New Year

Something has changed in the past few days. Or at least it seems so.

Thursday was the first day of the Jewish new year. Before the change in calendar year, I knew I wanted to write something meaningful and reflective –after all, that’s the customary thing to do in those kinds of turning points in our lives, no? However, nothing came to me except that I wished that things will finally go in the right direction, turn for the better, or just ask for some ease in my constantly anxious and analytic mind. For some reason it felt wrong to just ask and hope.. My ideas didn’t flow or click (hmm.. that’s an interesting phrase there).

So I gave up. I just let things be without analyzing them. And I think that it’s the lesson I had to learn or at least internalize as the new year started: think less, do more, and enjoy the ride. I feel that I have written about that so many times, but I never learned the lesson. I am choosing to make this my new year resolution.

Since the beginning of the new year, things have been feeling good, better, not as bothersome. There could be a million reasons for this, but I find myself finally taking joy again in little things like I used to before. I feel like a complete fool when these moments happen, but I cannot help but literally smile and chuckle. At the beach, driving on the Pacific Coast Highway, eating fish tacos, having a good day at work, driving to work with palm trees towering over me from two sides of the road, talking on the phone with people I love.

I am thankful. I am content. I am lucky to be living my life.

Happy New Year

Shabbat Ba’bait

I miss Fridays back in Israel. I miss them so much, and every Friday that I pass anywhere else reminds me of them. Very few could relate to this, so I don’t really talk about it; but there is something in shabbat experience that is more than simply relaxing, more than a weekend –it is something more profound and intimate. It the meaning and feeling of Shabbat that I can hardly wait to re-capture whenever I am lucky enough to go back there.

Every Friday during later spring (that barely exists in that hot, hot land of mine) and summer, we would have the same routine. My parents would come home after work early, and we would return from school. On days when the weather was not too hot (and I mean hot!), we used to open all of the windows, prop the front door open, let the warm air and sun in.

That was the beginning to each Friday’s shabbat celebration. We would then go to my grandparents’ house and have lunch there, which was followed by some sort of a siesta, and after that we would go to the beach. Ah! the beach. The sand wasn’t white, and the water was not crystal azul; but the warm, calm waters of the Mediterranean were so inviting. Before summer rolled around, and jellyfish took over the beaches, we would stay in the water for hours, until the sun started to set, and the sky turned from blue to purple.

Then came the highlight of Shabbat. We went back home, and washed ourselves up for the roughness and salt of the beach. Showers before Shabbat were, in retrospect, unique. They were longer since I had to clean myself up from the ridiculous amount of sand all over my cloths, body, hair.. anywhere. I would also leave conditioner in my hair (yes, even when I was 10) for longer then usual. While I occupied the shower, my dad would play his Gipsy Kings collection as loudly as can be so I could hear it all the day to the shower. When I was done, my mom and I would make some dishes for the Shabbat dinner, which we had at my grandparents’ house with extended family.

When I spoke with my grandmother over the phone this morning as she was getting ready for Shabbat to start, I I realized that there was something about that togetherness, warmness, and familiarity that seemed to have been lost when I moved to the United States. I try to bring it back though every Friday: I’m listening to the Gipsy Kings as I am typing this, on spring days, I lay on the quad instead of on the beach, and talk to my family. Each of these little things brings me joy, brings me bits and pieces of the Shabbat routine and practices that I had as a child. And with that,  I say !שבת שלום (Shabbat Shalom!)