Category: lizrael update
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My NYTimes debut: experience of an expat Staten Islander during Sandy
My New York Times debut: A journalist found my post on my experience of helplessness as a Staten Island expat, far away during the Hurricane Sandy disaster. After some emails and a phone call, my Staten Island-based mama and I became the lede of his article on New York expats taking action during crisis. Here’s…
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Back to school (again).
Move over Billy Madison, I’m going back to school (again). Had my first class at David Yellin College in Jerusalem, and looking up at the giant stone arches ushering me and dozens of other students through, I felt home again. Classrooms piled on to other classrooms. A little sandwich kiosk at the entrance. Students walking…
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Oh, it’s on.
As I slowly rouse from the last four years of pregnant haze and breastfeeding exhaustion, the world becomes slightly clearer, a little brighter, and just a wee bit more attainable. I decided that I would spend this year investing in myself, dusting off the creative workshops, writing exercises, draft after draft after draft of whatever…
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lizrael update: Thirty.
In a way, I consider myself fortunate that on the eve of my thirtieth birthday, I spent my night at an אסיפת הורים for my kid’s gan. I’m not a birthday person; I haven’t been for a long time. If nothing else, surely my mother deserves the credit for being split open so that I could…
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Year of me.
Seeing as I’m a mother and there’s really no ‘me’ anymore, here’s what I’m thinking… As of a couple weeks ago, when Bebe essentially weaned herself, thereby letting my body free into the universe where no one depends on it directly for sustenance, whether in utero or by breast… it marks the first time in…
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Lizrael Update: seven years.
So here I am, in Israel seven years today. Did I consider where I’d be in seven years when I got in the plane from New York? Never bothered to go that far. Maybe in the back of my mind I always wondered if the seven-year itch would grab me. It hasn’t. A rarity, maybe,…
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Lizrael Update: Insane mom you hate on flights edition.
Bulletin: I’m leaving tonight to New York, with both my kids, alone. That’s one adult to two kids. Or, one adult to an infant and a terrible two. So if you’re on my flight, sucks for you. Sucks worse for me. Like I told my mom, who I’m sure is containing all the giddy-with-pleasure as…
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On living outside Israel.
It happens every time I visit the States: I spend about 35% of the time thinking about the reasons I could and couldn’t live there. By now, the couldn’ts far outweigh the coulds. So it stands to reason that I’m going through the same process here in Melbourne. It’s different, of course, because it’s not…
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Got a feeling this whole family’s going down.
It’s amazing the things you can plan a year in advance and then when the date finally arrives, you’re scrambling to make it all happen. Weddings… Babies… Trips to Australia… Oh, that? Yeah, we’re leaving tomorrow on a long-awaited, long-planned, finally here month-long trip to Australia to visit the family. And introduce Koala to most…
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I’m here, but…
Questions: Has it all worn off? Is there nothing to say? What happens next? (I blame Twitter).
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How did you do it?
Funny how, so often, for so many, aliyah means getting on a plane with three bags instead of two. That’s how I did it. I had school plans in the near-distant future, a few phone numbers. Knowing I could go back and visit New York at the right price. No pressure-aliyah. With a five year…
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Love/hate.
The thing about love/hate relationships is that eventually you come back to the hate. It’s triggered by anything. Items on the news. The news reporters themselves. People on the street. Commercials on the radio. Things your friends say. Things your neighbors do. So, if you haven’t guessed, I’m in the hate phase. Which is ok,…