Transitions

   Rabbi Zev once told us that a rabbi, a Jew, has to be ready to go to a funeral and then a wedding on the same day, maybe within a few hours, minutes. As a rabbi maybe he didn't have to change clothes. But he did have to change his emotional tone, his presentation, demeanor, shed the sadness to receive the joy. 

We have three holidays in Israel this time of year, within a week and a day. Two are very sad, one, Independence Day, very happy. We are called upon to transition, as if from hundreds of funerals, to the celebration of a birth of a nation.* We transition in exactly they way Rabbi Zev says we can and we must. 

The first of the three holidays is Holocaust Remembrance Day. 

One might think, why not fold it into the next one, Memorial Day?But that all too imaginable Nazi slaughter takes top prize in every genocide contest.  It needs a secosl category of horror.

Here, in Israel, survivors of the Holocaust gather in the evening, light candles, sing songs, among others  Chai, Chai, Chai, Am Yisrael Chai. We still LIVE. Never forget us. How could we?

FD and I sing in a choir, a makhailah-מקהלה. We meet on Sunday nights with other new immigrants in a modern music hall. An exceedingly talented musical director takes us into our past with song, cultural immersion that reaches the depths of the soul. 

For the past several weeks we worked on a few to sing to/with survivors. Share that they are not forgotten. See them smile. 

They sit and drink coffee, nibble at cake in the small social hall. In blue skirts and pants, white tops, we sit in chairs opposite them. There is no stage. Candles are lit, stories told. We sing. It is an emotional day. It takes something from us, there's a catch in our throats, a halt to our breath knowing that this living history, in twenty years, is history. We give something to them, but they give us back much more. 

Next day I'm walking home from the pool. School just let out. The kids coming from school seem less animated usual. They are in black and white. Everyone remembers.

That was a week ago. 

The second holiday-- I promised three-- is Memorial Day, Yom Hazicaron, a week later, another remembrance day but this time we remember the young men and women who have sacrificed their lives so that we can live. 

War after war, well before the establishment of the State of Israel, Jews have been elbowing off their enemies, armies, countries, tribes, all collaborating to murder Jews, make us an ex-nation, an ex-people. They considering us to be the interlopers.** Our Torah begs to disagree and the Torah (those 5 books) precedes their holy prophets by 1500 to two thousand years. Just saying. Is it a competition? I feel in this case it is.

Israelis attend town gatherings on Yom Hazicaron , they hear dozens of stories of fallen, murdered soldiers, young men and women, their photographs streaming on Jerusalem stone, parents and siblings breaking our hearts. The music, poignant, sad, true magnifying it all. 

This is a reminder that we have so many to thank for the life we have in Israel, a life of freedom. Freedom to say what we want,  freedom to wear what we want, freedom to pray as we wish, freedom to seek justice. In America such freedoms are taken for granted, but not here, not when you are surrounded by nations that only allow such freedom to some-- not others.  

At 8 pm a siren sounds. It is so loud, ear piercing. No one moves.  The sound is absolutely chilling.

A far cry from the barbecues I remember, the parades in the US on Memorial Day. (Can I bring a salad? Sweet corn?)

Then, as evening approaches, a new spirit enters the soul of Israelis gladness, excitement. Tonight there will be fireworks, entertainers in the parks acting, singing, performing for free. Kids running around eating cotton candy,  spraying one another with shaving cream. FUN. We shift gears  with aplomb. It is not hard. 

Last of the three, Yom Haatzmauth, Independence Day. 78 years old and they still want to ___ us. 

The Israeli flag

A joke going around, fill in the blank. 

Israeli flags are EVERYWHERE. 

Today I will go on a hike. I'll show pics tomorrow.  

To happy times, 

therapydoc

Another article on, well, living Israeli: Actually read this writer anytime.

Amit Segal, A Day to Remember

* It might be argued, the birth of a State. We have been a nation since the great departure from Egypt, slavery, to the Promised Land, promised by the Old Mighty so long as we don't screw it up, so long as we do not become like them, the previous inhabitants. What a story. Read the book.  

** To paraphrase the late professor, Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks: 

There are 56 Islamic states. There are more than 100 nations in which the majority of the population is Christian.

He goes on to say: 

There is only one Jewish state. Israel  one-twenty-fifth the size of France, roughly the same size as the Kruger National Park in South Africa In his podcast, the late beloved rabbi, in Covenant & Conversation, on pars hat Kedoshim answers the question, Why do they need land? 

Those Sirens

Random flowers in Israel

This war has some Israelis staying home more than usual. Others go about their lives, hardly deterred lest a siren suggest they move to a bomb shelter. Most comply with the sirens. Although we have had few casualities, relatively, nobody wants to be one. 

But people who have lived here for decades, maybe their whole lives are out swimming at the clubs, traveling to see friends in other cities, even touring. They have become accustomed to pulling over on the road if a missile warning goes off, ducking into the nearest ditch. This is not something I think I want to do. 

These are tough people. I don't think the Iranians had any idea.

Missiles give me pause, being new here.  Not that I don't go out, I do, just as long as I know that I am not over a ten minute walk to the nearest public bomb shelter.

Only once did I break that rule, went out on foot with FD to shop for Passover. Of course there's a siren and of course we don't know where the nearest shelter might be. Suddenly even the birds have made themselves scarce. 

We knock on somebody's door, people let strangers into their shelters. This time, however, our would-be hosts had already locked themselves down, couldn't hear us through the steel door of their mamad leaving us to watch the skis from under a carport. We saw nothing, and ironic though that may be, I felt disappointed (I hear this is common). We waited for the all clear and went home, shaken.

Did that traumatize us? It traumatized me, I'm still talking about it.  Do I have Acute Trauma Disorder? (It is too early to diagnose PTSD). I'm not sure but I don't think so. I'm depressed on and off, and if it weren't my nature to not be depressed on and off, we might say so, but my feeling is that the blues are from feeling confined. Being confined. .

It is cabin fever, not getting out much, no socializing with friends (although there's no reason not to, really, they all have shelters). I take these short walk, back and forth within the ten minute from a shelter perimeter I set for myself. Does this careful, obsessive watch over the distance from a shelter should a siren go off constitute Wartime OCD? Oh, yeah, for sure. But  Home Security would approve. And like most OCD symptoms, it is functional. 

What's really functional is doing what I would tell any client to do when I get that down feeling that like a new self took over where my old, happy, cheerful self used to live. Using the tools I've spent 40 years teaching at work literally works, thank G-d. They make the blues go away. (There is a song in that) so it is time to get serious and share them. This may seem very obvious but it is easy to let a mood take over a day. Such a waste. So...

My top three beat depression hacks. They work for some, not everyone. That's all the caveat you get. But they can't hurt. 

(1) Music 

(2) Exercise

(3) Music and Exercise Together. 

Today I chose door number three and it worked like a charm. My Apple HEALTH app tells me that I walked 5,341 steps, which isn't enough but it isn't nothing and I stayed within my self-imposed perimeters. As I walked I listened to Israeli songs from Eurovision contests going back to 1975. Those were great songs! 

I came home in a great mood. 

I am sharing a picture. Taking pictures also makes me happy, make that No. 4. This one, above, is a hedge of flowers. I see a flowering bush every ten feet (I am an American, still have trouble with metric conversion but my guess is that's about 3 meters). They call my city the original Gan Eden, Paradise. I cannot argue.   

Oh, and fruit trees, lemons and oranges drop to the sidewalk. I'll have to get you a pic of those.

To resilience! To happiness! To peace, quiet.

Oh, here's a link to my favorite Israeli Eurovision entry, Liora (not Liora Yitzchaki) singing Amen in 1995. When it comes to the war, let it be over soon. Amen.

https://youtu.be/LJkGfeletR0?si=B_HC0Uti3N4f8uMr

therapydoc

What War

I understand that March came in like a lion in the Midwest (USA) where I come from. I feel for my friends and relatives who are still dealing with it. I know someone who can't wait to get planting his vegetable garden. But if I asked, Are you guys cold, they would say: There is no bad weather, only bad clothing.

But  being highly cold averse this has never been my jam and I'm glad I didn't have to be there last winter, glad I didn't have to wear bulky clothes or shop for duds bragging newer, lighter, better insulating fabric. Nothing ever really warms me up, I feel like King David must have felt. Nothing like skin on skin.,

When it gets chilly here a simple down jacket is like a fur coat so I'm not complaining. They are everywhere. Israelis start wearing them when it gets down to sixty. 

What I'm trying to say is What are a few missiles compared to weather.

I used to close my eyes in Chicago, imagine the beach, try to feel the sun. It is difficult to make that happen, but imagining what milder climes might feel like is better than focusing on the cold.

Truth be known, it hasn't become hot yet but it will, and it will be very uncomfortable. We are in the  seventies, it can hit 80 (sorry, I still think in Fahrenheit. 

When I go outside I'm blinded by the sun and the color, so many flowers. The pink guys below are not flowers but leaves. Tiny white flowers are tucked inside, gifts of the Old Mighty. 

I'm hoping that posting this, doing the research, I can point to the Monet while out on a stroll and say to a friend, that's a. . . a . . . a . . . and the name will come to me. 

According to my buddy Chat:

That’s bougainvillea — a very common and beautiful flowering vine in warm climates like Israel.

#keepingsane

therapydoc

Not My Secret to Tell

 This being a therapy blog, we touch upon things that make us feel badly and look for a hack to stave that off. Why should we feel bad when we can feel good? There is so much to feel badly about. I tell people in therapy to limit the amount of media they watch. The news will destroy your soul. 

Making a social faux pas is one of the things that makes me feel terrible. I will do anything to avoid hurting someone's feelings and tell patients to please scream at me if in any way that is happening. It can happen, however, that we hurt others if we are privy to information and share it without first checking with the person who shared it with us--is this public knowledge? 

Oddly enough, without that caveat we assume we can, even should share information. If nobody says, Not for common consumption, seems like fair game. 

What do they say about the word assume? (parse it out) 

We can, but we are sure to shoot ourselves in the proverbial foot when we tell a secret, even if we didn't know it was a secret. Once the words are out we can't take them back. 

It used to be that we had to work to share information but with WhatsApp and other social networks we can share to hundreds of friends and relatives and they will share to more. With a few simple words our voices shout out, Hey! This happened. We don't do it to flex our fledgling egos, not usually, but because we think people really want to know, or should know. 

Then, the pronouncement accomplished, we get a text from the person who shared with us initially to say, TAKE THAT DOWN PLEASE.  SO AND SO DOESN'T KNOW! ie., grandchildren of someone who passed away, the parents of an injured soldier. That sort of thing. 

You get it.

Anyway, don't shoot me. I'm just the messenger.

therapydoc

Wartime and Holidays

If you live in Israel and you talk to folks from your native country, they all say, Stay safe! And I repeat it back, You stay safe! Because the world is a crazy place. 

It is March 15, the war with Iran began on Saturday, February 28. 

February is a short month so if we do the math that brings us to a 15 day war so far. 

Two weeks and a day. Feels longer. But honest, except for an occasional missile from a hostile country, you would never notice. (Why so hostile?!) Israel has a few war songs, but nobody's singing them now. Most of our songs are about the love of the land, our beautiful, bountiful land. As they sang in the movie Milk and Honey, 

We want it green and so it's green for us. 

We also worked it. By we, I mean Jews. For hundreds of years, under other peoples, it lay fallow, produced mostly rocks. Come here. You will think you are in a first world country because you are.

But back to the war.

It feels inconvenient, is all, or so it feels, not dangerous, not by war standards. I picture Vietnam and napalm, horrible mayhem, mass slaughter.  Life Magazine photos. This is not that war. 

A week ago if you talked to Israelis they might say they felt that the conflict is winding down. Maybe, but that's in the Old Mighty's hands. Or in the hands of Her representatives. We all hope it is almost over, I mean, the holidays are coming. Everyone has a holiday in the spring. I'm not listing them all, ask your buddy Chat. But for example,. 

There's the East Asian Qing Ming celebrates ancestors, sorry, no pic, it felt like adding a picture of people objectified unnecessarily.

And the Japanese Hanami about memory, renewal and nature

Cherry blossoms for Hanami

Hindu holiday Holi-colors and joy, good over evil

Passover matzah: Jews couldn't wait for the bread to rise! Matzah on the run from Egypt so it looked like this

Muslim Eid-al-Fitr

Christians celebrate rebirth, sacrifice and redemption with Palm Sunday, Good Friday, and Easter

Muslims have Ramadan,  month of reflection and charity that ends with Eid-al-Fitr 

Should be a happy time, no? 

And yet the world feels upside down to many of us. We have to b e ready for anything, and I don't just mean in Israel, all over the world. 

News flash: terrorism is not the work of the Jews. We didn't invent it, aren't into it.

Living with uncertainty, tolerating uncertainty-this is a life skill, it is something we teach in therapy. Breathe, watch happy shows, laugh at comedians on Facebook and Instagram. Do what once made you happy. It probably still will. 

therapydoc