Homestead

Development Town

Beit Shemesh is a centrally located small town that started as a backwater, graduated to developing suburbia, and, having inherited from exorbitantly priced Jerusalem both a strong middle class and a si[...]



Little Boxes

When a heavy box of old junk that another has packed and stored badly *literally* falls out of the pre-fab suburban ceiling and breaks open on the ONE Day out of *hundreds* that YOU happen to be home, and THE OWNER/ PACKER / STORER happens to not be….What is the symbolism there?



What Would You Hand Down the Mountain? (WWYHDTM)

top-10 I have always been a fan of the top ten list. I suppose it started with Casey Kasem's American Top 40. (Doing the math? Yeah. Old.) Of course, the top ten format is as old as the hills...actually, one specific hill called Sinai, where, tradition has it, God's Top Ten was revealed amidst much noisy weather, on this, the Shavuot festival. Whether He intended it as marketing or humor will depend, I suppose, on your general outlook.



World Enough and Time

Minutes before we begin Passover, I can think of nothing better to do with some surprising free time than to revive my blog.



Daughters of Light

The experience of protesting alongside you has been super, since, really – where else would we have met? Unfortunately, I don't really have that many friends from other religions, so it has been nice to expand my horizons. It is amazing that in your religion, all of the Torah that matters really *can* be learned on one foot, as long as that foot is covered by a stocking.



Suburban Economics

Communal warmth comes with communal heat, just as residential cool comes with a lonely chill.



Memo to the Master of the Universe

she-ra-princess-of-power Here’s what I’m hoping You can answer for me: Do You believe - given the current reality of our world rather than any idealized version You’d had in Mind - in democracy, critical prosperity for all levels of society, scientific advances, basic human rights, and broad personal freedoms for men and women alike? I ask this sincerely because it seems that many of those who don’t believe in these thi[...]



On Tragedy…..and Triumph

job_complaint_blake_copy The thing about tragedy is that, almost by definition, it completely takes us by surprise. Life has very few rules we all feel apply both personally and globally, but one of them is, or should be, that people outlive their parents. And live long enough to perhaps become parents themselves. Tragedy takes these basic assumptions, assumptions we need to make in order to thrive, and in one awful moment tells[...]



Some Like it Hot

marilyn-monroe-219 For me, Summer is a strange mix of adrenaline and Zen.



Eight Posts I Never Wrote

Dorothy I've been something of a deadbeat blogger lately. I just don’t have the time…but that's never a good excuse: Time isn't something you have, it's something you make. Yadda Yadda. In honor of Hanukah – and the gift of my Dear Husband taking everyone out and leaving me to brood / work / clean – here are 8 posts I jotted down during the past few weeks, but never finished writing..[...]