10/17/23

 Tuesday, October 17, 2023

In bed at 9:30, up at 5:41, fractured sleep night, bed/brr.  Let Lilly out, 40°, high of 58°. mostly cloudy day ahead, AQI=40, wind W at 6 mph, 3-8/12.  Sunrise at 7:07, sunset at 6:05, 10+58.

Gratefulness.    As I woke up this morning, I was aware of unwanted itchiness and slight pains and stiffness, but I had the realization, too seldom experienced, that I am - right now -  in Heaven, alive, able to walk and talk and think and read and write and hear and taste and see and living with Geri and Lilly in a magnificent home, so much more fortunate, more favored, more blessed than most of mankind that lives or has ever lived on this wondrous rock speeding through space. It doesn't last but it IS now.   I think of my mother and my father and my sister, of Uncle Jim and Aunt Monica, of Moses and Brother Coogan and Wally Halperin, and of Sarah and Andy, and I am reminded again of the 4th and 5th stanzas of Vacillation:

IV 

My fiftieth year had come and gone,
I sat, a solitary man,
In a crowded London shop,
An open book and empty cup
On the marble table-top.
While on the shop and street I gazed
My body of a sudden blazed;
And twenty minutes more or less
It seemed, so great my happiness,
That I was blessed and could bless.

V

Although the summer Sunlight gild
Cloudy leafage of the sky,
Or wintry moonlight sink the field
In storm-scattered intricacy,
I cannot look thereon,
Responsibility so weighs me down.

Things said or done long years ago,
Or things I did not do or say
But thought that I might say or do,
Weigh me down, and not a day
But something is recalled,
My conscience or my vanity appalled.

I move between the two extremes, too often Mickey the Mope, like Ronny Cammareri needing Loretta Castorini to smack him and tell him to "Snap out of it!."  Or my dear sister.

A sunbeam in a darkening world.  Poland experienced a huge voter turnout in Sunday's election and defeated the new-fascist incumbent government in favor of a more liberal coalition.  How will the ousted react?  Like Trump?  Like Bolsonaro?

Heart of Darkness?  Will Republicans elect fascist Jim Jordan Speaker of the House this afternoon?  Facilis descensus Averno est . . . First vote: Jeffries, 212,; Jordan, 200; others, 20.  First bullet dodged.  More coming? Next vote tomorrow morning, after night of threats, promises.

Lilly and the White-tails.  I let Lilly out at daybreak and she promptly took note of 4 stately white-tail deer on the property line between our lot and the McGregors.  She snapped to attention, as the white-tails did, and they engaged in a staring contest with Lilly emitting an occasional "woof".  After a few minutes of this Mexican standoff, I opened the front door to let Lilly scoot inside away from the trespassing marauders who, in turn, elegantly proceeded across our lawn onto County Line Road whereupon I let Lilly outside again, unthreatened by the gentle big-eared neighbors.

The mezuzah on our doorpost; Howard Schoenfeld's FB post.  I subscribe to the Yiddish Word of the Day group on Facebook.  It reminds me of all the Yiddish I picked up from years of working with Bob Friebert and I enjoy the banter and sometimes bickering among the other subscribers.  Today, another subscriber posted: "Mezuzah. Can I have one on my door entrance if I'm not Jewish?"  As usual, there were many differing responses to the question, most responders saying 'yes,' but also some saying 'no.'  One response that really caught my eye said "I would say that, even if done with good intention, a non-Jew having a mezuzah on his door is a mockery and therefore should not be done.  No religion should be mocked."  We were given our own mezuzah years ago when we bought a new home and, after the massacre of the Jews at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, we obtained and mounted a Tree of Life mezuzah on our front doorpost.  I made a point of learning the proper way to mount it, mounted it properly, and it's been there ever since.  We found it online, bought it, mounted it, and keep it to acknowledge to all who enter our home our brotherhood with Jews.  Most goyim don't notice it and wouldn't be familiar with its significance if they did notice it, but it is meaningful to Geri and me and to our Jewish friends.  So I was surprised that anyone would consider it "a mockery" of Judaism or of Jews.

    My friend and former next-door neighbor Howard Schoenfeld re-posted on FB a touching blog by another Jew, JoshGilman'sblog entitled "Why you might have lost all your Jewish friends this week and didn’t even know it."   Gilman wrote:

Over the past few years, as the world in general has just gotten crazier than ever, it has become popular to post things like “If you think you would have been one of the ones who hid Jews in WWII but are afraid of speaking up about _____, you wouldn’t have been.”

It’s honestly a generally fair assessment because if you aren’t the kind of person who can handle criticism for a non-conventional belief of any sort, you surely aren’t the kind of person who would risk the Gestapo knocking on your door for hiding people. I’ve seen so many posts like this over the past 2 years.

But… here is what your Jewish friends are wondering right now. So, why didn’t you post… this time?

And that’s not an accusatory, WHY DIDN’T YOU POST!? It’s a genuine question. Because they need to know the answer.

Maybe you are so horrified by it all that you truly don’t know what words to say.

Maybe you are still wondering what to say.

Well, it breaks my heart to tell you what your Jewish friends are wondering.

They are wondering if you are safe.

They are seeing many others cave to the propaganda, the vitriol from the Hamas apologists; they are seeing the pro-Hamas protests and the threats to the world, and they are wondering if you are too afraid to speak. 

And they know that if you are too afraid to speak, then you would be too afraid to hide them.

Did you know that that is a category of friend that every Jewish person has in their mind? Who would I run to? Who would hide me? 

. . .

Dear friends who may feel this blog is written to you. I am not saying I fear you or that I don’t love you. I’m just trying to let you know that unless you have proven that you will stand with me, I will not run to your home if they come for me and my family.

I am also not saying that silence is support. I do not believe that everyone who hasn’t posted support for the Jewish people and for Israel is complicit. But… I am not totally sure if you are safe. And none of your other Jewish friends are sure either. 

 I am wondering if this isn't a bit too much, the suggestion that if I haven't posted on Facebook or other social media, or informed all my Jewish friends of my opposition to Hamas' murder, mutilation, and desecration of Jewish men,  women, children, and elderly, my Jewish friends question my friendship, my courage.  Is the corollary true  - that if I do post my horror on FB or X and contact all my Jewish friends to affirm my horror, I would be among the Righteous Among the Nations who could be counted on to hide Jews from Nazis?

Lyn Felsenthal has died.  Cam Wakeman just called with the news after Ed called her.  She was in hospice care after a disabling stroke and she and Ed marked their 60th wedding anniversary on June 2nd of this year.   Cam and I will drive down together for the wake on Thursday afternoon.   Lyn is the first of the Notch House 5 + spouses to die.  Too many thoughts to speak.

Hundreds die in attack on Gaza hospital; who is responsible? An Anglican hospital in Gaza City has been hit by a high explosive weapon.  Palestinians say it was an air attack by the IDF.  Israel says it was a rocket fired by Islanic Jihad, probably a mistake.  Another possibility is an attack by a rogue IDF pilot or other agent.  The hospital was also sturck by reportedly an Israeli missile on Saturday with 4 persons injured.  False flag?  Rogue?  IDF?  How can we tell?  No party can be confidently believed.

Treadmill:  20:37; 0.50, a struggle to mount the treadmill tonight, and to stay on it for at least 20+0.50m.