Don't Worry, The Blogosphere Is Behind You

RivkA's death has really driven home a point. Yes, the blogosphere really is a community. Of friends, compatriots, supporters, rivals, and everything in between.

On Friday at her shiva -- how odd, and empty, to be in RivkA's home, without her there! -- this topic came up in discussion with her mother and father. Like my own parents, they could not understand at first what would possess a person to write (and especially in RivkA's case, so openly and personally) to a vitual audience, "somewhere out there." After a time, they came to appreciate the regular updates, her shared thoughts, and especially, her very real blogosphere friends.

In RivkA's case, she was a source of information and inspiration to many, many people. Her writing brought people together. As I told her mother on Friday, whenever I read RivkA's blog, I felt the acute presence of others reading alongside me, a tangible community of supporters and friends.

This afternoon I had one of those -- dare I say it -- "Israeli" experiences... and there was Treppenwitz, right there behind me. You can read his whole piece here (recommended), but meanwhile, here's the the part that hit home:

Sadly, when faced with an immigrant making a formal complaint about a perceived insult (even when the insult can't possibly be open to perception and/or interpretation), the default response of many people in this country is, "You must not have understood...", or "That was not my intention...".

This is doubly frustrating for a non-native Hebrew speaker because even in cases where the insult is so glaring as to be beyond misinterpretation, the immigrant is often expected to feign difficulty with the language in order to allow the insulter to climb down from their tree and save face.

Ahh, so true, I nodded as I read along. And so sad, so frustrating. We've all felt this at some point, but for me today's experience took the cake. For the first time in a long time, I felt a tinge of regret for having moved here.

Here I was, standing in front (underneath, really -- it was cranked up on the repair lift) of my decade-old Beloved Renault, the recent victim of an unfortunate but -- thank God -- harmless accident,* with the insurance assessor trying to convince me that he had not listed the obvious damage to the ABS on the insurance claim because I hadn't initially reported it (I had) and maybe I hadn't understood him properly.

Oh uh, Mister Assessor. Now you've done it. Deep breath, short pause. Think of Treppenwitz, and Rev Up Your Engines.

I let the assessor have it. With a capital IT: Don't you dare pull that one. I understood you perfectly. And you know it.

He yelled, I countered (two rounds). He relented. I got the repair approved.

Thank you, David Bogner, for reminding me that I do understand. Perfectly.

Keep the balance,

ALN

* Wouldn't ya know it? Two days prior to the accident, I'd signed on a trade-in deal to have someone pay me to take the Beloved Renault off my hands. Murphy's Law, still valid. Or maybe just Freud. Oy.

NOT A HYSTERICAL HEADLINE!

In a few more days we will overstuff our suitcases and head for home.  The kids have been asking, begging, really -- When are we coming home?  They miss their friends, and the ease of access to those friends.  They miss our animals.  So do I.

I am torn.  I want to get back to normalcy, to routine -- not that summer vacation is the time for that, but never mind.  I miss my friends, our neighbors.  Reading all the latest "ideological conversations" (in the words of one neighbor) via community  listserv does not quite satisfy.

There are things here I will miss.

The cool weather, and the rain.  

Public parks, open farmland, trees.  

The convenience of buses, trains, and the Underground.   

People who wait patiently while others disembark from buses, trains and the Underground.  

The Science Museum, the Natural History Museum, the National Gallery.  

Every type of bird in the garden.  Squirrels.

Electric sockets with built-in switches.  

Trees.

What I will not miss:  Histrionic headlines preceding dumb-downed, hyperbolic newspaper pieces that preempt rational analysis and deter all optimism.  

There are real reasons for worry here.  Swine flu is spreading, a few have died.  Thousands are ill but most will recover after a few days and without hospitalization.  Newspaper headlines only inflame the panic. So when a young man gone missing in Katoomba, Australia was found alive and healthy after nearly two weeks in the wilderness, I took that as encouraging, hopeful, a reason for national celebration.   

Yet a Kew station news poster screamed, "DAD CHASTISES SON FOR HIKING ALONE!"  I mean, really. What a lost opportunity.  I see this type of thing posted on mortar boards, morning and evening, and think, Hey, Londoners, why do you do it to yourselves?  The constant cloud cover isn't enough? 

Not much balance there.

ALN 

Now I Can Laugh, Too

A Mentsh Tracht un Gott Lacht* א מענטש טראַכט, און גאָט לאַכט

Friday morning, and the to-do list is pretty long.  Shabbat comes in late in the Spring, so that list can include the usual preparations (cooking, cleaning, etc.), plus a lot of the spillover from the week -- several work projects, in this case.  I would just get the kids on their ways and get down to work.

As usual, Blondini Boy pulled his wake-up-early-and-refuse-to-go-back-to-sleep number.  But something was up. When I gave him his morning squeeze, he pulled away with,  No!  My tummy hurts.   

Since he has been known to neglect that certain daily ritual, I wasn't too worried.  I would encourage him to sit on the toilet for a few minutes, and all would be well.

Within ten minutes he was writhing on the sofa.  He wouldn't let me touch him.  He wanted his bed.  He refused to walk upright.  His face was pale.  I took his temperature -- normal.  I tried to feel his abdomen.  He screamed in pain and then kept moaning.

Quick internal debate:  Do I call ER this second, or first consult a friendly neighborhood physician to confirm I'm not overreacting?  

The latter won out.  I discovered that our friend G was on call at the hospital (I'd been afraid to call because I didn't want to wake him up after a night shift).  He asked a few questions -- Is he walking with difficulty? (Yes).  Is he willing to jump up and down?  (No) -- and told me not to waste time, bring BB into ER right away.  He would meet us there.  I threw some clothes and favorite toy vehicles into a bag with my wallet, phone, and hospital ID, and put BB in the car. 

On the road, I tried to keep my focus, a vast selection of scary scenarios competing with a the beautiful winding road I know so well from my morning commute.  Appendicitis.  Peritonitis.  I imagined my little boy being called in for emergency surgery after being diagnosed with one of these. 

Or worse:  Neuroblastoma.  Wilm's Tumor.  Burkitt's.  All those exceedingly rare childhood diseases that my work experience has long since deceived me into believing are common.  (They are not).

Back in his car seat, Blondini Boy was looking paler and paler, his eyes nearly closed.  The trucks and bicycles that normally grab his attention passed by without remark.   My tummy hurts, Mommy, he groaned over and over. 

Seven minutes from the hospital, he wanted to stop.  Mommy, I have a pee-pee.  

You're wearing a diaper, I told him.  You can make your pee-pee right now.  I hadn't taken the time this morning to change him out of pajamas, and now there was no safe place to stop along the road.  

I have a pee-pee, and I want to make my pee-pee in the toilet.

He was insistent;  he knew what he needed.  We stopped in a parking lot at the entrance to a hiking trail along the road, where I offered a pee-pee in nature as the next-best option to a toilet.  

Two liters poured out of him, and that was it.  I peered into his strained little face and watched the tension drain away.  Does your tummy still hurt?  No.  

Unconvinced, I pressed his stomach.  Here? Here? What about here?  (Not a grimace).  Jump up and down.  (Three jumps).  Run over to that tree and look at the birds.   (But I don't want to scare them!)

Soon, the color had returned to his face, and we were heading towards home.   

Next week we'll be visiting our regular pediatrician to ask whether some organic problem might have gotten BB into this state in the first place.  I suspect he'll tell me it's nothing.  For now, I am relieved, thankful, and acutely aware of being safe and relaxed at home, as opposed to where we could have been, and still would be, now.  

And if something like this every happens again, I'll try to keep some things in mind:   Use caution, but try to stay relaxed and focused enough to check the obvious.  

* * *

ALN:  So tell me, what did we do this morning?

Blondini Boy:  This morning?.. We were going to the doctor, and then I made a pee-pee!

* * *

Yah, that pretty much sums it up. 

Shabbat Shalom.

ALN

___

* From the Yiddish:  A man plans and G-d laughs.

Re-Awakening

What a funny feeling -- four weeks off-blog, and now, the ironic sting of returning to this virtual world of real people...  a feeling that this corner of my life has dropped out from under me.  Now there's that expected-nevertheless-surprising squeak of the gears as I try to slide my way back in.

Winter is here, rain is not (not in Israel, not nearly enough of it), but the microbes are back in full, and my two-week battle with bronchitis was there to prove it.  Tune in for my forthcoming work, An Ode to Rythromycin.  

No question, this was my psycho-somatic response to the usual stress at work and the unrelenting scrollbar of daily activity, against the ever-nearing backdrop of our country at war.  The verdict is quite clear:  if I do not learn to pace this hectic life-schedule multi-tasking thing, I will inevitably engage in a forced vacation, and last week was it.  I was in bed, or flopping over onto some sofa or other, for the entire week.  Did not recognize myself.

Even odder, for the duration of that week, nearly everything was input.  Instead of writing (or blogging, as noted), I read.*  Instead of practicing therapy at work, or art in the studio, I went over books and articles about therapy and art.  And I ate regular meals, ones that I had taken time to prepare.  A-B-C's for most, a notable accomplishment for me.  I barely opened the computer, and within three days found myself drowning and spluttering in an email effusion that nearly required a Cyber Coast Guard bail-out.  No blogging.  None.  Not even blog-reading.  It was the printed word, read off of authentic, bleached tree-pulp products.  

Freedom, in an odd way, but also a strange pang of loss and absence... and a return to my original question:  

How does everyone find the time?  

Please, send the magic pill on over.

Keep the balance (or -- you've been warned -- your body may do it for you),

ALN

____

* Namely, אישה בורחת מבשורה -- Until the End of the Land (2006) by David Grossman (I only found circumstantial evidence of its availability translated in English), and How Doctors Think (2007/2008) by Jerome Groopman.  I have thoughts on both, but not for now.

The Many Ways It Touches Us

In Israel, six degrees of separation is going way overboard.  One or two usually suffices.  

I'm relieved that -- for now -- my family and I have remained one or two degrees of separation from unending worry and shocking tragedy.  But within two degrees of separation, there are far too many examples. Here are a few:

I.

One co-worker, H, had just returned from a family holiday in Eilat over Chanukah, only to hear that the first missile to reach a house beyond Sderot crashed into her sister-in-law's apartment, injuring their teenage daughter.  A week afterwards the girl was out of the ICU and -- thank G-d -- on her way to physical recovery.  Her emotional recovery will take much longer.  Two weeks later, H receives word that another relative, a nephew, has been injured and evacuated.   One of her own children is serving, and she knows what could be.  She tries not to think about it.

II.

A classmate leans over toward my computer last week in the middle of class.  She has left her kids with their regular "babysitters," their grandparents -- her own parents -- in Be'er Sheva. They watched the missile fall into the kindergarten across the street, felt the BOOM rock their apartment.  Now they're afraid to leave the house, but this evening they've decided to spend a few minutes in the mall down the street, just for some air and a change of surroundings.  Now my classmate has her mobile phone in hand;  she insists on checking the internet news every few minutes.  Just in case.

III.

My cousin sends an email explaining that while her son, recently drafted, is still in training and therefore will not be going into Gaza, he is often sent to the border to provide security and support to the soldiers.  One of his closest friends lies in the ICU, critically injured after fighting in Gaza.  His friends are filled with worry and guilt that they cannot be by his side.

IV.

My friend and neighbor S. commutes to Be'er Sheva every morning.  She relates the time when she was mentally preparing herself;  She rolls down her car window and turns up the radio, should there be a warning siren during her drive.  No sooner is the window open and

 rrrrrrrrrRRRRRRRRrrrrrrrrrRRRRRRRRRrrrrrrrrr.

She stops the car, lies down alongside it, hands over her head and neck.  She explains to me that the missile shrapnel flies up to a height of 30 cm, so lying down flat is pretty good protection. She notes that our bomb shelter room ("Mamad," ממ"ד), like theirs, is on the North side of the house, so it will provide pretty good protection should the missiles start raining down on us. Meanwhile, she watches missiles falling over Be'er Sheva from her tenth-story office window, keeps her purse accessible under her chair, and cuts off telephone calls to run to the shelter when the siren wails.  I express amazement that she is still willing to come to work every day.  It's not the same as living there, she reminds me.  I come home to quiet every night.  It's not like my kids are sleeping all together with us in the shelter and we're waking up several times a night to throw them down onto the rug.*

V.

Another coworker, N, is safe (for now).   Her family is not.   She lives in Jerusalem.  Her brothers and sister and their children live in Gaza, along the coast.   Her phone is on all the time.  Her family has no electricity.  No heat.  They don't go out, to work or school.  Their only source of information is a small, battery-powered radio, which tells them whether the most recent bombings and incursions are anywhere near their home.  Every time N talks to her brother, she tells me, she makes sure to say a real good-bye.  She is afraid it will be the last time. 

VI.

A senior staff member is as close to beside herself as I've ever seen her.  Her son is being drafted tomorrow.  He will not be in Gaza, but her thoughts are there.  She doesn't spend too much time watching all those films showing soldiers and bombings and house raids, but she cannot stop thinking about it.   We can only imagine what's going on there, she tell me, emotion filling her voice.  Our army has killed 600 of them.  Six hundred.  I can't get my mind around it. Women, children.  Families.  Here I am, safe in my home, enjoying my every day activities, while over there... Nothing good ever comes when we fight.  Their next generation will only learn more hate.

* * * * *

A friend's husband, a security expert, is in the reserves along the Gazan border and comes home every night at two in the morning.  A psychologist colleague has been called up to counsel traumatized soldiers.  An oncology patient from Gaza in the hospital for treatments, worried about his father and siblings while facing a completely different threat to his own life.  Countless colleagues have children in the army.  They jump whenever their phones ring, half-apologizing for their edginess.  We give them knowing looks and continue our day.

  * * * * *

This war -- like all wars here -- has been full of the kind of wrenching decisions, moral dilemmas, and wide-scale destruction that hurt to contemplate.  Eight years of missiles onto our compatriots in Sderot?  Too much.  The killing of children forced to be human shields? Disgusting.  Our soldiers running from house to mosque, flying overhead, facing split-second, life-threatening decisions?  Painful.   I want it to stop, want a modicum of quiet, and safety, and security, and reason, to reign.  But it doesn't.

For now I have avoided the more graphic media, the photos and films.  I read some Hebrew-language articles, and tune in to some of the American media.  Knowing what is going on, on both sides, is terrible.  Often I find it hard enough walking through those hospital doors every day, and I'm not looking for more questions no one can answer.  I understand why we had to go in there and try to put an end to it.  But I worry, because I know that all that violence and destruction will not stop the hate, and hate keeps Hamas going, and going. 

I go to bed every night to the slightly-faint echo of bombs, and wake up in the morning, in the dark, again to the sound of bombs.  I try to fit my mind around the simultaneous feelings of relief and sorrow that follow those sounds.

I think Shoilem Aleichem (via Joseph Stein's screenplay) put it best in our favorite classic, Fiddler on the Roof:

Townsperson: Why should I break my head about the outside world?  Let the outside world break its own head....

Tevye: He is right...

Perchik: Nonsense. You can't close your eyes to what's happening in the world.

Tevye: He's right.

Rabbi's pupil: He's right, and he's right.  They can't both be right!

Tevye:  (Pause). You know, you are also right.

Only, this is no outside world.  Not even close to six degrees' worth.  This is here, and this is us.

Keep the balance, and keep safe.

ALN

Occupation As Balance

(No, not that kind of occupation.  I truly, honestly do not know how to address that topic in this forum, or with which vocabulary, and so I leave it aside).

Why I don't call my good friends more often than I do?  This evening I picked up the phone and dialed my friend N, and rediscovered how fantastic, how comforting it is to have those conversations and compare the day-to-day... The freshly-discovered gutter leak in the newly-purchased house;  the parallel laments over negligent school systems long-overdue for an over-haul;  our mutual agreement that the Obamas' extended family support system will only benefit them as a young, busy, professional couple preparing for the next busy stage in their lives... and on and on.

The conversation reaches that inevitable topic:  work, motherhood, how to do it all and keep the guilt minimal, the multi-tasking maximal, and everything in between relaxed and stable enough to keep everyones' lives together and whole and enjoyable.  

N works a much longer day than I do and gives her husband A a lot of credit for his super-husband abilities, especially in recent years, but reminds me of what it takes to reach household stability.   Sometimes one of them is down, sometimes the other.  But they know to take it in turns.  Both she and A cannot both let themselves feel drained.  

Or, as N put it, If that space is occupied in the house, then I know I can't be there... That is, she understands she has to stay upbeat and hold on to the energy level until A can get it back again, and then she can let her end drop a bit and let him pick up the slack.  

It's not always going to happen.  Within our own four walls, I know there's no guarantee that the two of us aren't going to hit some kind of simultaneous slump;  it just might happen, and it sometimes does.  We both get tired, cranky, past our peak.  Then maybe it's time, as it was last night, to just go upstairs and hang the laundry together, instead of trying to figure out whose turn it is.

Occupation as balance?  Maybe, if we can just hang on and take it in turns.  Hang in there, N.

Keep the balance,

ALN

Gender Imbalance: The Examples Are on the Wall

Elder Princeski and I sat down yesterday afternoon to do her halacha (Jewish Law) homework. She has a textbook/workbook which she's not allowed to write in, so that the school can get several years' use out of it, so she writes her answers in a notebook.  

I do not like this workbook.  Apparently, it was designed exclusively for boys.  It contains little evidence that females even exist, and what scant evidence there is, is not encouraging. By this I mean that the book has almost no mention of girls, with the following seven notable exceptions (and yes, I went through the entire book):  

1.  A girl's name is cited in a question asking whether women are exempt from ritual handwashing.

2.  A woman's name is mentioned in connection with preparations for her wedding.

3.  A boy's mother is mentioned as taking care of him when he is ill.

4.  One exercise cites an unnamed female teacher posing a question to her [male] pupils.  

5.  A question cites a girl as having cooked on chag (a holiday), and her two brothers arguing whether her actions were permissible or not.

6.  Another exercise in the same chapter presents an example of a woman operating a washing machine to launder baby clothes during chol hamoed, and a man chastising her for doing so.

7.  Finally, in the chapter discussing the laws of gossip, girls' names suddenly appear in one-third of the exercise questions.  (I smudged out the author's name here, since I have no desire to besmirch him;  I do not blame him for the book's bias, since I"m assuming it's consist with the attitudes and outlook of his community.   I do hold the school responsible for using such a book.  Of course it goes without saying that only boys are pictured on the front cover).

I AM DISGUSTED.

My daughter probably would never have noticed the absence of girls in most of the questions, nor the skewed examples that do mention girls.  But I noticed right away, and it hurts.  Whether the intent of the publishers is to suggest that the information in the book is mostly irrelevant to girls -- except when cooking, cleaning and gossip is concerned -- or to keep lascivious thoughts far away from the minds of nine-year-old boys, is anyone's guess. 

I wonder why my daughter's school has chosen such a textbook.  What kind of educational institution sends such a message to its pupils, male or female?  Meanwhile, I've come up with these horrendous visions of what would be an American public-school equivalent:  Math textbooks written only for boys?  Science textbooks with no mention of natural history? Civics books that only cite white people?  

The problem is not limited to textbooks.  I remember walking into Elder P's classroom during the first asifat horim (aka, Back-to-School Night, in American parlance).  Her fourth grade class consists of 33 girls and one female teacher.  All the pictures on the boards around the walls featured.... yup, that's right.  Only boys.  And men (all with long beards, of course).  I could barely restrain myself from addressing the teacher about this, but I didn't feel it appropriate to start off the year with criticism, especially since the teacher had clearly made an effort to decorate the walls.   But it irked me:   A classroom full of girls whose very essence is blatantly absent from their daily surroundings. 

As the evening went on, I debated trying to improve the situation via other means, like volunteering to help the teacher with future classroom decorations.  But I hesitated yet again, not wanting to offend her by suggesting that her own efforts were inadequate.  By now I feel that enough time has passed, and I can offer my creative services without causing offense.

I do not want to raise my daughters with the burden of a heavy, Seventies-feminism, seek-out-the-unfairness approach.  At the same time, I cannot justify a book like this, which presents a consistent bias in its blatantly unbalanced examples.  It's hard enough to raise children to respect themselves and others.  Why does the religious school system insist on making it that much harder for us?

For now, Elder P and I have found a small solution to the workbook problem.  When writing out her exercise answers, I encouraged her to respond creatively regarding some of the names mentioned.  Thus Meir has become Meira, David is now Davida, and Yossi, Yosefa. By the time we get to the later laundry, cooking and gossip examples, I hope I'll have come up with additional creative methods of dealing with them.

Keep the balance,

ALN

...and Patients' Rights

What do you think of this?  

The National Women's Health Network has been passing the following notice around cyberspace (I have quoted the notice in full since I'm assuming their intention is to spread the word to as many people as possible, and thus they are not picky about copyright issues).

Protest Genital Cosmetic Surgery!

Join NWHN ally, the New View Campaign, on November 17 in New York to protest the genital cosmetic surgery industry that is medicalizing women's sexuality!

Genital cosmetic surgeries like labiaplasty and vaginoplasty are on the rise. Surgeons who promote these procedures claim that they restore and enhance the appearance of the vaginal area, resurfacing and tightening the tissues to reclaim the “youthful appearance and function of the vulvar and vaginal area.” Women assume that these new surgeries are safe and effective, but in fact the claims are unsubstantiated by research, and there’s some evidence that they may create new health problems, as well as promoting a narrow and unrealistic idea of what women’s genitals should look like.

Most women don’t even know that the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology doesn’t support these cosmetic genital enhancement surgeries and has publicly said that “it is deceptive to give the impression that [these procedures] are accepted and routine" and has stressed that their safety and effectiveness have not been documented.

To raise public awareness of this assault on women’s health and well-being, the New View Campaign will stage a protest on November 17 outside a cosmetic genital surgeon’s office in New York City from 12 - 2PM. The specific location will be posted on http://www.fsd-alert.org/ on November 16. We urge NWHN members – particularly those in the NYC area -- to join the protest.

The New Campaign is an ally of the NWHN, which demands new regulations requiring that women requesting these procedures receive adequate information about possible scarring, chronic pain, obstetric risks, loss of genital sensation, reduced erotic pleasure, and post-operative anxieties. It also calls for independent post-procedure research to determine the extent of these adverse reactions.

My mom felt this notice was blogworthy, and thus forwarded it to her blogging family member (yours truly).   As of a quarter to six this morning, my response to her was as follows (with some minor grammatical changes, for clarity):

The physicians making these inaccurate medical claims are being irresponsible and should be treated accordingly, like any other physicians who act irresponsibly.  But what about the people who seek the surgery?  I mean, who the heck doesn't do research before committing their bodies, time, and money to elective surgery of this nature?  Also, I would think that the kind of research they are demanding here is appropriate regarding all types of surgery.

I'm sure there was the same uproar before other cosmetic procedures -- breast enhancement surgery, and botox, and all the rest --  reached their current popularity, and now they're all acceptable practices.  If people insist on demanding unnecessary and risky surgery for the sake of beauty,  I'm not sure the medical world will convince them otherwise, with the exception of the few who could benefit from psychological therapy, to help them with their low self esteem, which led them to want such surgery in the first place.

Having reviewed my original response, I would make a few minor changes to further clarify my response;  namely, that I am not at all belittling people with low self esteem, and that I understand that this is only one of many reasons women seek cosmetic surgery.

Does this fall under the guise of the West's version of medically-sanctioned genital mutilation?  Weigh in, dear readers (including you, Mom, and your friends...)

Keep the balance,

ALN

What We're Used To

What began as a comments on Conversation in Klal's recent Seminary post (read her post first to understand the context of mine) has morphed into its own entity.

My year in seminary, here in Israel, was one of the most meaningful and impacting in my life, both in terms of learning, and being in Israel. During that year, I learned more about Jewish thought and practice than all years prior or thereafter. I spent time with incredible teachers, who opened their homes to us throughout the year. My hesed (community service) project was working with kids in the hospital, which eventually led me to... a career working with kids in the hospital. I grew up in a nonreligious home and attended public school, so I had quite a lot of catching up to do in terms of Jewish learning, but by age 18 I was mature enough to make up quite a bit of it in only one short but intensive year. (I wanted to stay on for a second year, but that's another story...) My Rabbanit helped prepare me for the year by tutoring me in some pre-catch up catch up, and my parents generously funded a summer in ulpan to help me improve my Hebrew. (Ulpan was an intensive experience in an of itself, but that is yet another story, for another time,. In retrospect, the time and money investment proved invaluable later, when I returned to Israel to stay). Yes, that year was expensive (seminary cost less then, but still). I am thankful that my parents could afford it, and that they chose to support my wishes to attend seminary in Israel. I am fully aware that these days, this type of expense does not fit into many family budgets.

But allow me to look at the economic issue another way (and like Prof K, I'll probably get some flak for this too, and so be it). You might say my parents had more money to spend on one year of seminary because they didn't "waste" money all those years paying outrageously extravagant day school tuition, when there was an excellent public school freely available two blocks away. Back then, my family didn't have a choice -- unlike today, there were no Jewish private school options anywhere near my home town -- but if we're talking about educational luxuries, why stop at seminary? Some (I among them) would argue that Jewish day schools, with their ridiculous high prices, should not automatically be considered a necessity these days, but rather, a luxury. I would guess that the cost of a semi-private tutor for Jewish studies, split among the families even a small group of kids, has got to be significantly less than day school tuition.  

I know most religious Jewish people outside of Israel view Jewish day school as a given, and that no parent in his right mind would dare send his kids to public school. But those of us who didn't have the option as kids, don't necessarily view it as a necessity now, either.  Would religious families who chose to send their kids to local public schools, despite the availability of a local Jewish school, be shunned by the community? My guess is, yes, they would.

I see the irony in the idea that my own kids are growing up in a completely different situation, where public school IS Jewish school and costs under $1000/year (including books). Despite the many advantages, I'm not completely comfortable with the state education system having such a dominant role in the formulation of my children's religious beliefs. But -- you guessed it -- that's another story.

Maybe it all comes down to what we're used to...

Keep the balance,

ALN

Eight Days to Go...

A thought for today, and the next eight days, care of Aish haTorah:  Reality check as balance.

This version is in English, and this one in Hebrew.

גמר חתימה טובה

Shabbat Shalom,

ALN