Bird Calls: It's that Social Networking Time Again

It seems to be my saving grace - this social networking thing. Or perhaps I'm aiming for a balance? In the last two years, I have switched to a virtually online lifestyle which is weird for me. For eighteen years I lived in a kibbutz tunnel - a unique lifestyle that complemented my New York City ghostly past. I'd arrive to the kibbutz in our little green Volkswagen at precisely 2:20 pm from teaching at the local Regional High School and check up on the local kibbutz news via a specially hooked up TV channel and then pick up my son from the local babyhouse that was just a two second bike ride away.

Again, social networking spaces I've once felt limiting have fulfilled a deep social need - this time a global one. And now I find that we are yet in another disastrous era when Israeli ground forces are now entering Gaza - I find myself twittering once again. I remember the days when I pushed myself to discuss the media in front of my students without knowing what tomorrow will bring. For the past few weeks, I've been facebooking and twittering as if I'm en route tomorrow to Israel to visit our kibbutz home. But I stay in front of our computer waiting for a miracle to happen. But it doesn't work this way. Like a ghost, I slip in and out of kibbutz and Pittsburgh tunnels - to walk to the kolbo (Hebrew for a kibbutz supermarket - relatively small in size) and say 'hi' to folks I see twice sometimes more daily and open our mailbox (in this case, inbox) and read all the local news from the bulletin board.

Those bird calls are back again - social networking makes it makes me ironically feel safer under a virtual shell. Yet how much more isolated am I or how really connected am I? I guess the choice of where to live and feel connected is always, inevitably.. mine. (I'm lucky to have a supporting husband though..)

So back to real bird calls. Taking it "bird by bird," Ivry and I took our usual two buses that took us to the Aviary where we claimed our own "bird spaces." And like I predicted, Ivry took to the rainforest exhibit where birds swooped to the crunching of our apples. Their benevolent faces held much more promise than simply a flutter and screech. They wanted to feel exclusively part of our territories and for a moment, I thought they would perch on our shoulders - not an uncommonly noticeable sight but terribly crucial for these strikingly beautiful birds to feel important with us!

They stuck around enough for me to enjoy their exotic markings and colors and to take some wonderful pictures

I've stuck in some extra pictures of Ivry's fourth birthday celebration and a bonus picture of today's bird Bingo he received for his Hanukkah/birthday present, which we haven't played with at all until today. After our trip today, he wanted to return it back to the store. Yikes!

The Three of Us

These pictures I took from the nature trail beyond the gate of our kibbutz. We had a great time throwing stones in the Jordan River.It was hard convincing not to throw huge stones, but he stubbornly took part in the competition.

We got back just in time to eat a delicious Shabbat meal Haim prepared. Of course after I finish posting this blog, I am going to collapse in a heap. It's been an exhausting day, actually an exhausting week and there is still much to be done before we board that plane to New York City.

It was nice though to sit and be together. I'm glad we have this heavenly place near in proximity in which to do this. It certainly got us into the Shabbat mood. I wish I had 'discovered' this trail earlier.

S0, what helps you get into a weekend frame of mind?

Have a great weekend!

The First Piece of Me

I'm excited about this second blog. I was getting a bit tired just writing about my writing endeavors when I know there is so much more that my first blog doesn't reveal. Not that it bothers me. It's just different.

Before the fireworks began last night, all of Israel stood in solidarity for Yom Hazikaron - Remembrance Day for the Fallen Soldiers. Our small kibbutz community stood in white shirts, listening to the sirens, and praying for the dead and the very recent from the Second Lebanon War.

We hope that tragedy will never repeat itself.

And in a very short twenty four hours, we start eating cake, singing songs from the Palmach period and run around after our two and four years old, trying to smile and enjoy each other's company. We all feel something, we all acknowledge the pain. We all are part of the flame of the living.

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I like to explore trodden and unfamiliar places on the kibbutz. It seems I've been everywhere. It is quite a homey place to live. I do this exploration on Saturday when Haim goes off to guard at the kibbutz gate. It's usually very quiet but last week Ivry came across an artist painting. It was a beautiful moment. (picture to the right)

Then it was time to explore the library from a side that nobody goes past - the windows. For some odd reason, I love kibbutz windows - they are so old and rickety, dirty too. But they reflect the older periodspeople seem to have forgotten, and since there are so many new faces, new houses, new everything, I look for something utterly familiar and close to hold unto - the dust of the screen window, with the old kettle and sixties radio from the outside. Ivry didn't know all this but he will - one day when and if he reads this blog.