700 DAYS

 700 DAYS. The incredulous is credulous.  The not possible is possible.  The unbelievable is believable. 

                                                         

                                                    The Second Coming

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction while, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

The Second Coming! Haradly are those words out

When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert

A shape with lion body and the head of a man,

A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, 

Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it

Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again; but now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep

Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Written by Yeats in 1919 for another country, another land.  How prophetic for our sorry state as things fall apart.  How exact the words are for our times.  How very tragic.

What to Say?

Day 673.

Outside temperature is 33 centigrade, (about 95 fahrenheit).  Dew point is 65%.  It feels like it is about 38 degrees because of the heat load factor.  Oppressive.  What can it feel like in Gaza, either on the ground, or in the tunnels? No air conditioning there, not much water, no chance to get in the sea.  Hell on earth, hell below earth.

And the Cabinet has voted to conquer Gaza???????  I have nothing left to say.

As you know, I paint, and still am doing so.  I decided to try acrylics because I don't like the smell of the oil paint in my house, in which the windows are mostly closed, due to the air conditioning.  I also decided, for the first time, to copy an artist, because apparently this is good practice.  I found a painting of Edward Hopper's that I thought I would try.  It depicts a couple and their dog in their house.  The man sits on the doorstep, the woman is standing nearby, and their dog is playing in the ochre coloured grass.  There is a forest, or a wood, on the left side of the house.  I worked on this for a good few weeks.  Last week when I came to class I took it down from the top of the bookcase and stared at the painting.  The teacher said she really liked what I had done, and it is probably finished.  I looked at it in despair, and took out a pair of sharp scissors and cut it up.  In other words, I had a hissy fit, although I didn't say anything, I just slashed at it.  The teacher quietly asked whaat would make things better for me.  

I looked at her despairingly and said "bring back all the hostages, NOW, stop the fighting, end this futile war, feed everyone in Gaza, stop the insanity on the West Bank, "

Of course this whole incident had nothing to do with my attempt at copying Hopper.  But this is how I feel - DESPAIRING.

And this is what I did afterward.

656 Days

 It is 656 days since the horror of October 7th was visited upon us.  

I ask for any of you reading this, and who cares, to join us with your prayers. Tonight there will be massive demonstrations all over Israel, to demand an end to this war and that the hostages, dead and alive,  be brought back together.

Thank you.

Sadness

 I have been either avoiding, or unable - I am not sure which, to write a post. 

Today I sat in the events hall and listened to 'music from around the world,'  starting with klezmer from eastern europe.  The melodies brought tears to my eyes.  I felt a deep sadness.  Then I realized that this has been my main feeling since the 'ceasefire' of the war within a war.  

The first night I could resume my zoom yoga with my teacher from California without needing to head for the shelter, the class ended, as it always does, with final relaxation.  I began to sob uncontrollably, and remained, prone,  on my carpet, crying and exhausted,  drained.  The exhaustion has only just begun to dissipate, when, I forget which night, Wednesday or Thursday, I was deep in a dream when I was rudely awoken by the horrible rattlesnake warning alarm. It felt like part of the dream, a nightmare - I sat up and grabbed my phone - yes, a missile is on its way. I stumbled out of bed, rang my neighbour's buzzer and went off to the shelter. This time it was the Houthis.  Of course i couldn't get back to sleep afterward, just lay on my bed in a kind of numb trance.  Numb and sad, so very very sad. For all of us, for everyone.  Sad for all the young men being killed unnecessarily.  Sad for their families and friends, for us.  Sad for the people of Gaza - how can they be? - without homes, without shelters, food, water?  Their families being killed.  Sad for the Palestinians beaten to death by the settlers in the West Bank. Sad for the hostages and their families - how much longer can they endure this?  Sad for the people in Lebanon, and Iran.  Sad at how helpless we are to end this horror.  Sad for the destruction and degradation. How and when will this ever end?  645 days

Ahab

 I made it to my sister over the weekend (the weekend here, for those who don't know, is Friday night and Saturday.)  Friday morning she called and said 'come - over life and death.' I was truly petrified, but packed my overnight bag with extra things, in case, and ordered a Gett.  (That is the taxi service.) 

I have found them to be a reliable service, this time, no sooner had I ordered it than Ahmad, the driver arrived. He happened to be in the vicinity and really needs work.  I told him I am scared and he said not to worry, not many cars are on the roads and if there is a sirenWaze will guide us to a shelter.

We arrive quickly, without trouble.  That afternoon we lay in our respective rooms to rest. At 3.30 I was disturbed from my nap by a loud banging on my door - my sister came in. "Didn't your alarm go off? We have to get ready for the shelter." My alarm hadn't gone off.  As the shelter is in their house there was nothing to get ready, we just went downstairs with our phones.  Then all our sirens went off simultaneously. I have to say - it was a nice change, being with them, lying on a mattress.  A small cosy comfort. That night at 2.30 am my alarm did go off - back downstairs we went.   

It was there, in the shelter, that I said to my sister that I feel that Bibi Netanyahu has been obsessed with Iran, like Ahab with Moby Dick.   By this statement I was NOT whitewashing Iran who have been responsible for the bombing of the synagogue in Argentina, many other things, and of course the 7th October - but why go after them now, in the middle of an ongoing war?  Bibi is up for trial,  he is going down in the polls, what a brilliant way to divert the world's attention. He has a madman in America to back him.  And now we have yet another front to contend with. Gaza should be OVER and the 50 hostages, dead or alive, returned.  Finished. Done with.

I feel that the world is desperately in need of a sane and wise leader, and we have none. Just power hungry, money crazed narcissists who don't care if they sacrifice their people or the world. 

It is NOT a comforting feeling, and we sit under bombardments, day and night.

 PRAYERS FOR SANITY.

OCD

I cannot remember how often we had to go to the shelter last night, actually yesterday we had to go in at 8.30 a.m. The next round was, I think 5.00 p..m. At 9.30 I texted my sister to ask (not for her permission, just to check in) whether 9.30 is way too early to go to sleep.  When life is 'normal', I go to sleep about 12.00 p.m.  But life is no longer even approaching the what wasn't normal anyway, existence of our previous life.  I did not wait for her reply,, but simply fell, exhausted onto my bed, only to be jarred into a state of adrenaline filled alertness by the 'warning' siren about half an hour later.  

We constantly receive updated alert systems from the Home Front Command app.  5 days ago we would receive a rattlesnake-like sound which meant that missiles have been triggered and we should get ready to go to a shelter. It may take 30 minutes until we get the next siren which means we have 90 seconds to get to the shelter.  Now we have 10 minutes instead of 30. And we are told that lives are saved by going to a shelter. We see pictures of destroyed buildings in which families have survived because they were in the shelter.  Of course even the best shelter cannot survive a direct hit.  We are shown pictures of those too, along with the names of the dead. 

What do we do in the shelter? We sit in a sort of a circle on not very comfortable chairs. One or two people are wheeled in by their caregivers. We all look at each other sleepily and mumble something like "here we go again," or something similar. I bring a book, but I can't really concentrate. We used to leave after 10 minutes when it was just the Houthis firing at us - they still continue their fire, but of course most of the missiles now come from Iran.  We cannot leave until we get a message from the Home Front Command saying we can leave.  Sometimes we sit for an hour or more - sometimes less, each time is different.

 One of the 'residents' is 96 years old, and quite demented. Her caregiver is an angel from Kerala. The woman, Tamar, stands up after sitting a few minutes and asks where her dog, Toffee, is. Toffee is scared of people so he stays at home, unlike Chungi a pekingese mix who loves greeting everyone and comes up to each resident to have her belly rubbed. 

"Where's Toffee?" asks Tamar.  

"At home" says her caregiver.

"Does she know I will be back?"

"Yes, she is sleeping anyway.

Then Tamar becomes increasingly anxious - "Why are all these people sitting around with long faces. The All clear has sounded."  (It hasn't) and anyway there is not an all clear. She pushes herself up, takes hold of her walker and walks toward the door. Her caregiver gently steers her back to her chair. This becomes a sort of non stop dance until we do get permission to leave or Tamar howls saying she. has to go to the toilet.

When eventually we do get the OK to leave we all say to each other "hope not to see you soon."

This is our new life. I still go to the gym - thank goodness it is open, and I try to paint and knit and do my daily meditation. I go to Feldenkrais, and Arabic. There is no ceramics or hothouse work as the instructors cannot get here safely.  

Today, as I hung the laundry, cleaned the perfectly clean cutlery drawer, dusted the perfectly clean contents of my room, straigtened straight pictures and objects, I realised I am doing what I did after I was told my husband was killed, and during the First Gulf War when I was in Israel and Iraq was sending the scud missiles.  I am desperately trying to maintain a semblance of order in this chaotic existence.

I clean and organize what I can in my external surrounding.

 Isn't this what people with OCD do?

The Unblog-able.

Strange title - of course I made the word up. It is based on some inner feeling or working of my sub conscious. All is UN - unbelievable, unblog-able, unforgivable. This is how I feel - no clarity, nothing to hold on to. The mundane continues, of course, and life is lived.  Books are read, art is seen  and looked at, and something is felt in response. Music is listened to. Gardens are grown.  Holidays are observed (celebrated is NOT a word I can use at this time).  The spelling bee is played by me, faithfully, every day for the last few year now.

I had an eye infection, and it was attended to, and is now better. I went to Budapest for a few days, and enjoyed walking around the lovely and interesting city and took pleasure in a refreshing break from the constant stress of life here. Of course I instantly fell back into it. The taxi driver who took me back from the airport saw to that as he lectured me on the absolute necessity of this political war and how we should crush our enemies.  I informed him that I do not feel the same way and tried to maintain silence, but he had a dreadful habit of asking me questions and waiting for my answers.  Hmms and sighs were NOT going to suffice.

The Houthis are in the habit of a missile a night, it seems.  Also we now have an updated app from the Home Front Command.  When it has been detected that a missile has been sent we receive an alert that in the next 5 minutes the sirens will probably sound and we must go to the nearest shelter.  This is to give us time to prepare and get to a shelter safely, but sometimes the missile is intercepted and the alarms don't sound.  I don't know what is more adrenaline producing for me - the warning, or the alarm without a warning.

We are traumatised, we are grieving, we await the remaining 58 hostages, we shout our protests,  We watch what is happening in Gaza and the West Bank in horror.  We watch the Haredim refuse to fight while our young men are dying and being wounded and go crazy.  

This is the unblog-able.