For the Birds

So we have been inundated with just about every bird in the universe. Wow. Look around there goes a ..a..well I don't know the name but it's cute. There are the little yellow and gray ones that are like the all gray ones but, well with yellow. Since we are lucky enough to live in the NJ turnpike for birds we get all kinds here but with less tolls. The Syrian-African rift valley is the land route from Africa to Europe. Birds that require a stop-over on their way north stop along this land mass. The price of hotels may be high but the buffet is primo.

I do know some names. The yellow one that looks like  a gray one is a Wagetail and even if I don't remember the names so much...but they are still cute. I did learn what a Hoopoe (Israel's national bird...as well as Lebanon's national bird) is and how a Plover will practically pluck your eyes out if you go too near their nest which is camoflogued better than anything in the Hunger Games.

In fact I saw a Hoopoe hit pay dirt this morning as it plucked a huge juicy dung beetle larvae from the ground. Now that is one five star breakfast. The bee eaters and sun birds are swarming around our Bougainvillea and the Warblers (the winged kind) have a nest at the top of our Marula tree.

Scores of Babblers (or so it seems) crowd into our Neem tree in the morning to sing at the top of their feathery guts. They love the Neem because (I think):

1. It keeps insects away
2. It is well camouflaged
3. Its thick branches provide cover from other birds
4. It is closest to our window thereby maximizing their waking power at 5 am.

So basically we are one giant pit stop for birds who can afford to winter in Africa, stop by to annoy us, and then fly back, first class, to enjoy summer in Europe and take in the EURO 2012 games from a birds eye view. Local hawks, buzzards, eagles and such take advantage of the unwary travelers and find their fill of tourists that will not be bringing home souvenirs.

Storks, pelicans and cranes often dot our skies with tremendous aerial shows but rarely touch down near here. Once there was a lovely gray heron that made its way between what once were outdoor fish ponds and turned them into empty pools of algae.

OMG, I turn my back for one minute and a young Great Bittern sneaks under the mulberry. I empty the house of family members, trying to coral the young chick for a picture but the Great B is very elusive and escapes under our storage shed and into the wilds of our backyard. Wow, now that is an exciting visit.

So basically we are a snack bar. Why should the birds have the pick of the platter? If you are hungry, why don't you stop by and tuck in. There are some nice grubs here. You can have your fill, except for that big dung beetle larvae guarded by the Hoopoe and don't get too close the the Plover!

Shabbat Shalom

Join me on Saturday for a little poetry (very little)
and
on Sunday for some more Memory Tripping

Freedom is Just Another World

Every day we wake we have a choice. Hit the snooze bar or not. No really we have so much freedom in this world we have completely forgotten the meaning of the word.

One more small rant about Passover cleaning. Almost every year while I am cleaning for Passover and I see the trash can overflowing and I remind my self of the real meaning of cleaning. Cleaning for me has always been a matter of taking my refuse and moving it into someone else's space. It is true that most of the time we are moving trash into an "appropriate" receptacle but somewhere down the line it becomes refuse to someone (or someplace) else. In other words, we are really cleaning when we scrub and dust and sweep and throw, we are moving, moving my crap to you. My mother never accepted that as an exemption from cleaning so, unfortunately, it doesn't let us off the hook. If I choose to live in a dirty/unclean place it doesn't make your space any cleaner. When we get down to it we should learn that our lifestyle contributes to the trash that we "consume". The only way to really clean in the end is to "consume" less. As the popular saying goes, "less is more". I don't know how we teach that and I don't know how to live with that completely, but it is a goal of mine. Live with less. As we enter this new holiday season lets try and embellish our lives by having less. Less to clean, less to purchase, less to throw away when it is broken or replaced.

I guess that brings me back to freedom. The cynical side of me wants to say that most people believe that freedom is the ability to choose between which sugary cereal to eat in the morning all to the profit of one or two huge corporations in the world, but we live in a more complicated world where everything we do can effect the global market. So actually what we eat for breakfast is actually a good place to start. We can easily fool ourselves that our actions are trivial which gives us the out for taking the "easy" road. I don't mean to preach a specific brand of consumerism, but I do believe struggling with the issues at hand will help us make the right decisions. What are the "right" decisions? The ones that we not only can live with but the ones we want to live with.

Yes from time to time we are faced with the really big questions...real life and death stuff, but then we are so focused we can only see the forest, it is when we are casually strolling through the trees we lose sight.

I have seen some of my friends invite guests over for Passover Seder, on Facebook etc. and I am very impressed. At the Passover Seder table we usually invite people to come in off the street and eat, but for most of us that part of the Seder is a ritual, very much detached from the realities of the real world. I also look up and admire those who make sure to give tzedakah before they themselves enjoy Seder or other festive meals.

We have so much choice. We really are very fortunate, lets remind our selves how fortunate, share when we can, live humbly and healthy, and look out for our neighbors as we would want them to look out for us.

Shabbat Shalom and Happy Passover

(My poetry blog this week is also on a Passover theme so I am publishing a day earlier.)

The Well Hung(er) Games

Spoiler Alert! Spoiler Alert!...this is not a Spoiler Alert. I have yet to read, see , hear, or even taste "The Hunger Games" and yet I feel fully qualified to rip the living guts out of this puppy. Am I sounding a little violent? Naw it is all in good fun in the kind of way that makes the gladiator fights to the death in ancient Rome look like Mr. Rodger's Neighborhood. I realize that my little blog will do nothing against the juggernaut of social media and well financed advertising campaign for the movie which by now has grossed 12 gazillion dollars but I feel obligated to say how ironic this whole thing is.

The Hunger Games appears to poke artistic pokers at the reality TV phenomena and the culture surrounding it. I imagine that as a book this can be most effective, but as a movie it seems too ironic.

Not just the movie alone, but the advertising and merchandising that goes with the whole cinematic ball of wax. As one panel member of "Wait Wait Don't Tell" said, he cant' wait for The Hunger Games Happy Meal to be announced. Even The Hunger Games lunch box and the Hunger Games Coffee Mug would be in such bad taste that by the time this blog goes "to print" they will already be sold out (I am not making this up, but when I first drafted this I did not know there really would be such a twisted and evil thing as a Hunger Games lunch box).

Think about it, after they exploit Hunger Games I, Hunger Games II etc. They will do what other franchises do and turn to the prequel, perhaps The Obesity Games in which well groomed spoiled surburban teens have to out eat the other selfish participants. It will not be long before Disney makes it into a stage show (and if you thought Spider Man - Turn Off the Lawsuits was ripe with accidents...just wait.) before the ultimate franchise bid. THEY WILL MAKE THE HUNGER GAMES INTO A REALITY TV SHOW. Yes, Gremlins are stealing this idea even as I type it. Think of the sponsors:

"We'll be right back to the Pizza Hut Hunger Games, sponsored by REI, When your life depends on a bulls-eye, think REI and now..."

My real problem is that we are sucked into beleiving (by the hype) that because we are supporting the "Heroine" aka the Good Gal (Kitn Ass or something), we are also part of the good guys, but truth be told we are showing how we are the sheep sitting in the audience. We are the people that are willingly opiated. Nothing really new here, it is the basis for Gladiator etc and that whole genre of films. When it comes down to it we are titillated by the female "macho" heroine. There is a love message going on too I suppose but that takes back seat to carnage and dog-eat-dog.

Meanwhile I have only attacked the story on its ironic mixed media message. Major themes in this movie are murder, mayhem, and (gulp) suicide. It sounds more like Clockwork Orange (which was originally given an X rating I believe). I have no idea how they got away with a PG-13 rating. Oh , yes I do too. I suppose the violence is not explicitly shown and they stick to cussing in PG-13 ways like:

"Oh Shappoie, I just shot an arrow into my best friend's heart."
or
"Oh fuddy duddy, what's this darn spear doing impaled on my head."

La de da, lets kill everybody off (nearly) but hey no need to get violent about it. There is also some drug reference but I think that is mostly by the audience members. From all of the reviews I nearly read I can tell this movie is well made, well acted and in the end will have a powerful message for many people. Specifically how much popcorn and Jujubes will be sold during The Hunger Games run. So everything is acceptable? I think I draw the line at suicide. Sure it is okay on Glee, but not in movies that market towards young teens. I don't know. Suicide is one of those taboo issues in my mind a "holy cow" if you will that needs special handling and orchestration. No, our media should not avoid the topic altogether but it need not be part of an epic adventure movie for entertaining the kiddies. "Are they going to commit suicide...oh no. Pass the Sno-Caps." I don't think so.

But audience members will be left questioning some of the movies underlying themes like, "When will this come out in 3-D?" Alright perhaps I am reading too much into this. Let's just let people have their blood sports and pay their ten bucks to see other people hack each other apart...just as long as I get a cool prize in my Happy Meal.

Fog Lifted

We were "treated" to three days of sandstorms here in the Arava and when I say treated I am really "euphemising" the experience much like one would refer to being "treated to a spinal tap". Sand storms here are not the ones in Hollywood movies that blur and blind leaving mountains of sand. Yes there is blowing and a fine coating of dust and grit but the two aspects that most bother me are the light and the pressure.

You certainly can not say that the Sourthern Arava is sun deprived. We have one of the highest percentages of days with sunlight in the world. No surprise Arava Power decided to locate their flagship solar array here. Ketura's hi-tech agricultural industry ALGA Technologies  thrives on the sunlight, but the light during a sand storm is different, diffused, unwavering and pervasive. Perhaps because all colors are dulled by the dust, the sunlight coming through the murk and gilings reflects off everything. Yesterday I sat opposite the window in the kibbutz dining  room opposite our nearby mountain that is home to the kibbutz "Menorah" and stands out as the official overlook of the community. Trying to even see the top of the mountain was complicated with the blinding glow that has conquered our skies. As the light overhead blinded me and I could barely make out the mountain in front of me. The light combined with the dust in the air manages to shut down any emotional reflection other than seclusion. The light and view manages to create the feeling you are occupying the only location on earth. I can't see the mountains of Jordan from here. I can't see the fields across the street. I can't even see the gate that is a mere 200 meters from me and that demarcates the property line of my home. I appear to be alone and so alone is how I feel too.

The other downer for me is the pressure. A low pressure system brings with it low depressions too. The weather plays havoc on my sinuses, lungs, and general well being. reducing me to a biological machine that is struggling through the motions liked a labored climber in the death zone. Each breath more precious than the last.

So now I can't see and I can't breath and my world has been shrunk to the 100 meters around me. I just want to go to sleep and wake up when it is over...but that is the joke. Upon waking the next morning the skies seem clearer but renewed winds blow waves of dust only to blind us again and send my respiratory system into maxed-out mode. I can practically see the solar array sucking Volts back out of the national grid as if to compensate for these days of diminished production, the algae pleading with the carbon dioxide for just a little snatch of rays, just enough to get by. The algae does well enough at night by going to sleep, but I imagine the light during a sand storm sends them into a tizzy.

Algae: Give me some of those Rads
CO2: I don't have any.
Algae: Give me some of those Rads, I say! I don't need them, I just want some.
CO2: I am a gas. I have no radiation.
Algae: I can give up sun light whenever I want. GIVE ME SOME LIGHT! NOW!

Okay so maybe this is silly when was the last time you overheard a gas talking (Please do not answer or send "interesting" emails.)

It must be like drinking lite beer, it says beer on the label and comes in a beer can, but tastes like an unfamiliar beverage and  provides no true benefit. I guess I have to drink another one or twelve to feel anything. Why?  What benefit does a sandstorm bring? If you know than please leave me alone. I enjoy being miserable sometimes. Okay I guess that is the side "benefit" of the "chamsin", I am miserable. The day passes in a blur and I retreat to the confines of my home for as long as possible armed with nose drops and other elixirs. At some point I am dreaming that I am deep sea diving and my oxygen has been cut off and I am soon awake, snorting and blowing. Finally the exhaustion and the exhaustion of this weather bring me back under the covers and before I know it it is day again.

Today I awoke to birds singing in the trees. I am reminded of Spring and the spring sunshine, not the blinding light of the sandstorm but the bright light that accentuates colors and compliments the mountains during sunset, the light that nourishes our algae and powers the cells in the solar array. I don't even need to open my eyes to know that this storm has passed. A few nostrillian breathes and I can feel it. I feel much better.  In fact...I think I will celebrate the winds of change and go back to sleep. Snooze!

Shabbat Shalom

My Prose Palette

My mother is often heard saying, "If only I were a painter..." especially at scenic vistas, sunsets, and special family events. I think she could be a good painter too but it takes a special kind of person who is willing to put their soul out there on canvas for others to critique and analyze. Do you feel like you want to paint a beautiful scene when you see one?

I understand where my mother's sentiment is coming from. When I was little, the word desert had no tangible meaning to me, it was only a word that could easily be misspelled to read, dessert...and hey who doesn't like dessert. Now, I live opposite one of the most scenic desert mountain ranges in Israel. The southern part of Israel is mostly made up of the Negev desert. Even the name, Negev, implies a land swept clean, barren. Ecologists will argue the point that what we perceive as barren is teaming with life, just life that escapes our glances, ways of life that require a different pace of life to be seen.

The mountainscape of the southern Arava has a different life however, a constantly changing (evolving?) scene that would beguile and frustrate the most adept of artists. I haven't decided if this is an inspiration or a frustration. If it were me, I would want to paint the scene and then move on. Here a painter could paint a number of paintings from the same exact position and no two paintings would be the same. It might even be hard to convince someone who has never been to the Arava valley that the mountains could be so different from day to day.

We have an artist on the kibbutz, her name is Marla Slott and she paints, sculpts and otherwise defies nature with her brush strokes. Somehow she is able to capture the emotion of a landscape that changes more quickly than a busy Tel Aviv thoroughfare and emote the desert landscape for even the casual viewer to appreciate.

There is a decided danger to this environment that comes with a stern warning. The danger is in believing that we are producing a more stable world. The warning is usually subtle, showing itself in hues of change until the day when it erupts from the surface and swallows our attention.

In general, I believe, we as humans are ever seeking stability and predictability. I guess this is in and of itself an oxymoron since we are always seeking and yet looking for the stability. Predictability is what keeps us sane. The sun will rise tomorrow so I don't have to worry about the sun setting today. This landscape, this ever changing and evolving desert chalice, makes us question the predictability of tomorrow. Perhaps that is why the desert has been so inspirational for many teachers, writers, philosophers, and of course to many artists.

The sands and the rocks are moving beneath our feet and these are the minute changes that can only be perceived over longer periods of time but that can suddenly become very violent and controlling. As much as we would like to think we can control our lives, we are ultimately not masters of our fates. Tectonic plates, global warming, ice ages, and human polemic are constantly moving and re-shaping our world.

I suppose it could be easier if we were all to live in more stable environments, but instead we choose to dig and force our lives to take root in the shifting sands. In this flux we build our homes because we want to carry on a dialogue with the nature that seeks to control and to learn to control our need for control and stability.

Shabbat Shalom

Not So Shuttle

I like language. I also like getting to my local clinic without exceptional difficulty. What is the connection?

I am no language  expert (which I prove each time I blog), but when I hear the name Richard Lederer or Avshalom Kor I get a tingle in my  epiglottis. It really whets (not wets) my appetite to learn the etymologies of words. More often than not these little quips provide for passing entertainment or even a charming way to break into a conversation but are rarely down-to-earth applicable. Living in a community where there are more than one language spoken also complicates the matter.

There are instances where a colloquially accepted word in Hebrew is pronounced similar to the English counter part. One example that comes to mind is the Hebrew "Pendal" which is a bastardization of the English, "Penalty" referring to penalty kicks in soccer (aka football), but whether you say Pendal or Penalty Kicks the meaning is the same.

There are words that have the same homonymic trait but have different meanings, for instance the Hebrew word pronounced "toast" primarily refers to what in America would be called a grilled cheese sandwich whereas the Hebrew for toasted bread is "Tznim". Colloquially you may find the Hebrew "toast" used interchangeably but traditionally it is only for the grilled cheese made on the Hebrew, "toaster" as opposed to the toasted bread warmed in a "Matznem".

Several years ago there was a proposal to consolidate the health services of several communities and form a regional health center. This proposal outlined all aspects of the functioning of the center including a public transportation solution which is critical to these outlying communities. The proposal called for the establishment of a shuttle system to transport the members of said communities as needed to their scheduled and unscheduled  appointments.

I was concerned when the proposal was first announced. Up until that time, we received our primary medical services on the kibbutz without need to consider transportation or the time it takes to go from one place to another or the cost of the time itself away from work and I was a bit more accepting when I heard that the proposal was going to take care of everyone with a system of shuttle buses.

I rode shuttle buses all the time in University and they can be a very efficient form of transportation. After I graduated I even heard that some students used the shuttles to get to classes which I thought was a novel application of the system (but that is the subject of another blog). The plan was passed and all of the medical clinics in the region (except dental) moved to a central location. The first few years passed but the shuttle system was never established. When asked, "What about the Shuttle?" the answer was, "There is a Shuttle. If you need a ride just ask and we will figure something out." My immediate reaction was, "That's not a shuttle."

Lets backtrack one minute. When the original Hebrew proposal was published the Hebrew word "Shuttle" was used and not the more common "Hasa'a" which would mean transport (bus, limo, taxi etc.). Now shuttle is a very specialized word. The word's origin is in the weaving industry. On a loom threads are strung through the reeds of the loom and those strands collectively make up the warp of the item being woven. Whereas the fiber that is woven between the threads of the warp is the weft. Typically the yarn for the weft is wound on a spool and set in a piece of equipment called a shuttle. The shuttle is moved from side to side of the loom. As the shuttle travels down the loom the weft is released. The shuttle traverses the loom and the position of the warp threads is adjusted and then the shuttle returns. When the shuttle returns the warp threads re-adjusted and the shuttle goes back. In short, the shuttle goes from point A to point B. Upon arrival the shuttle simply returns to the other side.

When the proposal for the central clinic passed I was expecting a shuttle. A transport of some sort that would travel on a set path from point A to B (or with way points) and then return. The advantage of a shuttle system is that you know with predictable certainty that the transport will take no longer than X minutes to arrive based on its route and the number of shuttle buses being operated. No schedule is required except to define the operation hours and list the stops.

So... I like language. I also like getting to my local clinic without exceptional difficulty. What is the connection? I guess there is no connection, alas alack there are no shuttles in the Arava! So that is the local shuttle butt.

Shabbat Shalom

Beerded Men

I went on a beer trip in January with two brew buddies whom I will call "Yoni" and "Richard". We had a great time. In addition to touring several micro-breweries, pubs, and tasting almost 100 different beers, we just had a very nice time together not thinking about anything in particular and enjoying each others company. I had also been working on a writing project (something for myself, not for work) and I had just finished so I felt I deserved a little wine & dine or more aptly beer & cheer.

On Tuesday morning we packed up the car and headed out towards Tel Aviv, after a short search for a brewery in Kiryat Gat (we had a name but no address), we continued to Petach Tikva, where I took the guys to a place called JEMS. About a month ago I went to this brew pub with my oldest after a short visit to the Children's Hospital also located in Petach Tikva. So Yoni, Richard and I had a very nice lunch there. I also left a bottle of my beer for their brew master Jeremy (originally from DC) who was busy at the exhibition center setting up their brewery's station at the fair. Lunch was great and they even gave us a small sample of a special edition brew that I tasted while it was still in the fermenter (if that is a word at all) on my previous visit. JEMS makes their own hot dogs too, which were an excellent side car to the ales.

We then drove to downtown Tel Aviv were we stashed our stuff with Yoni's in-laws. The "in-laws" own an apartment in Tel Aviv and visit it for a few months of out of the year and as they had just arrived the day before we really lucked out. Almost as important, they managed to secure us a parking space so that we could proceed the rest of the night using public transportation. So to start things off right in Tel Aviv, Richard took us to a pub called the Brew House in a very nice section along Rothschild. The Rothschild boulevard has been beautified over the last 10 years or so with many pretty little parks, biking paths and even WIFI spots. Yoni's in-laws live near the start of the road, near the HaBima Center for performing arts (I remember they were showing Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf when I visited in 76). The Brew House was set up very nicely, They offered three of their own beers, but they no longer brew in Tel Aviv. They moved the brewing to Ashdod. The pub is decorated with very attractive copper plated brew kettles and fermenters, but no working equipment. The beer was respectable but I wouldn't go out of my way to go back.

We then moved on to the exhibition. After a short bus ride to south Tel Aviv we entered the Nokia Colosseum which is the home to Maccabi Tel Aviv Basketball. I had signed the three of us up as "professionals" in the field and upon registration we received free entrance and a tasting glass (gratis). So if you can imagine a large basketball stadium like the Cap center or something like that, all around the stadium on one level, were booths...over a hundred different stations, almost all of the either importers or brewers with a smattering of food stops, and assorted "knik knacks".

What was most surprising were the number of Israeli brewers, quite a few that none of us had heard of them, and we had done some research before we planned the trip. One of the most interesting for me were two brothers that brew in their parents attic and make very nontraditional beers, including one that uses sage instead of the traditional hops. They had seven different beers (wow) and they aren't even selling! The number of places that exhibited their wares but were not (yet) commercial, really surprised me. For them it was like a county fair in that sense. So again imagine 100 places to try beer and each one with several types of beer to try. It took us over three hours to get around the building and we didn't even eat there.

One of the more outstanding beers there was from a Jerusalem based brewery called, Shapiro. Tgratushey are well established and offer a solid variety of beers, but at the exhibition they had a special winter edition of beer called, Jack's Winter Ale...where the beer is soaked in barrels with oak chips that have been flavored with Jack Daniels Whiskey. When I read about it I thought it was a gimmick, but the flavor was outstanding. This process doesn't raise the alcohol content seriously, but imparts a very complementary smoky peaty taste that whiskey-beer lovers will enjoy.

I did get to see Jeremy from JEMS and thank him in person for our previous tour and we chatted and drank with people we met there including another ex-pat who blogs (in English) about Israeli Beer, and another ex-pat who is the brew master at the Dancing Camel brew pub in Tel Aviv.

The other brew worth mentioning was one called Keller. It was brewed by several crafts people especially for the exhibition and to raise awareness (and funds) for people who are blind-deaf and deaf. A ten shekel contribution gave you a taste of beer served by deaf attendants who communicated in sign language and special bottles of the beer were to be auctioned off to different breweries/pubs for additional revenue. What a great idea!

So what do you do after a night of drinking beer? You go out and drink some more. We hopped (all puns intended) over to the dancing camel to see their brewery and enjoy the ambiance of a Tel Aviv pub, with jazz quartet playing at the entrance. The food wasn't kosher so I just munched on corn chips but the other guys had sandwiches and we tasted the local ale too. Excellent selection of beers and good service. Not at all rowdy (at least not that night) and rather spartan in decor, since the seating area is also the brewery. I liked that a lot. Oh how Bohemian of me. I imagine they can also use it for big dance parties too.

We walked home from there and got to see the Habima area lit up at night. Worth the trip if you are staying in the Tel Aviv area.

We took our time getting up in the morning and relating the previous nights events to our hosts. Interestingly enough Yoni's in-laws had attended an evening dinner-performance called "Not by Bread Alone" which is produced and acted by members of the deaf community. The experience sounds fascinating and I shared with them our experience at the exhibition in Holon several years ago at the "Dialog in the Dark" which focuses on living as a blind person.

Yoni was keen on showing us a local bakery so off to breakfast we went. We enjoyed some sun as we walked through the new gardens at the cultural center and then on to Hashmonaim two doors down from the original Cafe Joe to a bakery called Lechamim (Breads). Wow and Yum. We had a mini quiche, croissant, bear claw, and even tasted their cheese sticks. I really loved the bear claw which was light and fluffy and very tasty.

Interestingly enough we passed a rather expansive wine store (Derech Hayayin, Wine Route) which also had a large selection of beer. The store attendant, who had been at the show last night) poured off several kinds of beer for us and we were soon tasting and chatting about what else, beer and spirits.

As we walked back to pack the car, the weather turned slightly cold and a light rain started. We thanked our hosts for their hospitality and drove to South Tel-Aviv-Jaffa to a home brewing supply store. We had a short wish list which we did our best to complete and then back to the car heading north for our final brew stop.

We drove up to a place, not far from Givat Chaim, just south of Hadera, called Alexander. The brewery is named for the Alexander stream which flows south of their position and the symbol for the brewery is a turtle. The turtles of Nachal Alexander were almost all killed off by pollution but thanks to efforts by environmentalists, the turtles have been replenished and the stream cleaned up.

The brewery in its current form is rather new, only one year old. They brew and distribute themselves and they brew about 8,000 liters a month, which is a lot for a micro-brewery in Israel. The place is state-of-the-art and we got a lovely tour while the skies above us fell in great lashes of rain. A perfect place to stop and taste and talk. We were the only visitors and we got the royal treatment. The woman who gave us the tour took us around each part of the small facility and let us ask our crazy questions. The few questions she didn't know the answer to were answered by a the brewer who was working there.

At the end she opened a few bottles for us to taste and we gave their Green, IPA style beer very high marks. The Green had won the best in show last year and it was deserving. They had an excellent Porter which is brewed with oats and we made a few purchases for us and for some people on the kibbutz that asked us to pick up some bottles along the way. I even got a free glass out of it because I am a pushy Israeli.

I ran out to our car and gave them a few bottles of our own brew to try and then it was time to turn South (no puns intended) and head home. We made a direct trip home except to stop of Varda's for lunch. Sharon and I took Alan and the kids to eat there..it is sort of a truck stop, diner kind of place but with home cooking where they accost you as you enter with a spicy beef stock soup and you don't leave until you are warm and well fed.

We were home in time to rejoin our families at dinner and to share stories. So now its time to plan the next trip! I would like to get up north if possible and see the breweries on the Golan and upper Galilee, but that can wait a year or two.

Shabbat Shalom

Apart From the Past

Were you born in the wrong time? I know I was. I don't suppose there is anything one can do about it and I suppose that is one reason there are so many movies, books, etc. that use time travel as the answer to present day misfortune. I really want to know if this is just a fixation of mine or do other people feel this way.

Sure I know more then a few people who would like to know how it was to live at a certain time period. How did people talk to each other in Shakespearean England? What was the mood during the depression? Was "Another one Bites the Dust" a popular song during the plague? and other important historical issues. I don't really mean those people. I guess it is more like the Woody Allen movie, "Midnight in Paris" where the main character romanticizes about living in Paris of the past (supposedly because he is lost in the Paris of the present.) That could easily be me and the way I feel now.

I suppose there is nothing I can do about it but more and more I get the feeling, or more accurately the yearning to go back in time...not too far perhaps the beginnings of the State, or the beginnings of the Kibbutz movement and see what the average person thought about and what they felt, not just the ideologues and the thinkers, the ones that put their thoughts on paper, the ones that drove the socialist movement, the ones that drafted and indoctrinated, and the ones that eventually become so frustrated that they too left the kibbutz fold. How did people react when the first person asked for something of his own? When the kibbutz decided to allow individuals to have their own tea kettle in their "room" were there people saying, It's the beginning of the end."

I would have loved to walk in the freshly ploughed fields near the Kinneret as the flies buzzed around me and still be able to marvel at the sun as it beat down upon me drawing out sweat and tears but to still see the beauty of the sunset and the shadows of the dusk as they slither over the Syrian Golan heights with nothing but fields and open space all around me. What would it have been like to imagine a vibrant state in a budding environment and what does it then feel like to see a bustling chain of communities clogging the roads and choking the last ounces of mother earth. The pioneers of those days built Utopia, at least in my mind, they built the perfect harmony of work, struggle, and accomplishment. Will future generations look back at us and think the same? or will they wonder at our selfishness and corruption of the natural resources we abused. Will they critique our lust for money and power? or will they wonder why we didn't wield even greater power?

I look over to Jordan (and what did I see...) and wonder what will change here in this valley during my children's lifetime. When I reflect upon what I have accomplished up until now, I am not too impressed. I have not built the Utopia I dreamed of in my idealistic teens and one could easily debate whether I am leaving a better world or a more complicated and dangerous world for the next generation. So you say, "Hey, get off your but and do something!" I agree and I am encouraged by many of my peers who volunteer, who build communities, who engineer demonstrations, and who, most importantly, are not complacent.

It is easy to look back at what appears to be a simpler time and yearn for our issues to be simpler and more easily understood and it is much harder to look forward and have a good sense of where to step up and act. The sun is going down and although the sky is filled with a haze that blinds me, the smell is of the incapacitated waste water treatment ponds, the buzzing of the cars from the highway but I know that the hills of Edom are turning blood red and the migratory birds are circling looking for shelter for the night. If I try hard I can block out the high tension lines and see just the mountains whose changing colors befuddle geologists and poets alike. Even if I am not sure where to act, I can start by imagining  the world in the way I dream of seeing it.

Shabbat Shalom

Hard of Herring

I am sick. My nose has been stuffed for about a month now (no kidding) and now my ears are blocked. Each time I go for nose drops I feel guilty. How many of those little plastic bottles am I going to use? Why don't they have an economy size for nose drops? I know you aren't suppose to use nose drops for too long but I weighed the option of not using them and the option of not breathing until the cold abates...guess what I chose. It is suppose to be hot here in the Sahara but not this winter. We really had a true winter...okay it didn't go down below freezing more than....well never but it is cold for us warm weather light weights.

Having my ears all stuffed up makes me think a bit about my oldest who is profoundly deaf and yet functions quite well armed with a hearing aid and a cochlear implant. The part for me that is hard to grasp is that even if intellectually he knows he is deaf, he doesn't really know what it feels like to be deaf. Sure every so often you might here him say something like, "Well I don't hear so well do I?", but that could be any teenager talking to his parent. When he was younger, before he had the implant and before he "grew up" he would often wake up in the morning, especially Shabbat morning, before anyone else. I don't really know why he did this, I used to say that he was more affected by the morning light than the rest of us, but that was a shot in the dark (ha ha). My son likes to do things and likes to be involved with something. Especially on the Sabbath he has learned the art of curling up on the sofa and enjoying a good book with a sidecar of hot tea and a bowl of Cheerios and ice cold milk. God bless him.

What I don't understand is why he doesn't put his hearing aid in when he first gets up in the morning. I would go nuts if I didn't hear anything. Like having my ears or nose blocked...I grab the drops and ease the congestion. I would reach for my hearing aid and then probably my teeth when I woke up. If my son never heard in his life, I would understand it. You can't miss something you never had to begin with right? But he has heard and he can hear, so why isn't his first morning impulse to go and put in his hearing aid? Even more so because when someone else gets up he might start a conversation with them. A rather one sided conversation which I find rather clever of him. So it isn't because he wants to shut himself off from the outside world, which is totally something I would do if I had a hearing aid and wanted to escape the big bad world. Okay, you caught me. There would be times I would want to hear and there would be times I would elect to shut down.

This question troubled me for awhile until I was speaking with a friend of mine who has some trouble seeing in the mornings. He uses a hair dryer to dry his eyes and only then can he fully function. He was describing how, on a non-work day, he would wake up and not bother with the normal ritual and deferred to other things before having to "get sighted". Now he wasn't not using electricity for purely halachic reasons nor was he being irresponsible; perhaps a bit lazy but the choice was intentional. One day a week, and not really a whole day, just a few morning moments that he could pigeon hole the routine and be himself for himself with no one else letting him know he is different. Perhaps for my son that is the way he feels too. When he would get up early in the morning and the only one awake was him, he could set the rules of what is reality. What is normal.

Now my son is much older and if he wakes at all in the morning it is to grab a bowl of cereal and to climb back into bed. Now that sounds like a plan to emulate.

Shabbat Shalom

Turns on a Dime

Days come and go so quickly, but there are moments in my day that make my days seem strangely longer and threaten to shorten my life. I am refering primarily to those moments where brains fail and muscles muscle in, like yesterday when I launched into an inane argument about sports statistics with a friend. We were both being pig-headed about it and in the end we parted with sour expressions. Why is it that we can't just stop mid-argument and say, "Hey, this is just stupid sports." I can be having an incredibly productive day, sun shining, and blue skies but them a dime turn and I find myself skulking behind my computer monitor trying to hid from people and sunshine.

If the muse hits me I might put on some music or listen to an entertaining podcast to try and releive myself of the funk, but it still rides over me like a dark storm cloud. So to try and scatter the couds a bit, I have decided to try blogging. I have often found writing very catharthic, ever since my sister gave up her manual typewriter for a new Smith Corona. Pounding on the keys in the privacy of my bedroom empowered me in ways I wouldn't realize for many years to come. Looking back on that time I was rather prolific. Keep in mind this was before the age of the personal computer. A journal was a book that you kept next to your bedside or desk and you did not need a password to open it (perhaps a key). When making a typing mistake out came the noxious white out. I typed on onion skins and enscribed blank books with graphite, India, and dye.