Springtime

Dear blog, how I’ve neglected you! But if you only knew what my life has been like these past few weeks, I’m sure you’d understand.

We had a lovely, low-key Passover that included the three essential ingredients for any successful family gathering: much food, much wine and much laughter. We ate matzah and brisket. We skipped around in the Haggadah (fast-forwarding to the good parts, if you will). We enjoyed non-Manischevitz swill. We celebrated my brother’s birthday with key lime cheesecake, which, thankfully, he ate all by himself. (This particular confection did not appeal to me, and not because it wasn’t kosher for Passover.) In the morning, we ate matzah brei and our version of Israeli salad. In fact, we did little else but eat for two days. Ah, Jewish holidays—how we love you!

School keeps me inordinately busy and I am very much looking forward to the culmination of another challenging semester. I have some decisions to make regarding my summer plans, which I hope will include a trip to Israel and some time to relax before beginning my final semester in August. I am amazed at how quickly my time as a student has passed—even though some weeks have dragged along at a infant’s pace, the months and years have raced by.

As always, my mind is a jumble of thoughts (good and bad), plans, feelings, ideas and plenty of cow dung in between, keeping everything warm and sticky. I'm incapable of quieting it, most of the time. It’s like that car alarm that no one ventures outside to silence; the one that pierces the otherwise peaceful night and makes sleep impossible.

The sudden passing of a friend’s father last week has me preoccupied with thoughts of death and fear of losing someone dear to me in such an abrupt way. I fully recognize how lucky I am to have reached the age of 35 without suffering the death of someone so close to me that my daily life is altered by their loss. That’s not to say I haven’t lost loved ones—I’m just incredibly fortunate that the wonderful people I hold most dear in my life are still here.

I recently read an excellent article about poisoned Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko that disturbed me greatly and has reawakened an uneasy awareness of the horrors men are capable of perpetrating against others. Recent news stories about people burning Jewish synagogues in New York absolutely horrify me. More and more friends having children (I have as many friends with kids as without) and books I've seen on the subject have me contemplating my own feelings about parenthood, while the coming end of this phase of my education forces me to seriously consider what the future holds. I realize none of these thoughts are unique to me, but my way of deliberating and sorting through them is truly my own, whether effective or not.

Meanwhile, I’m jumping on a plane yet again--very excited to see family and friends in NYC. Luckily for me, I can always count on my east-coast loved ones to bolster the spirit and urge me forward on my journey.

Posted by ayelet at April 9, 2007 10:56 AM