About the settlement freeze

Last week, the Cap’n informed me (after returning with his Friday morning shopping) that the Associated Press was in the shopping center of Efrat interviewing settlers about the 10-month settlement freeze proclaimed by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. I suspect most people opposed it, and for good reason.  Settlements are not now, nor ever have been, [...]

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A dream is NOT a wish your heart makes

Regular readers of my blog are pretty familiar with my version of Israeli politics–center-right in Israel, far to the right on an American scale, and way off the deep end in most of the rest of the world.  What may be slightly more surprising is that my politics have at last managed to make their [...]

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Praise to HODS

Years ago, while living in the US, flyers from the Halachic Organ Donor Society appeared at our shul giving information and a pitch for traditional Jews to consider donating organs. Many traditional Jews (and not-so-traditional ones) believe that because Judaism embraces the value of kavod ha’adam (respect for the human body), does not generally support [...]

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Those who forget history…

There are days when, as a Jew and an Israeli, I just cannot bear to read the news.  It’s just too awful.  Yesterday was one such day. Two headlines I read yesterday read as follows: “Germany attacks Israel settlement plan before visit” and “‘Why Israel’ film canceled after violent German leftist protest.” The first was [...]

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On Jewish writers and writing

Last Wednesday, author Tova Mirvis spoke at the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute on the subject, “Writing Between Worlds: On being a Jewish writer.”  She set out to answer the two questions most often addressed to Jewish writers: Do you consider yourself a Jewish writer?  And, Is this a Jewish book? I am fascinated by these questions with [...]

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I hate growth charts

The Cap’n took Bill for his regular well-child visit last week to Tipat Chalav, the children’s clinic where they do weight checks, observe the child’s development, and offer dietary advice. Back in the US, I used to find these regular well-child visits to the pediatrician’s office pleasant.  Our children were usually healthy, thank God, and [...]

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Lessons from twenty years ago

I’ve been thinking these past few months about what I was doing 20 years ago.  Following my college graduation, I traveled for six months in Asia and Europe on my own, and saw wonders and learned things that I would never have seen or learned otherwise. I had dutifully ordered my life according to expectations: [...]

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Bleeding hearts: Another point

After my recent post about bleeding hearts, a lively debate took place in the comments section.  A card-carrying bleeding heart stepped forward and offered all the tired, worn arguments those of his ilk use, employing slogans and buzzwords, and accusing me and others of being unable to see the other side, reality, the truth.  Among [...]

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Shiva and redemption

I’ve been to a number of shiva houses since “getting religion.”  While a few have been grueling—families mourning mothers of young children, a 4-month-old baby—most are for adults who have lost parents.  The mourners in these houses are sometimes surprised, even shocked, by their parent’s sudden death, but in most cases, the mourners are resigned, [...]

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What’s YOUR Thanksgiving menu?

The Cap’n and I spent Thanksgiving of 1996 on a program in Arad where we and a group of fellow students managed to cobble together a quite respectable dinner.  We were joined by a few British and Australian friends who enjoyed the repast, but were hard pressed to discover the meaning behind the holiday feast.  [...]

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Ilana Epstein’s 10-minute pasta sauce

I’ve struggled for much  of my life to find a pasta sauce I liked that wasn’t prohibitively priced.  In the US, our family liked Barilla sauce (to match our Barilla pasta, of course).  But here in Israel, we find, the pasta is still affordable, but the sauce is not.  (It comes in jars half the [...]

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On bleeding hearts

Disclaimer: This is a combination rant/analysis of a problematic type of person in the world today.  I acknowledge that the majority of the readers of this blog do not fit this description.  Therefore, if you do not see yourself in the post following this disclaimer, do not be offended.  If you do see yourself, you [...]

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The science of fall foliage

While this is not a Mayflower-specific fact, it is one that I gleaned from reading Nathaniel Philbrick’s book, and that interests me greatly: Neither Bradford nor Winslow[two governors of Plymouth Colony] mention it, but the First Thanksgiving coincided with what was, for the Pilgrims, a new and startling phenomenon: the turning of the green leaves [...]

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Book Review: Nathaniel Philbrick’s Mayflower

I’ve been reading a lot of non-fiction in the past few months.  At the end of October, I decided at last to pick up a book I purchased a couple of years ago, Nathaniel Philbrick’s Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War. Philbrick, a Nantucket resident, became curious about the Pilgrim story while researching [...]

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The memorial that wasn’t

Like most bloggers, I occasionally get spam comments on my posts.  I usually don’t mind, and once I’ve ascertained their irrelevance and self-serving nature, I simply delete them.  But the subject line of the spam comment I received in my inbox this morning after yesterday’s Tragical History Tour post caught my eye: “Memorial to Warsaw [...]

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Tragical history tour

I exchanged pleasantries with a friend on Shabbat.  He told me that he and his wife were to spend that evening with a friend who had recently returned from a trip to Poland.  Since most Jews don’t visit Poland just to sample the borsht and visit the church where Chopin’s heart rests (his body lies [...]

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Missing out

Yesterday, while enjoying a very pleasant Shabbat lunch with neighbors, the subject of becoming religious, conversion, and intermarriage came up.  My neighbor told me about a family she knew where a grown child married someone very religious, came to live in Israel, and hasn’t seen her parents since.  But not because she herself is too [...]

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