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Thanksgiving

November 23, 2007 by

Living in Israel is sometimes surrealistic. OK, who am I kidding? It’s always surrealistic to live in a country that is working and building and thriving at the same time as hundreds of millions of people are preparing for/waiting for/praying for its destruction. It is a country that at once is the best place to live (at least I think so) and is the most self-deprecating, self-destructive country I know. It is a country with a huge amount of intellectual capital with little of it residing in the people who are running it.

So it should not have seemed odd to have lived in two different worlds in the last couple of days. We were getting much needed rain in quantities that were awe-inspiring and the sun would then peek out for a few minutes and then the downpours would resume. Meanwhile, my cousin who was visiting in Manhattan was messaging me about the beautiful weather there. At the same time on Wednesday evening that I was waiting for my fresh mehadrin turkey to be brought to me by a man who lives in Kiyat Arba (outside of Hebron) I was watching the Fox News Network and I was back in the US, preparing for Thanksgiving with the Americans.

And last night, we had our turkey and cranberry sauce and all sorts of goodies including pumpkin pie (baked by my daughter) and apple pie (baked by me) and we enjoyed the company of our children and our current youngest grandchild– and felt thankful– grateful for the home we knew in the US, privileged to be able to come and make our homes here, and grateful to the source of all blessings for all of the blessings that have been bestowed upon us.

Filed Under: Family life, Israel, Ramblings

Another 8 things meme

November 20, 2007 by

I thank my dear daughter for the opportunity to wrack my brain to answer this meme. I had thought that she would have stopped keeping me up all night about 28 years ago, but last night’s foray into the wonderful world of CT scans was only the latest of our late-night bonding sessions. As she pointed out, in one of the more successful ones, she ended up coming home with a baby. All kidding aside, this was an interesting one to work on. Answers are not necessarily in any logical order.

8 passions in my life:
1. My husband, despite his beard
2. My children– who couldn’t be more terrific
3. The dentist, the juggler, the nurse, and the professor (in alphabetical order)
4. My grandchildren– each and every one of those magnificent young people– they all make me very proud!
5. My extended family including my sister and my cousins and others we include as family
6. The Land of Israel
7. People who walk humbly with G-d
8. China

8 things to do before I die:
1. Live 120 years (or more if I’m still having fun)
2. See my grandchildren grow up
3. Spend lots of leisure time with my family
4. Be a great-grandmother
5. Get my house in enough order that my kids won’t curse me when they’re cleaning it out
6. See the people of Israel living without external threats
7. See all of the Jews come home
8. Let those I love know how much I love them

8 Things I often say:
1. You always have to behave yourself
2. Somebody’s got to be the grownup
3. Take it easy
4. Take care of yourself
5. Be kind to each other
6. Okie Dokie
7. I sure could use a coke
8. Where are my keys?

Eight Books I read recently

1. Wild Swans- Jung Chang
2. To Live- Yu Hua
3. Chronicle of a Blood Merchant- Yu Hua
4. Mao’s Last Dancer- Li Cunxin
5. Snow Flower and the Secret Fan- Lisa See
6. Empress- Shan Sa
7. Leaving Mother Lake- Yang Erche Namu & Christine Mathieu
8. Mao: The Unknown Story- Jung Chang and Jon Halliday

8 songs that mean something to me:
1. Try to Remember
2. The Green Leaves of Summer
3. Shanghai Breezes
4. HaMalach Hagoel
5. Min HaMaamakim (Idan Raichel)
6. Let Me Call You Sweetheart
7. Ki Tin’am
8. Ra’iti Ir Otefet Or

8 Qualities I look for in a friend:
1. Kindness
2. Healthy outlook
3. Good sense of humor
4. Self-awareness
5. Intelligence
6. Optimism
7. Energy
8. Passion

8 people I am tagging
Everyone I know personally who has a blog has already been tagged. Anyone reading this who wishes to be tagged, consider yourself tagged and please link back and leave a note so that I can find where you’ve posted.

Filed Under: Family life, Ramblings, Relationships

I met a woman

November 15, 2007 by

I met a woman. I can’t tell you too much about her because she deserves her privacy, but trust me, this woman has been through heart-wrenching, excruciating, cutting, crushing pain in her life.

I found this out only after I had known her for a while.

Before that I thought of her as a sunny, loving, kind, caring person. She exuded warmth and that special inner beauty of hers was evident in everything she said and did.

That’s how I used to think of her.

But now that I know her story, I know that she is miraculous. I think of her as a hero.

I see so many people whose lives are objectively fine. Their husband/wife is too hard/too easy on the children. They don’t feel appreciated enough. They don’t get enough help around the house or their spouse expects too much of them. Some of these people make themselves miserable. They whine and moan, not just in therapy (where I get paid to listen) but to their friends and relatives and neighbors and children setting off time bombs that will erupt into divorce.

I want to introduce them to my miraculous woman…. because she knows how to value each joyful experience each kindness, each day.

Filed Under: Emotional health, Family life, Ramblings

Love your spouse

November 13, 2007 by

Is your husband/wife driving you nuts? Does s/he sound hostile, negative or generally unhappy? Love him/her! Tell your spouse how proud you are to be married to him/her. Be generous with praise, kindness, and helpfulness. Do it even if you think it isn’t appreciated. Do it more and more and more.

Sometimes people go through bad times emotionally because of changes in life stages or physical concerns. People become overwhelmed with the tasks of life, with the worries of others, with their feelings of frustration. They may act withdrawn or angry. Their spouse feels hurt, left out, angry in return and then everything begins to deteriorate.

It is exactly when your spouse is the least lovable that s/he needs the most love, concern, and caring. It’s not about fairness; it’s about the relationship that you hope to have in the future.

Negative cycles can begin for the most insignificant reasons and deteriorate easily into anger and acrimony. But the test of love and devotion is to be there with your spouse at those times and to continue to give and give and then give some more in the knowledge that once again someday s/he will be back with you as a partner and a lover and someone with whom you will feel happy to share you life.

Filed Under: Family life, Ramblings, Relationships

Lies

October 24, 2007 by

There are a few things that are, for me, principles of parenting that should not be violated. One of them is that parents should not lie to their children.

To me, it seems like a “no-brainer.” Our children need to be able to trust us. Without trust, they cannot feel safe and secure. That means that they should be able to trust the things that we tell them. Therefore, except in rare, extreme situations, we should be very careful to tell them the truth.

So it came as a shock to me that today I heard of two instances where the parents lied to their children. They lied when there was no good reason to lie. One lied because it was easier for her than explaining things to her children and the second lied because she wanted to say what she needed to say to calm her daughter down.

In the case of the first mother, her lie will become clear when the family is invited to the wedding of their uncle and his “wife” who, their mom told them, were already married. The children will find out. It’s a sure thing. And then what will they think of their mother?

The second case, though is much more toxic. In this case, the teenage daughter had feelings of not being respected and not being taken seriously. She had good reason not to trust her mother who had failed to protect her in the past. She pleaded with me to ask her mother to honor a very reasonable request she had made of her. I did so. The mother told me that she would comply with her daughter’s request. I spoke with the daughter and told her that her mother had agreed. Today, three days later, the mother called in a panic. The daughter had become very angry and upset. In the course of explaining what had gone on in the last couple of days, the mother spoke of having twice done what her daughter asked her not to do. The mother had called me to ask me to speak with her daughter. I said to her, “What about the promise you made to her?” She said, “I never promised.” I said, “You told ME that you would comply!” She said, “Well, that was for THAT day.” I told her that now that I had no credibility with her daughter since she had lied to me and I had vouched for her, she needs to find someone who will have credibility to help the daughter.

I think that what I did may have shocked the mother, but I needed to shock her because she has denied her daughter the most important gift we give our children, security. If a parent is not reliable, if a parent lies, if a parent pretends to respect the child and doesn’t, then the child will lack the security he or she needs to grow up whole and healthy.

Filed Under: Emotional health, Family life, Parenting, Relationships

Enough to go around

October 11, 2007 by

A long time ago I came across the Warm Fuzzy Tale (highly recommended) and it was the first time that I realized that there really is enough love and kindness and good feelings to go around. In fact, the more that one gives away, the more one has. A couple of years after reading the tale, I became aware of the same thing as a lactating mother: the more milk my baby took from me, the more milk I would produce. In the act of giving, I was actually participating the in process of creating even more.

The other day I was talking to one of my daughters. She said to me that she really doesn’t subscribe to the mystical beliefs that many people in Israel seem to share. In Israel many people, both those who would describe themselves as religious and those who wouldn’t, believe in the power of: blessings from certain rabbis, prayer at the graves of righteous people, water blessed by certain rabbis, saying prayers at a specific location (the Western Wall, Rachel’s tomb), buying new mezuzot and/or tfilin, wearing special amulets or wristbands, etc. She told me, however, that she does think that good things she does, in some way will increase the goodness in her environment.

And I would agree.

When I was in driver’s ed class in high school, they showed us a corny movie about driving courtesy (for the Israelis in the audience — no, that is not an oxymoron). It showed someone driving down the street and seeing someone in another car trying to get into the flow of traffic. The first driver smiled and let the second one in. The second driver,when faced with a similar circumstance also smiled and allowed another driver to maneuver past him. One by one, there was a chain created of people being generous and kind to each other. Back when I was contemplating the meaning of life– something that preoccupied me for a period of time– I came to the conclusion that the real meaning in my life was the increasing of goodness in the world. I wanted through my actions, to set off chains of kindness and caring and generosity. And it seems to be true- that for the most part, the more kindness and caring one can give, the more one will receive.

Of course there are people who are bitter and angry and hurtful and malicious, but if we allow them to change our behavior, then we become a part of a cycle that brings increasing negativity to the world. And after all, there really *is* enough kindness and love and caring and gentleness to go around and the seeds we spread can grow and bloom and produce more seeds and more blossoms for us, and our children and our grandchildren.

Filed Under: Emotional health, Family life, Ramblings, Spirituality

Observations

September 25, 2007 by

1. Feeling the cool breeze blowing as I look at my sukka, I am struck with what a privilege it is to live in Israel where building a sukka is not only normal; it’s a national pastime!
2. Thinking about my life, I am awed at all of the opportunities I have had and am thankful for every one of them.
3. Having seen 3 of my 5 children today, I feel incredibly blessed.
4. Having seen both Abigail and Kinneret today, I am struck with how incredibly cute little girls can be (especially when they’re my granddaughters).
5. Having seen Abigail’s big sisters and brother today, I can’t help thinking about what terrific kids they are.

***************************************************************
I remember as a little girl watching the movie “White Christmas” and hearing Bing Crosby sing “Count your blessings.” The song made a very strong impression on me. It was almost my theme song, especially the line that said, “I think about a nursery and I picture curly heads; and one by one I count them as they slumber in their beds.” And now when I picture curly heads, there are about two dozen. Every one is precious. I never taken them for granted.

Filed Under: Family life, Ramblings

A plea for support

September 20, 2007 by

Today I am going to write about problems in my life so that all of my many readers (most of whom want to sell drugs and get me interested in foreign currency trade) will be filled with compassion for poor suffering me.

Well, to start out with, yesterday when I got up, I couldn’t find my glasses anywhere. I mean what could be worse? I did have another pair, but they were not nearly as attractive and didn’t match my outfit nearly as well.

Then, I had to drive in terrible traffic. There were hundreds of police on the streets of Jerusalem making sure that Condoleeza Rice would have a safe and expedient journey, but none to clear the streets for me. Imagine that!

Worse yet, when I got home, I needed to heat dinner. I understand that the leftover chicken, roast, and kugel were tasty, but they didn’t volunteer to leave the fridge for the stove on their own…

Life is very difficult and I sincerely need support.

Filed Under: Emotional health, Family life, Ramblings

Choices

September 17, 2007 by

It occurs to me that during this penitential period, we Jews are asking G-d to make some choices. We implore Him to have mercy on us and our children and we ask Him to remember us and give us health in the coming year. This implies that there is order to the universe- that things are not random or predetermined, but that there are elements of choice.

But how often in our daily lives do we hear people talking as if there is no ability to choose. How many times have you heard people say, “I just had to do it” or “I couldn’t help myself”? Worse yet, how many times have I heard in my office, “I just don’t love him anymore”?

When I tell my clients that love is a choice, they usually look at me with the same level of comprehension as if I were speaking Chinese. “What!” they say. “Love is something that happens to you.” Actually, no. It is not. Infatuation is something that happens to you. It usually happens in concert with a dose of pheromones, a sense of loneliness, a need to be loved, and sometimes a little too much alcohol.

In many cases, infatuation turns to love. But what is the mechanism? Well, I believe that mechanism is a conscious decision to put the other person in the center of one’s mind and heart. It is a commitment to care for that other person, to want to make that other person happy, to want to share one’s life with that person. It is not a magical force field that descends on someone. It is a choice.

Let’s look at some proof of that. If you were raised with a religion or ethnicity that is important to you, even though you might meet/have met wonderful, beautiful, clever, intelligent people of another religion or ethnicity, chances are, you did not let yourself “fall in love” with them. You may even have said to yourself, “He/she is really nice; too bad he/she isn’t [fill in the blank] because otherwise, I might really be interested in him/her”

Yes, there are exceptions, but in general, when one marries “out,” it is because of a choice too.

So when people say to me “I just don’t love him anymore”, I say, “You have chosen not to love him anymore.” In the recent film, “The Painted Veil,” the wife disdains her husband until she sees him through others’ eyes. Only then does she realize that all along he was a good and kind man. She at first had chosen not to love him and later on, chose to love him. When she made that choice, she began to see how kind and caring he was. She was able to appreciate him. Before the choice, he was the same man, but her feelings for him were very different.

It is like that in marriage. The person we are married to is not perfect. If we choose to see the negatives, he/she will supply us with many opportunities. If we choose to see the kindness and the caring and the love they feel for us, that is what we will see.

Similarly, with children, we often make decisions early in their lives as to which ones are the winners and which ones are the losers. Sometimes all I do when people come to me with “problem” children is help them to see their children as winners. When parents believe in a child, he/she can grow and develop into a winner. When parents give up on a child, the child gives up on him/herself.

People have choices. Will they value the other people in their lives or will they not? Will they interpret the other’s shortcomings as human and normal or will they blame and punish? Will they choose to be kind and loving or will they choose to be judgmental and rigid?

People hold the keys to their own happiness and to the happiness of those around them. The choice is theirs.

As we pray for G-d to make the right choices, may we too make the right ones.

Filed Under: Emotional health, Family life, Spirituality

Thoughts on cooking…

September 11, 2007 by

As I was contemplating my potato kugels (making them, not eating them), I realized that by now I have made that recipe so many times that I don’t need to open the cookbook. Now this is no major accomplishment as far as I can tell since there are not a lot of ingredients and it’s not a complicated recipe, but for me, it is unusual. You see, over the years I have cluttered my brain with lots of facts that I simply have no practical use for. What good does it do me to remember that our phone number in 1970 was 531 0485 (in Pittsburgh)?? Why do I need to know the name of the staff chaplain at Fort Knox, Kentucky in 1967 (Bermel)?? Why am I remembering useless information???

Well, knowing that I have been craming my poor little brain with useless information, I chose not to learn any of my recipes, satisfied that the cookbook would remember and all I had to do was remember which cookbook had which recipe. And that worked. Over the years, one could trace which were my favorite recipes by seeing which pages the books opened to and how dirty they were. The dirtier, the more loved the recipe. None of that plexiglass cookbook holder stuff for me. I’m hardcore. If its going to get dirty, well, then, so be it. I am expressing my love for the recipe in this way.

And I started to think… we have all sorts of measures of personality from the 16 PF to the Myers-Briggs to the MMPI. All of them have their uses. But I was thinking that maybe we could learn a lot about a woman (yes, I do think that men and women are different, but that’s another entry) by looking at her cookbooks. Maybe even we could ferret out the nurturer in her by seeing what she chooses to make. We certainly could see if she is daring or conservative. We can see if she’s a “health food” person or an “eat, drink and be merry” person. We can, of course tell her age by the yellowing of the pages. Of course, in my case, you would have to take into account that some of my cookbooks were my mother’s and in that case, some of the paperbacks have begun disintegrating.

Well, I began my foray into this type of personality testing by looking at my own books and by and large, we’re talking comfort foods- carbs of all sorts. After all, meat and fish kind of speak for themselves. Most of the time, in my experience, anything you do to meat detracts from its taste. Fish can be sweetened, but then is it really fish? (Of course I exclude gefilte because after all, that is a very special hybrid kind of fish that grows complete with bread crumbs, egg, onion, salt, and sugar already in it.) Same thing with vegetables. To me, they are all pretty delicious with very little intervention. Desserts? Yes, well, desserts. In the days when I weighed in at a hefty 125 when I was 5ft 6inches, my favorite recipe was for chocolate cheesecake. At this point, typing the words just added 3 pounds to my weight. Need I say more? Lemon meringue pie? I did that a few times when we lived in Oklahoma. It was so much fun and very delicious, but on went 2 more pounds just typing about it. I don’t know if I can continue …

And I began to think about my mother. There were a lot of things about my mother that were hard for me. But when I think about her recipes, it makes me appreciate that fact that she did care. She did want to give us good things to eat. She did want to nurture us that way. Her cabbage borsht was not just delicious; it was love. Her spaghetti sauce was caring. Her Passover apple kugel provided sweetness that lives on after her.

Filed Under: Family life, Ramblings
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