Finding myself in the Middle East



Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Eizeh hu ashir

While brooding about our apartment woes, Outdoorsrman went to work and I drank a vodka and orange juice as the kids destroyed the house played with the children for hours on end.

It's funny about vacation, right?  Summer vacation!! My heart skips a beat! Then I realize, oh. 

So I have been keeping them busy and letting the house slide a bit, which is so so hard for me, but right now I am typing this while their wet towels are scattered on the floor, the garbage can is yet to be graced with a new garbage bag, and there just seems to be a general stickiness in the air.

But I was distracted, too, thinking about the apartment, how every time I can almost allow myself to feel that is will be ours, it's moved out of our grasp. And my apartment, here? Is falling apart around my ears. For serious. It's like the apartment is expiring. Or giving up. Like, what the heck, it's saying. I can't do this anymore. I'm tired. Plonk. The nob falls off in the bathtub.

Outdoorsman came hom early and the babysitter came because Outdoorsman and I had an appointment at the bank. Da-da-da-duuuum.

But no. Because they called. They cancelled.

We looked at each other. I don't remember the last time we had hired a babysitter, and the possibilities were endless!

We decided to get all wild and crazy and go out for coffee. We might have giggled over the idea. Just sayin. ANYWAY, we took a walk afterwards, and Outdoorsman told me about this guy that he bumped into on the way home from work.

"He was flagging a cab down and he barely spoke Hebrew. Almost none. Fresh off the boat from Russia. A cab pulled up and told him, 80 shek. He said, "lo, lo." I went into work for a few minutes and then I had to go back down and go on an errand for a part that I needed. He was still out there, trying to flag down another cab. I asked him where he was going. He was headed in my direction, so I told him that I would take him.

"D, he is so lost. He has no family. No no one. No job. He doesn't speak a word of Hebrew. He wasn't complaining, I was asking him and he was answering, but it was crazy to bump into this man who has nothing just as I was in a frenzy about the apartment."

A friend of mine calls problems like ours "upper class issues." They are not worries of hunger, or sickness, death, exposure. I have a place to live. I have beautiful children, a wonderful husband. We make enough money for all the basics and some extras besides.

It's true. I look around and see; I all of my problems are of the first class sort. Because really? Look.

I have everything.

5 comments:

Mystery Woman said...

I love it! That last part is beautiful.

Anonymous said...

Isn't EVERYTHING a imlpe matter of perception (and, perhaps, vodka)?

Malka said...

Good for you, going out on a date!!

And speaking of first-world problems...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2p5svFJ9cQ

MusingMaidel said...

Wow. This really spoke to me. We're also looking for an apartment now (to rent, not buy). And one just became available in a place I'd LOVE to get to, and I have my heart set on it. And I know our chances of getting it are like zero, but I can't help hoping and hoping. If we don't get it, at least we still have a roof over our heads and food on the table. So what if the baby sleeps in the living room for a little longer?

Thanks for the perspective...

Batsheva said...

you write so beautifully! i just found your blog, and i am totally hooked! its eruv shabbos and i all i can do is read!
p.s. i read your article in the Ami Living, about your father, a document that you found on the computer, and it made me cry. you really have a gift, and may you continute to be zoche to use it!!

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