Coming Home: A Love Story

This 50 sheqel note was in my wallet when I left Israel on August 15, 2001 and resided there until January 1, 2008. I had kept it for those 2,331 days in חוץ לארץ as a sign for myself, a comfort and palpable assurance that I would return to Israel to spend it. (To satisfy your curiosity, I spent those 50 sheqels on a bus ticket from Jerusalem to Eilat- a sojourn through the beautiful Negev must be a worthy expenditure for this worn, weighty bill to complete its own journey.)

Because of jet lag, I wasn't able to sleep our first night, in Jerusalem. So I arose at 4 AM and left the hotel (before the buses started running) to walk to the Kotel for prayers at sunrise (vatikin). The streets were empty, dark, and quiet. The world was so still, it felt like walking through a photograph. I had a decent memory of the 3.5 km route and set out with my old map in my backpack, for backup.

Walking around is like déjà vu, only I've really been here before, these places, these streets. Sights I haven't seen in years and I have forgotten, or those that have faded, trigger in an instant a flood of memories. It's like carrying a Geiger counter through a hot area; pockets of some potent, invisible radiation set off flurries of activity.

It absolutely does not seem real- It just doesn't make sense that I'm in Israel. And yet, I am.

I spent the first half of our trip in euphoric disbelief that I was actually back. Standing, seeing, conversing, being on Israeli soil reawakened feelings that had lain dormant, atrophied from disuse with time spent in America. During the second half of our trip, my struggle was coming to terms with the fact that I'd be leaving again.

This time around, we spent the last of our sheqalim in the airport on chocolate and chips (no, not that kind). We aimed to contribute as much as we could to stimulate Israel's economy, and we knew we'd be back to spend more.

Earlier, back in the States, a fellow extern at Creedmoor, a Jamaican Christian, was excited to tell me about her mother's Christmas trip to Israel. She asked me, "Do you have a lot of family still in Israel?" People assume we came from there and left family behind. Jamaican = from Jamaica; Dominican = from the Dominican Republic; so Jewish = from Israel, right?

They don't quite get the distinction among scales of history, but in a sense, they're right. It is we Jews who artificially, inappropriately cleave the awareness of recent generations in Europe and America from the resonance of our millennial history and our homeland.

Hibernation

I took a short walk outside today. It was the first time I'd stepped out of my building in seven days. I normally have a couple free days during the week, plus my assorted clinical responsibilities were suspended for the federal holiday, so I had a lot of days with nowhere to be. The beginning of the week, I was working on my Master's thesis, and I'm generally a homebody anyway, so I didn't feel the need to get out. I started coming down with a bad cold on Wednesday night and was sick the end of the week, so I didn't go out (I had externship on Friday, but called in sick).

By Shabbos morning, I was getting cabin fever and really needed to get out of my apartment, but I was still feeling sick and miserable. I'm feeling a lot better today, but less cooped up and still tired. However, I thought its probably not a good idea to be so homebound for so long, so I went for a short walk before dusk. It felt good to break the cycle, especially because this coming week bodes the same schedule for me- nowhere to be until Friday. I just have to make sure to get out again before then.

The Purple Frog

First told 3/5/05

There once was a purple frog. There are such things as other purple frogs, but he was the only purple frog in his town. The green frogs made fun of him and otherwise ignored him.

He also had a burgeoning gambling addiction. Every weekend he would go to the local froggy casino and spend his paycheck, distracting himself from his purple otherness.

One weekend at the casino, after losing a day’s pay at the blackjack table and not doing much better at roulette, he approached the poker table. The dealer, a cute chameleon, was having trouble dealing the cards because her hands were sticky, as all chameleons’ are (that's what makes them such great climbers).

He won the first hand and felt bad for her dealing troubles. She saw that he was empathic and decided she liked him.

“So how did you get purple?” she asked spunkily.
“That’s a personal question; I never tell on the first meeting.”
She turned purple and said, “So we’ll have to have another.”
“Really?!”
“I’m sorry, what did you say?”
“I said, “Really?’”
“Oh, I thought you said ‘Ribbit!’”

He went home excited, even though he usually would stay gambling into the night. He couldn’t sleep, he was so excited. He hadn’t seen her at the casino before and realized that he didn’t know her name or number, and they hadn’t set up a time or place to meet. He started worrying about how he would meet her again. Now, he was a worrier, but not a pessimist, so he thought things would just work out.

On Monday, he put on his froggy overalls and froggy hardhat and went to the construction site, where he worked helping put up a hi-rise office building. His construction buddies weren’t real friends, but they didn’t make fun of him. They saw how excited he was and asked what was up. Over a lunch of grilled cheese and flies, he told them what had happened, but they didn’t believe him.

Meanwhile, the chameleon was called into the manager’s office.
“Lindsay, we love you, you’ve got great energy and a great work ethic, but you’re obviously having some difficulties as a card dealer and your sticky hands didn’t help you much at the craps or roulette tables.”
“Mr. Toad, I love working here, I love the people and dealing with all the customers. Is there some way I could stay on?”
“Well, I have an idea. The main gambling hall has a high ceiling and whenever a light bulb burns out, we have to bring in a huge ladder to change it.”
“I know, people always get distracted and stop gambling.”
“Right, Lindsay, and when people stop gambling...”
“We lose money.”
“Exactly, so here’s my idea--can you climb?”
“Sure, Mr. Toad, I’m a chameleon!”
“So instead of bringing the big ladder onto the floor and disrupting the customers, you can go up and change the bulbs.”
“Well, that’s great Mr. Toad, but that doesn’t happen too often. You would pay me just for that?”
“Lindsay, that’s only half my idea. I know how great you are with the customers and how much you enjoy dealing with them. I’m going to keep you on the floor as a cocktail waitress. With your tacky hands, you’ll never drop a tray of drinks. What do you think?”

On Wednesday night, already early in the week, the purple frog went back to the casino to look for her. He went straight to the poker table, but she wasn’t there. He raced all around the casino looking for her but he didn’t recognize her because she was wearing her cocktail waitress uniform and her skin matched the plaid skirt. There were other chameleons working there too, so he couldn’t exactly ask after her in particular.

He left, dejected, and stopped at the ice cream parlor to temper his panic with a root beer float with flies on top. He’d never been able to afford such luxuries before because he always gambled his money away. At work his buddies asked him how things were going with his chick. “She’s not a chick, she’s a woman!”

On the weekend, he went back to the casino, hoping to see her, and for once pessimistic. He meandered around, not gambling, just searching for her. No luck. He went to the bar to drown his sorrows in a root beer float. The bartender saw how downtrodden he was and asked him what was going on.
“I can’t find this woman who actually seems to like me for who I am.”
“That’s tough buddy. How about I toss some sugared flies on top of your float, gratis?”
“Yeah, sure, whatever…”

Lindsay, still plaid, came up to the bar.
“Hey, Max, we need a Shirley Temple; a Reptile with Diet Dew; an Islay, neat; and a Red Frog."

Just then, she noticed the purple frog staring into his drink.
“Speak of the devil! So are you going tell me how you turned purple?”
“That’s a personal question; I never tell on the first- HEY! Hi!”
“It’s good to see you around here again. I can’t talk now, I have to finish serving these drinks, but I finish my shift in three hours, maybe we can go get some coffee and cricket biscotti.”
The purple frog, easily excitable but usually clearheaded, said “That’s great, but I don’t want to risk losing you again. Would you mind writing down your name and number?”
She laughed and wrote down her information on a napkin.

Epilogue:
Over coffee our fuchsia frog told her how he turned purple. His mother had been swimming around her little pond, doing her pregnant froggy water yoga. An inordinately lost octopus, in its stress and confusion, let loose a cloud of ink just as the mother was laying her eggs. Octopus ink isn’t very good for froggy eggs and she lost most of them. Instead of thousands, only a few hundred survived, including our purple protagonist, all indelibly violet-hued.

All the purple brothers and sisters went there separate ways, the purple population explosion having disrupted the sensitive politics of the little pond. Every ten years, they had a reunion. At the next one, our froggy brought his chameleon bride.

Measure twice, cut once

So after consulting with my supervisor about a patient, he recommended administering the Criminogenic Thinking Profile, and he emailed me the test. Naturally, after printing the test, I took it myself and put my results in my Gmail status (40th percentile overall, if you care or if it means anything to you).

Because Gmail does not allow you to annotate emails, I often reply to myself and include relevant comments. Because the email from my supervisor only said CTP, and not the full name of the test, I posted my Gmail status message with the test's full name into a new reply to send to myself, so it would be included in the conversation and I could search for it in the future. Of course, as you'd so intuitively gathered by now, I sent my results to my supervisor. Lucky for me he's got a sense of humor and a natural curiosity. His response- "Not too bad. Any high [subscale] scores?"

Pedalling in the rain

Soon after starting off (without having checked the weather, of course), I saw heavy clouds and lightning over New Jersey, but I decided not to head back. I like to change my routes, because they're tracking me, I mean, to explore new areas of my neighborhood I couldn't (or wouldn't) on foot, and to get some variety. Here's today's ride:

It started to rain on the last leg of my trip, and I put my legs to work (uphill) to get home. I had my bike safely in the vestibule and sat in the rain on my stoop, guzzling water and waiting for my heart to slow down a little (and for my jelly muscles to get it together, man!). Tough workout, but good to get moving. Also nice to finally get inside and plop down listening to the thunder.

Today's Ride

I had to drop off the dry cleaning up the hill, so I thought I'd go into the park to practice mounting and dismounting my bike. See, with the saddle properly adjusted, the knee is only slightly bent when the pedal is at the 6 o'clock position. This maximizes pedaling efficiency and prevents injury. Problem is, that makes the saddle really high up, and your toes only graze the ground.

During my last ride, I realized I needed to figure out the proper way to get on and off if I don't look like a flailing platypus trying to get on and I don't end up unsafe and fraught each time I want to stop. I was headed to the park to get the hang of these basics on the grass so I could avoid showing up to my sister-in-law's wedding with embossed asphalt on my face (and having it preserved for posterity in her album). Turns out these techniques are really rather simple, and I got the hang of them by the time I got to the park, so I enjoyed my ride and got back in time to move back from alternate side parking.

On the Velocipede (or, with apologies, Zen and the Art of Bicycle Maintenance)

So I bought a used bike on Craigslist. My last bike was stolen when I was in 11th grade and I've been wanting a new one more and more in recent years. I could use the exercise, and I could use the activity to help with the doldrums of an isolated summer at home trying to make progress on my Master's thesis (more on that another time, maybe).

When I want to buy something, I research it to death. On Craigslist, my options are more limited, but I ended up buying a really good used hybrid bike I wouldn't otherwise be able to afford new. Of course, I also had to research to death a helmet, multi-tool set, mirror, bell, kickstand, lock, cyclometer, etc.

There's a hole-in-the-wall bike shop down the street from me where I went to pick up some parts. My experience corroborated the refutation of the fallacy of of of of of... HELP! I'M MIXING UP ACADEMIA AND MY BLOG!

Well, what I was trying to say was that some people believe that abundant options are an indicator of happiness, or freedom, or fresh breath or something. We talk about "Freedom of Choice" and about not being constrained by limited options. In America, one can choose to do or be anything they want! In actuality, people are easily overwhelmend by an abundance of choice, it causes anxiety, panic, and uncertainty (a source of anxiety).

So I realized that though Amazon might make available 218 types of bike lubricant, I can be much happier and at ease deciding between the two brands in my local bike shop (LBS). What's more, I can be out on my way that much sooner.

Using the awesome videos at bicycletutor.com (including one on "How to Choose the Right Lubricants" - I guess that guy would be the Lube Guru, helping anxious, confused, unhappy people make the right choice), I quickly learned my way around the morphology (uh-oh, it's happening again!) and maintenance of my bike. I got my hands dirty and felt like a real bike mechanic. So, I was ready to ride. Today, after the thunderstorms cleared up, I climbed in the saddle and took off to the Hudson River Greenway. Here's the round-trip route I took:

Now, early on I came to realize what starting off a ride in Washington Heights means- you better be sure your brakes work for the initial steep downhills, and that your knees and thighs don't give out on the return's uphills. Here's an elevation map of my trip:

I'm proud of myself, but also realized I have a lot yet to re-learn about biking.
Any suggestions for saddle-soreness? I'm hurtin!

Aural Fixation

I've been pining after these computer speakers for some time. I splurged and bought them on sale (a wee sale, but a sale nonetheless). They arrived this week and I had them set up in time for ל"ג בעומר (Lag Ba'omer), when we bring back the music sweet music. I have to say, I've owned some serious music equipment before (or at least gear that took itself seriously), but I've never owned anything like these. One of the first tracks I queued up was this one:

powered by ODEO

It's from "New Shabbos Waltz," Andy Statman and David Grisman's awesome follow-up to their stupendous "Songs of Our Fathers." (Please don't mistake my enthusiastic endorsements for hyperbole.) With these speakers, I feel like I'm in the studio with these bearded Yidden. No, scratch that- it sounds like the studio is in my head. With such clarity and fidelity of sound, I'm enjoying my music on another level. (I haven't heard with such sensitivity since an ear-wax-removal incident I won't further elaborate in your polite company.)

Ultimately, with this and some other recent acquisitions, I hope to begin recording this summer some of the music I've written in the past eight years. In honor of these plans, I've added a new guitar tuner to my blog page (check it out on the lower right).

Playing with fire

מועדים לשמחה
Last week, I went to burn our chametz behind a local shul where, as every year, they have set up a couple garbage can bonfires. (When I used to work near the UN, I just threw my chametz into the East River.) I hung around after tossing my 10 rye bread cubes into the inferno because it wasn't much of a conflagration and needed some help. The fires were so confined and so many people's chametz just choked the flames.

I understand people throwing in their dried out lulavim as kindling, but last year's afikomen? A few people tossed in the remains of their Chanukah paraphernalia, wick holders and wax candles. Most infuriating was the person who threw in moist, raw dough. All that does is put out the fire, it'll never burn. Most perplexing, though, was the pair of BVDs. Huh?

So I stayed around to try to keep the flames alive and keep people safe (leave the plastic bags out of the flames, please!). Maybe we Jews are just pyromaniacs at heart. I conclude with a cautionary video of a biur chametz from two years ago. Thank God, no one was hurt, but those in attendance learned that water sometimes spreads fuel rather than extinguishing the flames. Be careful out there.

Tragically neglected

I know it's been a while, and things are still busy, but I just wanted to give y'all a quick update of what's been going on (some of them atavistic to this time last year).

First off, our trip to Israel (with a jaunt to Jordan) was awesome and successful. I hope to write more on that later.

The day before we left, T.'s back went out again, though not as bad as last year. The El Al agent was able to give us a three-seat row with an empty seat so T could stretch out during the long flight home. Thankfully, her back much better now.

I went through the externship application rigmarole again (including a more compassionate, less stressful version of last year's bird-in-the-hand/two-in-the-bush dilemma). I ended up accepting an position (which was offered on the spot!) at a geriatric outpatient/partial hospitalization clinic. Who knew there'd be so many elderly people there?

Last week, I developed an intensely painful infection in one of my wisdom teeth. Long story short, I lost several night's sleep, had all three wisdom teeth extracted, and am recovering decently, having just returned to eating solid foods (mostly). I will miss the pizza smoothie, though.

More to come, I promise!

P.S. It's actually not rigamarole. Go know...

Blink and ya missed it

This past summer, traveling along Route 50 between Lake Tahoe and Sacramento, we passed the town of Kyburz, CA. I suppose you can call it a town, I mean it is on the map.

A few indicators of how small this municipality is:

It was named after the postmaster (Mr. Kyburz, I presume).

To get from Kyburz Drive to Kyburz Drive, you take Hillbilly Lane.

But the best sign of how small the place is, well, a sign. A single sign on a store on Route 50 proclaimed:

ENTERING KYBURZ
NOW LEAVING KYBURZ

View Larger Map

STREET VIEW UPDATE:

View Larger Map

Thoughts on psychosis

Some details have been changed to protect the confidentiality of protected patient information (Thanks Ariel for the consult).

Leaving the hospital right after my session with a remarkably insightful young man who some time ago, in a psychotic and drug-intoxicated state, shot and wounded several police officers, I heard a report on the radio about the developing case of Khiel Coppin. I'm sure news reports will be more comprehensive by the time you read this, but for now you can check out the story here (be sure to read the transcript of the 911 call) and here.

Basically, Khiel, an 18-year-old living in Brooklyn, was killed in a confrontation with police. He had stopped taking his anti-psychotic meds and decompensated. His mother called 911 because of his threatening behavior. He can be heard in the background saying he had a gun. The police responded and Kyle ignored their orders to stand down and surrender. He threatened them with a knife and then brandished something from under his shirt. It was a hairbrush.

People will blame the police for firing 20 shots at him (10 hit their mark). I don't blame the police. I don't blame Khiel. I don't blame his mother. It's just so sad when this happens. No one is directly responsible. There are only victims: the ill, the police, or in the case of other patients on my ward, a father perceived to be a robot sent by the CIA, a great-aunt who was believed to be turning into a witch.

I work with people who've committed horrific, violent crimes with incomprehensible intensity and purpose. Were these people not psychotic, they would be tried, vilified, and incarcerated. Thankfully, the law recognizes their impairments and commits them (usually) under Article 330.20 of the Criminal Procedure Law (CPL), otherwise known as "not responsible by reason of mental disease or defect."

In the short time I've served on my externship, I've come to understand two major concepts:

First, when you encounter in the news someone who is arrested after committing or attempting an exceptionally violent act (like this recent case), you can usually count on reading the words "motive unknown." You can also expect that person to fade from the media's eyes. But he (or she, though usually he) doesn't disappear. He gets swept under the rug. I work at that rug. They appear on the news radar when their actions are salient and shocking, but they often get better with medication and therapy. I often encounter incredulity when I relate the story of a given patient who committed any given -cide, who is doing really well and is heading towards discharge.

Which leads me to my second discovery. These are regular people, though ill. They are not hell-spawn or terrorists and they are not sociopaths (usually, though some of our patients are). They see and hear and experience as real things we only encounter in horror movies, and worse. When psychotic, they can feel terrified, entirely overwhelmed, with no one to turn to, and especially, no one to trust. If I were seeing demons all around me, my grandmother were the devil and angels were telling me to kill her to save my life and the world, why wouldn't I follow through?

When they are treated and come out from within the delusions and hallucinations, they can realize what they've done and they express a remorse that can be existential and eternal. One patient is reconciling with his mother for killing her mother. He is working to stay healthy and lead a productive and fulfilling life in the community. He says, "I realize what I've done. I'm horrified at what I did, I'm angry at myself, and I pray for her soul everyday. I have two choices- I can kill myself or try to move forward with my life. I choose to live. I don't want that ever to happen again and I'll never go off my meds." And he means it.

When talking about the kind of people I work with, I'm often asked
whether we rehabilitate them to the point that they can then begin serving the appropriate jail time. That would be a terrible thing. The law recognizes that their crimes were not committed with an intact mind and thankfully does not punish them for being sick; it tries to ensure they are helped to heal and to cease being a danger to themselves and others. When a person like that becomes well, he is not the same person who committed the crime and doesn't deserve to suffer the criminal consequences of the act.

It is important to know that a very small percentage of people with psychosis are violent or act violently, but when I work with these cases or hear about them on the news (and I feel like I've been hearing more and more of them), it makes me so sad.

UPDATE: A follow up post on another tragic case.

Just another day on the road

I've never experienced another human being willfully and intentionally try to cause me grave physical harm and quite possibly death. Until last Wednesday.

I was doing one of my usual commutes (school, externship, and research take me different places every day) that morning and was driving over the bridge at 9:45, in the right-most lane. Because of construction, the lane was closed ahead of me and I had to merge left. I was running out of road, but found space in front of the blue dump truck to my left. I signaled and merged in, and he HONKED. He had been going pretty fast and was right on my tail, so I jerked back into the right lane. I sped up to make some more clearance, and merged in again. He sped up. I brake-checked him to slow him down (until about 20 seconds later, I thought one of the scariest things was to have an 11-ton dump truck bearing down on you), and he got mad.

The lane to the right had opened up again, and he passed me- dangerously. I had to brake hard to avoid him smashing the front passenger side of my car. So now I'm behind him in the middle lane and starting to realize that he's a little nuts. I went into the left lane and tried to pass him, but as I sped up, he jerked his wheel into my lane. I had to slam on the brakes to avoid being crushed into the concrete divider or flipping over it into oncoming traffic.

Like a faucet opening full throat, adrenaline carried a primal, existential fear to every cell of my body. Thankfully, I've been driving long enough that I'm able to hold my own in tight situations and remained (behaviorally) calm. He had slowed down to antagonize me and I had a patient to see at the clinic, so I didn't want to trail off behind him. He was watching me intently in his driver's-side mirror, so I picked up my cell phone and pantomimed a phone call to the police, hoping to maybe intimidate him enough that he would back off. I should have actually called. He picked up his phone and I didn't want him to see my license plate, so I moved behind him again, in the middle lane.

I followed him this way off the bridge and onto the expressway, waiting for an opportunity. After another mile or so, the road curved sharply to the left, and there was no one in the left lane. I put my accelerator to the floor and passed him on the inside of the turn- barely. Again he tried to slam me into the divider. I got by with my car 1/4 in the left lane and 3/4 on a rough, narrow shoulder, riding up right against the divider.

I zoomed ahead, keeping sight of him in my rearview mirror and scanning the side of the road ahead for police or highway patrol. Where are they when you need them? I got off at my exit and was stopped at a light with a view of the expressway behind me. I saw him coming and got a quick glimpse of the side his truck as he passed:

S S C
8 9 3 9 3 0 8

I had dealt successfully with the situation, or at least survived, but only afterwards when the thought crossed my mind, "He tried to kill me!" did I get really shaken. I was glad my patient didn't show up, because it would have been very difficult for me to function in that session (though not as difficult as the session I had with a patient 30 seconds after receiving a call that a friend died unexpectedly of a brain aneurysm), and I was also mad at the patient for an additional no-show/no-call. I had left earlier and had to deal with this dump truck to see him and he didn't even meet his commitment.

I searched online, trying to find the company that operates that truck, but came up with nothing. PLEASE CONTACT ME IF YOU CAN PROVIDE MORE INFORMATION.

By the end of the day, the memory seemed so surreal that it provided a functional emotional remove, for the time being. On Friday, I went to my local police precinct to inquire about the utility of filing a report. The desk agent told me it was just road rage and there was nothing to do unless our vehicles had made contact. When I told her that this isn't about a motor vehicle accident, but that this person should not be allowed on the road, she said that he might say the same about me.

In the eyes of the law, this was a benign, everyday occurrence. I now have a greater appreciation of all the "unreported" incidents that qualify statistical presentations. In my eyes, I chanced to meet a psychopath (and I know- I work with his type and worse at the psychiatric hospital) who clearly had no concern for causing a serious accident, and apparently not much more concern for causing my death.

This story is not the truth, it is my defended representation of what happened that day. I know that I played a role in provoking this person and I don't hide from that, at least within myself. But I can also be honest with myself and realize that his reactions were unconscionable and disproportionate.

Attempting to file a police report was one step towards finding closure. This post is another. But the one that affected me most profoundly and unexpectedly was in shul this past Shabbos morning, when I recited the bracha of gomel.

In the times of the בית המקדש, those who survived peril offered a sacrifice, a קרבן תודה, in thanksgiving to HaShem. In our time, we cannot offer korbanot and instead recite this blessing before a minyan (preferably including two wise men, as it is written, וירוממוהו בקהל-עם ובמושב זקנים יהללוהו):

ברוך אתה ה' אל-נו מלך העולם
הגומל לחייבים טובות
שגמלני כל טוב

Blessed are You, O Lord, our God, King of the Universe,

who remunerates the culpable with good,
so You have repaid me with all good.

I thought I had been doing better three days after the incident, but as I stood before the whole shul and clearly recited the bracha, I was swept up in the emotions again. A couple people were sensitive enough to notice that I was not discharging my obligation after flying back from overseas, and they asked me about it.

Ultimately, processing the experience with others (repeatedly) has been a boon to my getting back on track. Thank you, everyone.

Addendum: As you may have discovered in the gomel document linked above that only someone who was in a serious, life-threatening accident makes the bracha. Someone who was almost in an accident does not make the bracha (with 'שם ה).

As Rav Bick [sick [sic]] told someone who came to him asking if he should make the bracha after a large tree branch fell right where he had been standing a minute before, "This morning my wife ironed my pants. If I had been in them..." Ergo, I should not have bentched gomel with God's name. I did so based on my interpretation of an otherwise murky threshold of danger the bracha requires.

I thought this only happened in email forwards...

So my university's IT people are upgrading some marginally important who-knows-what and had to shut down some systems to do it for a few days. One of these systems allows off-campus access to library databases, which I need to continue moving forward with my master's thesis and get articles for class, etc.

To accommodate people like me, they said we could ask for a temporary login and password that would permit off-campus access. I sent an email requesting these and got this reply:

Hello. The best way to obtain a password for remote access is to contact the computer service desk in S_____ Hall. The number is 3768. They may not be able to help today but they can on Monday. The computer systems are expected to be down until Monday.

I dunno, what do you call this? Technoratic idiocy? Institutional oblivion?

Location Location Location

A few weeks ago, my brother helped me install air conditioner support brackets to appease the landlord, who apparently didn't know (or didn't care to let me know) that it's a moot endeavor.

For a while, I've heard chirping from outside our kitchen window. We couldn't see where it was coming from because the AC unit blocked the view, but I thought a bird had built its nest on our sill. Indeed, when we removed the monstrous AC from the window, we found a bird's nest on the original wooden AC support. It was a struggle to extricate the AC from the nest from the support, but we managed to preserve the nest and its eggs (save for one unfortunate egg that was cracked). We installed the new AC support and gingerly placed the nest, eggs and all back on the windowsill (it had previously been on the wooden support, so it took more maneuvering to make sure it was steady) and put the AC back in the window.

Job well done!

Except for that one egg we missed, still on the kitchen floor. It was late and we were tired, so we had omelettes. Just kidding- we took out the AC unit, which is HEAVY, and put the egg back in the nest.

A few people told me that if you touch a hatchling in the nest, its parents will not return. I don't know the veracity of this phenomenon, but I wondered whether it applied to the eggs as well. A few days later, though, I heard chirping again, unmistakably adult. Score one for ornithology!

Prophecy

I was driving along this morning to clinic for practicum, like any other Wednesday morning, amidst throngs of other commuters in the urban haze of summer. I certainly hadn't been preparing myself for the moment, but out of nowhere, a vision appeared before me. I was surprised and scared, but also rapturous.

I never really expected to merit prophetic endowments, let alone to perceive the image with such clarity. I reproduce it here:



When the vision presented itself, the world went on around me. Traffic continued to ebb, and I continued to drive while experiencing this epiphany, lest someone crash into me.

Though the image was clear and persisted for the duration of my journey (until I parked and turned off the car), I realize that gleaning its interpretation for myself or mankind is the challenge. What do I make of it? How am I to understand the word "CHECK?" Should I skip dessert and get the bill? Is it time to reorder my Donald Duck checks? Am I about to be slammed up against the glass? The numerical value of CHECK is 30 or 3 (3+8+5+3+11 = 30 = 3+0 = 3), but what does that mean?!

And what of the glyph? Maybe it's a four-winged seraph trying to convey a divine message. Is it a map or schematic? Of what? Which way is north? Maybe it's a studio with walk-in closet and two balconies.

My intuition, my gut sense, takes this as an ominous portent of things to come. I'm still not sure, but it fills me with foreboding. I can do naught but sit and wait for another sign to appear and guide me. Maybe it's on YouTube.

Update (or, The Oracle)- So AutoZone will check your car's diagnostic codes for free with a scanner that plugs into a port in your car (in my car the port is on the steering column- who knew?). What was the problem with mine? Code P0442- a small fuel vapor leak in the Evaporative Emission Control System. Most common cause? Loose gas cap. Indeed, care of the gas station attendant in NJ (where competent self-service is illegal), my gas cap was not fastened tightly.

A satisfying solution to a perplexing mystery.

Flip your lid redux

As T. and I look towards August and start planning our vacation, I am reminded of an intensely meaningful interfaith encounter we had last summer. We traveled through central and western New York (the banner on top of my blog is from a picture I took of a sculpture at the Corning Museum of Glass), entered Canada in Niagara, and drove up to Niagara-on-the-Lake (a jaunt Winston Churchill rightly called the prettiest Sunday drive in the world), a pretty, quaint town with shops, bed & breakfasts, and three theaters, all surrounded by orchards and vineyards.

We caught a play, The Magic Fire, at the annual Shaw Festival (as in George Bernard), and stayed at a B&B. We like staying at B&Bs on our travels- prices can be comparable to the cloned hotel rooms you'll find in any city, but they are so much more cozy and interesting. (Explaining kashrut to the hosts is a separate story.) The one we stayed at in NOTL was actually the hosts' house. The family of four lived in the basement and the upstairs was for (paying) guests. The hostess is Sri Lankan and had worked for many years in Dubai at Jumeirah's Burj-Al-'Arab, the best hotel in the world. There she met her husband, who is also in the hospitality industry.

They decided to semi-retire and moved to NOTL, opening up her B&B. She is a Muslima (but is not an Arab) and over the course of our stay, she kept wondering why the Jews and Muslims have such conflict if we can all get along under her roof. She knew about kashrut because she keeps halal. She told us how she wakes up at 3:30 every morning to pray and prepare a scrumptious breakfast. In the afternoon, I told her we also pray and asked her which direction is East. She directed me towards the Kaaba. Close enough.

As we checked out out the next morning after breakfast, she stopped us and turned to me. With great anticipation and trepidation she inquired whether she could ask me something about Judaism. I always welcome opportunities for us to learn about each other and I acquiesced. She asked me, with all the serious curiosity of a seven-year-old, "How do you keep that little hat on your head?"

If you don't have your health...

...at least you'll have good grades.

So I've been more or less sick since חול המועד, the worst symptom being a horrible cough (words cannot describe how the magma in my chest has been affecting me). I tried two different inhalers, but they didn't really do anything for me. What I really needed to do was to see a doctor, but this was the last week of the semester. For the past three weeks or so, I've been using all my free time to write papers, reports, and a presentation.

So now I'm done with the deadline stuff and will finally get to a pulmonologist on Monday.
Here's to breathing again soon!
-PH

My two cents in WH

I just wanted to share my thoughts, as I commented on another blog about a controversy I think has become a great embarrassment.

I don’t care to comment on my personal opinion regarding whether the shul’s announcer may be a woman (other than to applaud Sharon for stirring things up), but I would like to comment on Rabbi Schnaidman.

I’ve known him for four years. Not a lot, but significantly longer than many of the current mitpallelim/ot at our shul (I’m one of the geezers of the younger cohort). I’ve had many personal and private discussions with him over this time regarding life in general as well as nuanced halakhic issues pertaining both to bein adam l’chavero and laMakom (sometimes both at once). These were usually not black or white, yes/no, muttar/assur issues.

Sadly, many figures of religious authority I’ve encountered in the past have withdrawn from taking an unequivocal stance and accepting responsibility for their answers, or they have so diluted the matter with superficial hashkafic platitudes.

Rabbi Schnaidman never backed down from tough issues and sought, with great sensitivity and gravity, to find appropriate solutions that would maintain people’s dignity and rights, and especially his commitment to halakha. I have been repeated impressed by the creativity he draws upon to reach such solutions.

That many of you were not satisfied with his logic does not mean he is old-fashioned, inconsiderate, or obdurate. He recognizes the inherent challenges in leading a shul comprised of very different populations and has taken great pains to foster the spiritual & personal devlopment, comfort, and acceptance of each, though such effort has often been fraught with conflict.

He is not perfect, but he is sincere and sensitive to the individuals that comprise the kehillah. I know first-hand the angst he experiences when he feels that someone may have been slighted or excluded within the context of his shul (and the hospital to which he devotes so much of his energy).

My only disappointment with the recent influx of new members of this community (of which I am part) is that so many see him only as “the old guy who gives really long drashot and seems kinda out of touch with us” and don’t appreciate the opportunity they have to be part of his flock.

I know I probably got a little too worshipful of the good Rabbi, but I guess I had a point to emphasize. This incident has been very upsetting to me, and people don't seem to have any הכרת הטוב for what has been accomplished in this community, much of it with the support of Rabbi Schnaidman. Of course, before recognition, one must be aware of the good that was done.

How many of the מתלוננים were even in this community to remember when the young people had their own minyan in the basement, once a month? How many of them appreciate how far out on a limb the Rabbi went to make the eruv a reality, how much indignation from others in the community he will have to still absorb even after we've moved on in two or three years?

Someone commented to me cynically that these dissatisfied youth should seek a younger, more progressive Rabbi and go to the Bridge Shul. Of course, no one really goes there anymore because the shul was not willing to make the accomodations Mt. Sinai and its leader have made.

These events have reinforced for me how alienated by the younger community I feel here. T and I have been talking about moving for a while, but never got our act together. It's time to move on.

What life asks of us

As stressful as life can be, we usually have a good handle on what we're supposed to do. I know I have to pick up my dry-cleaning or I won't have anything to wear for Shabbos. I know I have to use a pot holder or I'll seriously burn myself. Some decisions may be nagging, but ultimately don't invoke much responsibility because their consequences are not significantly influential for our future. Should I order the pasta or the fish? (The pasta- I don't like fish.)

And then there are times where life asks more of us, times where our impotence to really control our destiny becomes painfully obvious. During January/February, I was applying for externship positions for next year. I sent out five applications and was called in for three interviews. Awesome.

The first interview was on a Wednesday with my last choice hospital site (my fall-back). I considered it a practice interview. At the end of the interview with the training director, she offered me a spot for next year and asked me to let her know my decision within a week. My other two interviews were the following Tuesday. I told each interviewer about my offer and the pressure for a decision and asked them if they could let me know, in a non-binding way, where I stand. They understood my predicament and explained their predicament, which was basically that they couldn't really tell me because they weren't finished interviewing and would contact me the following week. One advised me to go ahead and "make [my] decisions."

Tough situation, right? It was literally "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush." So what do I do? Take the ho-hum sure thing and feel I didn't get the exciting, prestigious placement or hold out hope but risk ending up with nothing for next year? What would you do? This was one situation where I wished I could just know one relevant piece of information from the future. That would ease my decision and give me the serenity of certainty.

So many times we ask life for its meaning, what it expects of us. Viktor Frankl, in his seminal work, Man's Search for Meaning (an explication of his experiences during the Holocaust and how they contributed to his theories of Logotherapy and Existential Analysis, which posit that our greatest drive is not towards pleasure (as per Freud) or power (as per Adler and Nietzsche), but toward meaning- buy and read this book!) informs that it's the other way around.

"Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible... [In the concentration camps] we needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life - daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual"
-Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

The responsibility is upon us to discover, define, and pursue our meaning. So, my friends, where does this leave us? Well, I'll tell you what I did.

I called the director of the first site on Wednesday and blubbered a request for more time to decide. I tried to frame it in a way that didn't convey that "I don't really want to go here, but you may be my only hope." It's like this- T. pointed out that people tend to respond more positively to requests based on a principle than just a סתם request because "I want/need it." I told her that I try to make my decisions with knowledge of all my options, that if I didn't want to go there, I would tell her, but I wanted to find the placement I would gain most from and could contribute most to. She very tactfully did not point out to me how full of it I was and graciously offered me a couple more days to decide, as they expected to fill all positions by Friday. She said she'd call me when they'd all been filled (not, of course, when there was one spot left I could still accept). That bought me more time, but not enough.

I let Friday come and go (along with the phone call that all positions had been filled) and hoped for the best the next week. Monday I received a call from one of the other two places, rejecting me. I should have seen it coming. The director told me that it wasn't becasue of any lack of qualification, but that they generally seek externs with more experience. As such, they usually interview applicants for 4th year externship poistions, a preference the director informed me of during the interview. I was applying for 3rd year externship. They called me in for an interview because they were impressed with my CV and wanted to see what I 'm about. In the end, they went with 4th years across the board. I should have put the pieces together earlier. 20/20 hindsight, right?

Later that day, I got a call from my last hope. The director asked if I'd accepted the other offer I told her about at the interview. I responded cooly and calmly that I hadn't and in fact preferred a placement at her site (READ: I reallyreallyreallyreallyreally want you to take me because I have nowhere else to go). She said she'd let me know their decision on Wednesday. On Wednesay, I got the good news. I'm really excited to extern next year on two MICA wards with ex-convicts and oodles of psychopathology. In addition to the experience, this institution's name on my CV will help take me places in the future.

Does this mean I made the right decision? Not necessarily. As much as I got the outcome I'd desired at the time, I still have no way of knowing what the consequences of my decision may ultimately be.

When I called the director to accept her offer, she told me that they were very impressed with me when we met (on Tuesday the week before), but that they had to finish all the other interviews [as a formality]. So it turns out that at the very time I was troubled by uncertainty and the decision required, the conclusion was already there (she could have saved me a lot of stress had she told me then!). Of course, I could have chosen the fall back.

I'm curious to hear your about your throughts and experiences.

Update 12/28/08:
At the end of the following year's application process, I was in a similar bind. I had an offer from one place I thought I'd have been very happy with, but still had another interview, with another place I also thought I'd be happy with. At the end of the interview, I frankly told the interviewer my dilemma and empathized with her position (having come to understand it from last year's process). This time around, she offered me a position on the spot! She didn't make me accept right away, but I did ultimately accept the position and am very happy there.