sort of the same feelings this year; being considerate of adult kids and their autonomy NOT from things you might do on purpose – those I can control. It’s the stuff that can happen by accident and end up being an issue that I always worry about.
If there’s anything I’m thankful for it’s the gift of these two young men who have grown into such fine people. Even from all the way across the country, they bless my days. Makes Thanksgiving mean a whole lot.
NO POWER (TO THE PEOPLE, THE LAPTOP OR THE MICROWAVE)
This is a boring photo – I know. But I’m not about to post a picture of a dead squirrel (as far as I can tell I could get somewhere around 138,000 different ones on Google Image Search) and the squirrel is the star of this story. Here’s how it went:
Since we’re just back from Israel we’re completely screwed up as far as time is concerned. I woke up at 3, watched the Tivos of the last House and the last two Heroes and then decided that since sleep was out of the question, I’d go to the store to get milk and some stuff for breakfast. Wandering toward my car, I saw, on the street next to the curb, a — yes — dead squirrel. Extremely unattractive — and I wondered how he/she had ended up dead outside our nice, harmless little house. I was tired though — this was too hard to consider — so I got into the car and took off.
When I got home, I opened the front door to dusk — all the lights were off. Wouldn’t turn on. Ditto the coffee maker, the oven, the (GASP) computer and everything else. Checks with PEPCO, our local electric company, produced, after very long hold times, the information that, 45 minutes after their first customer call, they were still in the process of dispatching a crew to figure out what was wrong but "hoped to have things back on line by 10."
The hour drew near. Since I had to decide whether to wait it out or decamp to the local coffee house (free wireless) and write from there, I called again. Got even less information than the first time. BUT – and here’s where it gets really interesting — just as I sat down at my desk and looked out the window, a PEPCO truck pulled up right outside. Or squirrel-side.
Former reporter that I am, I tore out the door to see if the PEPCO guy knew what was up. Boy did he. Our entire neighborhood blackout had been caused by that one dead little rodent. Apparently when a squirrel leaps onto, and subsequently is electrocuted by, a transformer – the transformer responds with great sympathy and, basically, dies too.
He fixed it in about ten minutes — grinning as he explained that "this happens all the time." He had just triangulated all the calls reporting the outage and figured out where the problem was. Cool, huh?
Now I’m here in my office talking to you, the lights are on and I even made soup. Not much meaning here but somehow there’s an oddity about the entire event – reminding me as I returned to our own "natural habitat" from afar that going home to the same old house is no guarantee that things will be the same — there or anyplace else.
IF I KNEW THE WAY, I WOULD TAKE YOU HOME: TEL AVIV TO FRANKFURT AND THEN SOME
When you arrive in Israel this ramp is the entrance to your visit — the gateway to Ben Gurion Airport. When you leave, it’s the way out, too. It’s as good a spot as any to start this final travel post. Just a few last looks around.
This is VAT, where you get refunds on Israeli sales taxes if you live outside the country. Some line, huh?
Our trip went through Frankfurt and we had a long layover – so why now lunch downtown? It’s a quick trip from the airport on the train – for five bucks. Which is relevant – because, right in the center of the first square past the station is this statue of — a EURO!!! There was a sculpture of one, too, further down the street.
The city is growing, too. I love this picture — new being built around the old. Right in the middle of town…
This is the last picture. When I was in Berlin I went to the Stasi Museum, built in the old headquarters of the Stasi secret police in East Germany. It’s a hated memory across the country, so this political poster stuck on a mailbox just seemed a way to tie up this trip too. In Europe and here – and probably most other places, the ghosts of past horrors are how we interpret the present.
That’s why it’s so great to travel — and so great to come home, bearing our lessons with us.
BEST FRIENDS FOREVER
There we are** – Jane and me on her porch one summer during college. Friends since Brownies, we’ve always had a warm, respectful and sturdy relationship, interrupted by years at a time but never diminished. Recently she sent photos of a family reunion – her four kids and their spouses and all their kids. And some things she had written. Beautiful things. Especially about her parents. I knew them well; I spent so many Saturday nights at their house, even going to church with them in the morning. They never ate breakfast before Communion but Jane’s mom always insisted that I eat something even though I was going with them After all, I wasn’t taking Communion so why not?.
A "nice Jewish girl" in a milltown suburb (here I"m on the right and Jane on the left, I had no Jewish friends; Jane, Catholic, was my dearest. What might have been a huge cultural gap was just a curiousity; differences in our lives but not in how we felt about one another. We’d always sworn to be at one another’s weddings; I’ll never forget her beautiful one in the cathedral at Notre Dame. Years later, when it was my turn, Jane was living in Dallas and already a mother; she just couldn’t make it.
Then, just days before our wedding, she called. "Do you still have room on that boat of yours?" (We got married on a boat.) "I have to keep our promise- I’m coming!" It was so great and meant so much. Just as she knew it would.
That was 36 years ago; almost twice the age we were when the top photo was taken. But it doesn’t matter. The blessing of shared memories — of remembering each other’s parents and the Girl Scout trip to New York and her first love, who died in Vietnam — and mine, who ran off, perpetually stoned, to Santa Barbara — those memories make her part of so much of who I was and who I’ve become. What a gift to me that the one whose friendship blessed me was so blessed herself – generous and fine — helping me to be what she knew I had to be when I wasn’t sure myself what that was…not at all.
***NOTE: In order to observe the Sabbath, this post was written in late October and set to post on Saturday morning November 17th.
JERUSALEM DIARY 2.0: DAY TWELVE TEL AVIV DAY TWO
Breakfast in our little cafe surrounded by locals with dogs and newspapers. This is a wonderful neighborhood – the kind people move into until those who created it have to go someplace else because it’s become too expensive. You can see it happening all around us. But it’s fun for now and the Mediterranean is literally five or six blocks away.
On our way out we passed this noodle stand — I guess these people want fresh ones for Shabbat soup
These kids in the Carmel Market are canvassing to get people to sign up as organ donors. In Israel it is still difficult to convince people to participate because of Halachic rules about burial. Much has been done to change the rules, but the squeamishness has not abated. They were charming kids, and very committed to this issue – and they had quite a stack of cards of new registrants to the organ bank here.
It’s almost Shabbat so my post for tomorrow is written and ready; this is the last one from here. I’m hoping we can go tonight to the beach for the drums that welcome Shabbat then to our friends for Shabbat dinner.
JERUSALEM DIARY DAY 11: ACTUALLY WE’RE IN TEL AVIV IN THE “COOL” NEIGHBORHOOD (OF COURSE) OF NEVE TZEDEK
This little cafe, NINA, is also home to a small hotel owned by a young woman named Aliza. One of the pioneer establishments in the gentrifying neighborhood of Neve Tzedek, it’s full of the sorts of scenes you would expect in an area that was almost gone and is returning to a lively street and commercial life.
Here’s a bad photo of the room – I’ll post an improved one tomorrow. It’s a little apartment with a sleeping loft and a kitchen. Adorable.
This is the oldest neighborhood in Tel Aviv, just blocks from the sea. As you can see, there’s lots going on , even on a Thursday night – from book store readings to the odd practice of staging wedding photos posed against the industrial landscape here.
We’re going tomorrow to the drum circle on the beach and a crafts show with our friends. It’s nice to be in a modern city after all that time in Jerusalem – as moving as it is it’s also confining in an odd way. I have described the Jerusalem/Tel Aviv comparison as really Red State-Blue State and I think I’m right. Culturally, politically, sartorially and philosophically they are like Salt Lake City versus New York City. Both have their charms and represent parts of the Jewish whole but boy are they different. Goodnight from the Bluest state in the Middle East.
JERUSALEM DIARY 2.0 – DAY NINE — PHOTO ALBUM DAY
Today was our last day of classes – thrilling both at Pardes and the Ulpan. We got a funny little certificate from our Ulpan teachers – here we are with Shira – who taught us most of the time.
I was really sad to leave; it’s been so exciting for me to finally at least understand the alphabet and a flash card pile of new words. I never thought it would happen and am enormously grateful – I never thought I’d do this — but also very fond of the crew who taught us.
After class we went down to the Old City. Here’s some of what we saw:
SUNSET AT YEMEN MOSHE, OLD CITY ROOFTOP EFFORTS TO QUIET A FUSSY BABY, FINDING THEIR WAY – NEAR JAFFA GATE, FINDING THEIR WAY NEAR DAVID’S TOWER
OK. More tomorrow – onward to Tel Aviv – the Blue State to Jerusalem’s Red – at least 15 degrees warmer and the mirror opposite of this.