Skip to main content

Slowly, slowly, slowly

I can't remember the number of times I have use this phrase in Hebrew - all things related to settling into life in Israel go this way - slowly. It takes patience, which is remarkable for a country totally lacking in patience!

I've put on my daily to do list to write this post numerous times since I started this experience. And, shockingly, it's gotten pushed off a bit. But I'm persistent, if nothing else.

First of all, thank you to everyone who wrote back to me with kind words of support and encouragement.

My mother wrote with an insightful and thought-provoking point. And so I'll use that as a jumping off point here. She wrote to me: "I would also ask why you are writing to the audience you pick and what you want to tell them." Easier said than done!

To answer the first part, I don't have an audience in mind in particular. I have shared this with everyone in my address book and invite you all to share it on further. The absence of a specific audience does make developing posts and and overall theme or message challenging.

I have come to realize that as a stay-at-home mom, for now, I have a lot of time to myself and that leads to a lot of thinking. I am looking for a way to share my thoughts, as well-developed as they hopefully are, in a way to spark thoughts in others, actions in others and myself, and build on my thought process in a more active way. And as a way to check myself and see if my thoughts are really as good as I think they are!

I do not intend for this to be a blog about me, my kids, my parenting adventures (as awesome as they are!), and hopefully it will not be me telling others what I think is right. Rather, I am hoping to use this experience to clear and organize my head and share with others my thoughts in the attempts to create a dialog - virtual or real, communal or personal.

As a final note, it does strike me, as I suspect it may have struck others in my family, at least, that there is a longstanding tradition of journalism and the written word as a career in my family. It strikes me as apropos that I am digging into something in the journalistic arena.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Macher or Schmoozer?

I'm working my way slowly through the book Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam . In a nutshell, which has to be pretty big because it's a hefty book, it's about social behaviors and the decline of them in the US - things like voting and participating in the political process at all levels, and engaging with volunteer and community efforts. Chapter six looks at Informal Social Connections. At paragraph two of the chapter he mentions the Yiddish words macher and schmoozer . That stopped me in my tracks for a moment. He continued to explain that fundamentally a macher is a doer, someone who makes things happen in the community. Whereas a schmoozer is a talker, a person with an active social life, someone who focuses on informal connections to others. And while it is certainly nice to sit and talk with someone, at the end of the day that's all a schmoozer does. Alternatively, the macher will sit and visit with you and then either your roped into helping or the macher...

Cooperation isn't a dirty word

I started this slowly evolving blog after hearing Senator Diane Feinstein's inspiring words in the documentary Miss Representation . I find myself, now, even more so, propelled forward by that thought. We are indeed only here on this earth, here engaged with our communities for an instant in what is really an eternity. So our contribute while critical and vital is fleeting. It has been nearly 4 years since I started this blog, and as you can see, I haven't given it a great deal of attention. There is so much to do, so much need in the world, so much good to be done, so much inequality to be called out. How can I even find time to stop for a few minutes, string together a few well chosen words, and even take another minute to review those chosen words? Certainly not when all three kids need me NOW! (Of course they don't really but don't tell them that!) Times have certainly been tough these past three months since the world was rocked by the US election...

Seven Years Back...Seven Years Forward

Eight years ago we decided to take the job offer from Intel and make aliyah. It was a one-way move. It took us another half year to get it all organized. We packed up and moved. Then we arrive. Las year was our sabbatical (שבתון in Hebrew) year, our Shmita year. It was a time for us, whether we knew it or not, to take a bit of a rest, a rest from this exhausting and exhilarating process of absorption into Israeli society. I did a bit of a mental relax, not really a check out, more of a check in - an adjustment of expectations. The history of the State of Israel and the stories surrounding her founding are told in epic, mythical proportions in the diaspora. It's hard as a Jewish child not to be engaged by these stories, won over, even. The challenges were massive and daunting. The confidence and enthusiasm were boundless. The pioneers who founded the State of Israel would be successful. We talk about the heroic establishment of Israel, the heroic history of the country, and t...