They Paved Paradise

This morning, I was standing at my kitchen counter, kneading sourdough for my weekly double batch of Challoh. As I knead, I always keep an eye on the display of my oven, which is situated to my left. Watching my oven clock that way lets me know that ten minutes have elapsed and I can now put my dough to rest, covered with a warm, damp all-cotton dish towel, for a couple of hours before shaping.

I was in the thick of my kneading and if you've never kneaded dough, I can tell you that it's about as physical an activity as is possible to perform. I'm not a physical sort of person, but my arms and hands are very strong from years of piano playing. I really do enjoy the workout I get from kneading dough, even though it leaves me as quivering and breathless as my bread dough.

I am not the first person to suggest that making bread is therapeutic and brings peace of mind. Once I'm into the rhythm, the thrust and parry of the at first uncooperative mass of dough, my mind travels to a place where there is no thought. There is only the hard, manual labor of creating art in the form of a homely loaf of bread. Bread, the act of making it as well as the act of eating the finished product, feels to me about as elemental as, well, giving birth. So nothing much is in my mind as I knead. It's just me and the dough, and a sense of purpose.

All at once, the motor of my refrigerator stopped cold, jolting me out of my bread-making induced mental coma/revery. The quiet was so sudden I glanced at the display of my oven to see if the electricity had gone out. But no. It was just my refrigerator motor, at rest. It occurred to me then that the motor makes a background noise I never notice until it ceases it's electronic grumbling.

That got me thinking, even though I was still kneading. I thought: this situation is ripe for a quotable quote.

So I mulled it over: when I knead bread, I realize that I am content. Even though I may moan about being overloaded with work and housework, I am happy to be at my work. It feels right. Maybe, I thought, my contentment is like that refrigerator motor: I don't notice my contentment until something in my life goes south--goes crazy, haywire wrong. Then I look back and think, "What happened to the normalcy of yesterday? Where did it go?"

So here it is: Contentment is like a noisy refrigerator motor. It's background noise until it stalls.
Of course, this thought was immediately followed by, "Nah. Someone must have already written a quote like that."

Yup. It didn't even take long for me to figure it out. It was Joni Mitchell: "Don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone."

Trumped again.

At least it was Joni.

Visiting Vandergrift

Today, I'm hosting a guest blogger, Israel Pickholtz, with whom I share geographic roots. Both of our families lived in Pittsburgh and in Vandergrift, Pennsylvania. Both of us made Aliyah to Israel a long time ago and are near neighbors. The two of us also share a common interest in Jewish genealogy.

My earliest relative on my maternal grandfather's side to come to the United States from Europe, was Max Kopelman, one of the original settlers of Vandergrift Heights, Pennsylvania. Israel is visiting the States just now with his wife Frances and youngest son Devir to celebrate Israel's grandson's Bar Mitzvah. He decided to seize the opportunity to explore the town of Vandergrift as it is today.




VISITING VANDERGRIFT
11 Shevat 5770 (26 January 2010)

Israel Pickholtz, with Frances and Devir

In the morning, we had gone to the Carnegie Museum to see the dinosaurs. Going to Vandergrift felt much the same. A trip to the very distant past.

We drove into town on Hancock Avenue, just like we did when I was a child. There had been half-a-dozen road signs on the way, not like the long low sign I remember from fifty years ago, but the plain green highway department signs that direct traffic to every other small town in the state. But still, the fact that Vandergrift warranted an official sign at all was something.

We first came down to the old store across from the Casino Theater. I was pretty sure I knew which one was R. Gordon and Son, both from the structure of the outside and from the angle to the Casino. I realized afterward that had I come down the alley behind Sumner Avenue, I would have recognized the store from there, more than likely. I forget what business is there now - it wasn't important. Not much a reporter, I. Probably should have stopped for a picture. There may never be a "next time."

We went around the block towards the bridge to Apollo, passed the other end of Sumner Avenue and came around at it from the VFW end. It was pretty much as I remembered, but of course it all looked smaller. A policeman parked his car not far from ours and we spoke a bit. I told him who I was and that my grandfather and later my uncle had furniture stores in town. "Oh yeah," he said "I bought stuff offa them." Yep, I was in Vandergrift.


Raymond and Sarah Gordon's house, 126 Sumner Avenue
I knew the house at 126 fairly well, having been there many times, including the second floor. I saw though that there was a dormer in the center of the front of the house, so there must have been a third floor too. I'll have to ask Mother about that. The house was shuttered, but in a short-term way--perhaps just for the day. No chance of any occupant's showing up to offer to show us around. I took a few pictures of Devir standing in front of the house. Further down towards the river, there were three houses in a row with "for sale" signs.




Ethel and Kenny Stull's house,
172 Franklin Avenue
Then we went up Grant to Aunt Ethel's house on Franklin Avenue. Number 172 looked exactly as it did then, the house, the yard, Lafayette Street over to the left. But way smaller. It was depressing to see how badly it was kept up. There was mail in the box, so it obviously was occupied, but the paint looked like it hadn't been redone since Aunt Ethel died in 1976. I didn't look to see if our two mulberry bushes were still in their yard. I took a couple of pictures of the front of the house.
There was a woman delivering mail down the street and we asked directions to the Historical Society, on Sherman. The society operates a museum in an old school that is no longer in use. The sign said they were open until three and by the time we arrived, it was two. I had had some correspondence with Beth Caporeli and I told her I'd be coming either Tuesday or Wednesday, but we hadn't set anything specific. We found a woman named Mickey Thomas, to whom my name was not familiar. I told her who I was and she asked how my cousin David was. I had to tell her that David - who had worked at the store with his parents - had died a month ago.

Mickey had also known my uncle Kenny Stull, Aunt Ethel's husband, and their son Eric had worked for her for a time. I don't think she knew that Eric's mother was a Gordon. Mickey said that it was really too bad that after finally getting all his difficult adolescence behind him, Eric had died so suddenly. (He was thirty and the accident was completely the other guy's fault.)

They have a nice gift shop and I bought a book called "Something Better Than The Best" and a little statue of the Casino Theater. While leafing through the book, I saw a single reference to Max Kopelman's brother-in-law (they married sisters) Louis Landau, who had some kind of business partnership with a Black man named Louis Sutherland long before such things were commonplace. I'll probably send the book to Varda on long-term loan.

303 Longfellow St.

Varda's uncle Max Kopelman had lived at 303 Longfellow. Beth Caporeli had already told me that the building had been taken over by the Italian restaurant next door, but we stopped to look anyway. The restaurant building was sitting on two lots and it was clear that Max Kopelman's house was gone.

Mickey spent more than an hour showing us around. Lots of old things that were not specific to Vandergrift but had come to local people. And alot of other things about the town, yearbooks, sports trophies, maps, city directories and items relevant to local people. As usual, I came away with impressions rather than details. (You want details, send my brother.)

They would like to have additional photographs and artifacts and I hope to get them some of those.

We also met a woman named Lou Smeltzer Gill who works at the museum. She is from Vandergrift but now lives in Apollo and "walks over every day." Lou mentioned that among the Jewish store owners was the wife of long-time Pirates' team physician Dr. Joe Finegold, who had some connection with the Rubins. In fact, she said, "all the store owners were of the Jewish religion back then."

Neither of them knew of Mr Sturgeon, the barber whose shop was next to my grandfather's store. I fussed terribly as a child when in the barber chair and he reached a point where I was not allowed inside.

Mickey says that new people are moving in, mostly New Kensington, because enforcement in Vandergrift is more lax. Drugs, mostly.

We drove around Washington Avenue. The "new store" - where Uncle George, Aunt Esther and David sold furniture - now sells party supplies. I identified Uncle Martin's TV-radio store across the street because it had the living quarters upstairs.

If the museum is any indication, people are trying hard to preserve the past and there may be enough civic pride to enable them to succeed. I certainly wish them well.

Choosing God Over the Tooth Fairy--Dedicated to Bernie Newman

My friend Bernie Newman asked me why I believe in God as opposed to say, the Tooth Fairy. I gave him a very long response and thought to blog it it since it goes to the essence of why I have become religious.

This is from the word I gave at my daughter Malka's Bas Mitzvah:

There's a Midrash that says that when the angels got wind of the fact that Hashem (God) was about to create another human being--Eve--they complained. They said to Hashem, "Why are you going to create another one of those things? They SIN!"

Hashem told the angels, "Don't worry. This new creature will be different. I will create her so that it won't be in her nature to sin."

Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch said that when Hashem split Eve from Adam, Eve/woman was given man's portion of innate spirituality.

Because Adam/man lost this part of himself, he would always be at risk for becoming at sea with his spirituality--would always need to actively tie himself to Hashem by dint of doing many mitzvos (commandments). Without the mitzvos, man loses his connection to his spirituality.

Take the mitzvah (commandment) of sukkah*, for instance. Men are commanded to dwell in the sukkah for an entire week. Women have no such commandment. Men need to enact the drama of living in the desert under the stars for a whole week so as to connect them to the history of their ancestors' lengthy desert-wandering. That little playing-out of ancient history is exactly what they need to get them through another year of their Jewish existence while they live out their day-to-day drudgery.

Women, on the other hand, have no need of all of those commandments because they have a direct spiritual tie to Hashem. It's inborn. Men have to strive, women are already there, close to Hashem every second of every day.

In the morning service, there is a series of blessings called the Negative Blessings. We say thank God I'm not this, and thank God I'm not that. Many feminists get P.O.'ed about the blessing that men say: Thank God I'm not a woman.

Rashi explains that men are thanking God for having more commandments--that the more commandments we have, the greater our quality of life. So, a free man has more commandments than a slave, and so forth. A man has more commandments than a woman. That's the real meaning of those blessings: we express our gratitude for what we get out of living a Torah life and fulfilling the mitzvos.

Within all those negative blessings, there is a single affirmation. Women say (channeling Popeye??): Thank God I am what I am.

I love that. Woman is saying: Thank you for creating me with innate spirituality, for making me a special kind of human being with a direct tie to You, for making me someone who isn't so inclined to sin. I am happy with my portion, even grateful!

Man, on the other hand, is lucky to have those many commandments because he needs them. It helps him alter his life from one of humdrum toil to a life that has meaning. So a man who strives to follow the mitzvos is joyful for having this constant tool for attaining the spiritual.

A woman is every bit as joyful because of her unique position of having been born spiritually whole.

As I explained to Bernie, either you buy it or you don't. There is nothing one can say about the Tooth Fairy that will speak to my soul. The reason is something inborn, because I'm a woman--a Jewish woman.

It's much harder for a man to come to and maintain faith and spirituality. It requires striving. This is what I believe with all my heart.

*Sukkah-a temporary hut that is central to the holiday of Sukkos.

Gardasil Victory

The following is the text of an editorial I wrote about the 2010 vaccination schedule issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The topic doesn't apply to my own sons and daughters because Israel does not routinely vaccinate children for HPV.

I became aware of the Gardasil vaccine controversy during research for a series of articles I was hired to write on the topic of sexually transmitted diseases (STD's). The implicit message of the drug company and the American governmental bodies responsible for creating and distributing the Gardasil vaccine as something for women only, aroused my feminist ire. I was thrilled to discover that the 2010 vaccination schedule includes boys and men on the Gardasil roster.


"Those of us who felt anger that our daughters had to be vaccinated against the HPV virus (and not our sons) have been handed a victory. The newest vaccination schedule issued by the CDC advisory panel in October 2009 now recommends that boys receive the vaccine, too.

The Gardasil controversy has many factors. For one thing, vaccinating youngsters is seen by many as the equivalent of tacit approval for sexual activity in children as young as 9 years of age. Of course, as parents, we'd like to protect our daughters against STD's contracted during sexually violent encounters such as rape, but does vaccinating a young girl give her the impression that it is safe for her to become sexually active? Will she get the wrong impression that this vaccine means she has the permission of her parents and her government to have sex?

Why Daughters?

Then again, the feminists among us had other fish to fry: why are the girls being vaccinated and not the boys? Aren't boys every bit as responsible and even more so if one considers the act of rape, for spreading the human papilloma virus (HPV)? Why should our daughters submit to this vaccine and its risks and not our sons?

Drug manufacturers and our government tried to tell us that the vaccine was not proven effective in boys and men but underestimated the ability of the public to reason. The thing is, the effectiveness of the vaccine in girls and women was known because it was TESTED in girls and women (and not in boys and men), until at last, angry parents hammered the idea into the heads of the people who run the drug companies that boys and men be tested, too. Parents were not surprised to discover that the vaccine was found to be just as effective in boys and men as it is in girls and women.

So, we can see the new 2010 vaccination schedule as a victory of sorts for American parents, who have learned better than to shut up and put up with whatever the drug companies and the government wants to do to their children. Yes, we are grateful as parents that medical interventions have been found to protect our children from HPV and its effects, but we have issues in the way this solution was presented to us and our children.

Carte Blanche

We don't want our boys and men to think that they have carte blanche to engage in any sexual behavior they choose and that it's the girl's job to protect her person against a boy's undeniable urges. Boys and men must also take responsibility for their pleasures. We need equal rights to apply to our medical care every bit as much as we need these rights to apply to our employment situation.

As parents, no matter whether we are mothers or fathers, we need our children to think outside of gender stereotypes that permit boys and men to be all-empowered when it comes to sex while women must be protected from them. We must teach our children the concept of equal responsibility."

Alberghetti and Her Spaghetti

My family is on a spaghetti kick this week. Some of us are loving it with garlic butter and cheese and others of us are totally into spaghetti with meat sauce. None of these dishes are especially gourmet. They are more what Alice B. Toklas termed, "nursery food," than epicurean delights.

There I was at my stove, browning meat for sauce yet again, when I thought of a television commercial from back in the 1970's, when I was a teen. This woman appears on the screen, someone I've never seen before, and she's wearing an apron. The frame shows her standing there in the kitchen, apparently getting ready to cook her brains out. She announces herself with some alliteration: "Hello, I'm Anna Maria Alberghetti and I'm here to talk to you about spaghetti sauce."

Every single time this commercial came before my television-saturated baby-boomer eyes, I was puzzled, but not too puzzled, ready to accept anything the family television wished to air on my behalf. I registered this unknown face and thought, "Who the Hell is Anna Maria Alberghetti and what do I care about her spaghetti?"

It never occurred to me to ask my mother, who would have known. But like I said, I didn't much care. Today though, when I remembered Ms. Alberghetti, I remembered the truism that GIYF (Google is your friend) and hastened to my PC to see what I could dig up. It seemed like a fun thing to do.

I was surprised that youtube doesn't carry a clip of that particular commercial, though I did find this one that shows Ms. Alberghetti advertising a different product, right at the end of this collection of dated, nostalgia-engendering commercials. So, I bombed out trying to find that particular spot that jogged my memory in the first place, but I did find lots of other material about the singer/actress.

Anna Maria Alberghetti (b. 1936) was a child prodigy born in Italy. Her father was an opera singer and concert master and her mother was a concert pianist. Anna Maria , according to Wikipedia, sang onstage in Rhodes with a 100 piece orchestra when she was six and had a debut at Carnegie Hall when she was 13. She won a Tony Award for Best Actress in Carnival in 1962. She appeared on Ed Sullivan more than 50 times. She married Claudio Guzman, a television producer and director, had a couple of daughters, and divorced.

Then she kind of faded away until she reappeared in those Good Seasons Salad Dressing commercials in the 1970's. I had remembered that the commercial was about spaghetti, but it must have been about the accompanying salad's dressing of choice. It seems this advertising campaign was geared to housewives who would have remembered Anna Maria from her glory days, because she'd all but faded from the consciousness of anyone else by the time those commercials were aired.

I still think this ad campaign was a bit misguided. It's one thing to have Joe Namath advertise pantyhose . Everyone knows Joe Namath, right??

Come to think of it, my kids have never heard of him. Hmmmm. But he was in the public conscious at the time he made that commercial, and Anna Maria had well nigh fallen off the radar by the time of that late lamented (okay, so not so lamented) Good Seasons promotion.

It's kind of hard for me to grok why they chose her, other than the obvious associations: Italian name, looks, and home-cooked Italian food. I didn't know her from Adam. I kept thinking: Saturday Night Light should spoof this.

I did find one more piece of information that kind of tickled my imagination: "The tragedy of World War II forced the Alberghettis from their homeland... "

"Hey?" I wondered. "What's up with that?"

Can you feel my brain ticking, thinking: is it possible?? Was Anna Maria Jewish??

She wasn't. But in 1992, the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) co-sponsored a two-day conference with NIAF (National Italian American Foundation) entitled, "Italians and Jews: Rescue and Aid during the Holocaust." The event was held at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel, Beverly Hills. Anna Maria was honored with an award and spoke of her memories from her childhood in Italy during the war.

She told the crowd that her aunt was shot by the SS and her father, who had trained many Jewish cantors, was arrested by Il Duce's Fascists. After her speech, she accepted a silver coin that commemorated the 500th anniversary of Columbus' famed voyage of 1492. According to the account I read of this event, this was the only time anyone from either the NIAF side or the ADL side made mention of this obvious connection between the two groups.

Maybe I couldn't connect Anna Maria with that spaghetti, but as it turns out, Anna Maria had no problem making the connection to me and my people. I salute you, Anna Maria Alberghetti AND your spaghetti.

Plural Thinking

In the era of love and peace, A/K/A, the sixties, everyone talked astrology. It was big.


Astrology made its way into pop culture via the musical Hair (Age of Aquarius), people nixed lovers based on astral predictions of incompatibility, and folks slurped up their daily newspaper horoscopes for a hefty dose of narcissism.

Some of us said, "We know it's not real, but it's fun," while others paid close attention and planned their calendars and love lives in accordance with the printed word.

But the appeal of astrology and horoscopes have faded quite a bit and don't figure quite so large in our everyday lives. Of course, like every other truth, this is more or less true, depending on individuals, with some people still enthralled with the idea that the stars have the power to invest their lives with meaning. I'm not one of them.

I am, however, very involved with the idea that my sign, Gemini, is a true reflection of my personality. I've noticed that my Gemini friends tend to feel the same way: that there is something about this astrological sign that makes Geminis proud to own up as members of the tribe. We feel special. Anointed, even.



I don't want to delve into the roots of astrology, but would like to give an overview of my personal beliefs on the topic. Astrology has Jewish lineage, since its roots are in the Jewish Sefer Yetzira (Book of Creation). But observant Jews are wary of astrology as a guiding force because of the biblical precedent: "Do not act on the basis of auspicious times" (Leviticus 19:26).

It's like this: God could, in theory, paint a picture in the stars of future events, but depending on any one particular picture would be foolish, since God could change the sky at any moment and even from minute to minute. God could make the stars look one way, but make things play out in an altogether different manner. Sky-pictures can be tests of faith.

The test: Do we base our actions according to a chimera in the sky, or do we do we examine each moment and act according to what is right or wrong at a given moment according to our code of ethics?

On the other hand, we can use the idea of the astrological signs for personal insight and for the purpose of perfecting ourselves. For instance, Scorpio is consumed with the idea of sex and death. Scorpios have the nature of murderers, but, on channeling their instincts, might become butchers or surgeons. I feel very comfortable with the idea that my sign says reams about me and that this knowledge can help me become a better person.

About ten years ago, some women I knew took a course on astrology from a Jewish perspective. The teacher was a French woman, the daughter of a rabbi who had achieved some renown in this field of study. The all-women students were taught how to make astrological charts and give readings. My friends were eager to practice their skills and asked me and my husband if they could be allowed to do our charts.

When I was shown my chart, I was told that it was very rare in that it depicted a perfect Magen David, the Star of David. Wow. I looked at my chart, and sure enough, there was a perfect Jewish star holding pride of place. The women consulted their teacher who said that this was a rare occurrence and signified that I was a special person. Who wouldn't love hearing that stuff? I just ate it up.

But things got even more interesting when my husband's chart came out a perfect triangle. I watched the women pointing to the three points of the triangle as they mumbled and nodded. One of them explained, "Your husband is inflexible. He goes from point A, to point B, to point C with no digression. EVER!" The woman used her finger to punctuate each fixed point.

Furthermore, other women jumped in to explain, his bullish ways were bound to butt into my fuller, more rounded character on a continual basis ensuring regular collisions in the form of marital spats. Five faces turned to me in curiosity, yearning (drooling) for confirmation. I kept a poker face. "Interesting," I said.

I know, I know: I shouldn't disappoint people like that. But it's a Gemini urge to always dissemble. And above all, I am a died-in-the-wool Gemini. Nyuk.

In actual fact, those women weren't really surprising me much. When Dov and I were dating, and I discovered he was a Virgo, a part of me thought, "Yikes. Virgos and Geminis are incompatible," but I dismissed the idea as retro, 60's thinking. I registered but didn't place too much stock in the idea.

I don't plan for this to be a reveal-all blog entry, but suffice it to say that while Dov and I could never stand in for Ward and June Cleaver, our 30th anniversary is only two months away. If I had counted on astral predictions, I never would have married the guy, but somehow, we're making it work.

A friend once shared with me something she read in a Jewish book on astrology. The book was in French (are you seeing a pattern yet?), so she translated for my sake. This tome commented on the fact that out of all the astrological signs, only Virgo and Gemini are represented by human figures, whereas the others are animals, elements, or objects.

The idea that Virgo and Gemini are the only signs represented by people has a Jewish significance. Virgo is associated with the Hebrew month of Elul, in which the High Holidays begin, a traditional time of repentance. Only people have the ability to repent.

Gemini is associated with the Hebrew month of Sivan, in which the Torah was given to the Jewish people, as commemorated by Shavuos (Shavuot), the Festival of Weeks, which occurs in Sivan. One of the reasons that Gemini is represented by twins is because this is the time that the twin tablets of the Ten Commandments were given to the Jewish people and God became tied to His Chosen. Only people can observe the commandments.

So, there you have it: Sivan and Elul are of special importance to people. But why, then, should their associated signs be incompatible? I would be interested to hear from my readers any ideas they might have on the subject. Maybe my Jewish star as it appears on my chart is a kind of hint? My Virgo husband goes in one unerring direction, while I have two triangles in two opposite directions?

Another friend (not French this time, but maybe in training?), showed me that she had a book, not a Jewish book, that spoke about the negative aspects of the astrological signs. A Gemini herself, she told me that Geminis were the sign most likely to end up behind bars. She showed me the cover of the book, which was decorated with the astrological signs depicted according to their worst characteristics. The Twins were shown in jail-stripes.

I didn't read the book, but I'm guessing this has to do with the fact that Geminis are impulsive and mercurial (a good word to describe a sign that is associated with the planet Mercury). I could have said, "Geminis are 'supposed to be' impulsive and mercurial," but I totally buy into the idea that these personality traits are real. I see them in every Gemini I know. I don't see these traits in other people.

Geminis tend to attract other Geminis for friends, though relationships aren't calm and smooth. Geminis are creative, they write, they're musicians--they love to perform. But to me, the main thing about Geminis is that they are changeable. They are like two people rolled into one and you never know which one you're gonna get. Geminis are honest, but color the truth to make it more palatable or to get what they want. Geminis HATE boredom and are always flitting from thing to thing in an effort to stay engaged, but all too often find themselves in hyper-focus over the inconsequential. Geminis talk too much and then find they are hurt too easily. We are immature and volatile. We lack discretion and prudence. But we're witty, fun, and humorous.

Are Geminis double your pleasure, double the fun? Or are we double-trouble? Leave a comment below. Both of me are waiting to hear from you ;-)

Bled Dry

Has anyone noticed my long absence from this blog? I sincerely hope so. It would be nice to know I've got people waiting--nay hanging--on my every word. Ha!

This month has been a killer. Though my company agreed to the bid I submitted as a lowered compromise fee per article, I discovered that I still wouldn't receive enough articles at this price to make this month's rent. And so, I lowered my sights and agreed to take half of my former fee for a guaranteed 100 assignments; the exact number of articles that would cover a month's rent at that rate.

This meant that whereas I used to write a maximum of 75 articles a month and had enough to cover rent plus two utilities, I scrambled to push out more content than ever before and only just covered rent. Well, I'm glad to have a job, and I did manage to get my articles in 10 days early, a kind of miracle, but I am thoroughly burned out.

Yesterday, I found myself in a stupor of sorts. I felt pressure to produce something, ANYTHING, now that my assignments were handed in and I could write about whatever I liked to my heart's content. I could use this time to write something for the freelance market, work on one of my books in progress, write something for a contest, or just blab on my blog. But nothing came to me. I felt bled dry.

It felt like the fibro-fog I'm always writing about for my job. I tried and failed to get my mind moving. I reviewed ideas and rejected them, one after the other, and finally gave in to the fog completely.

I got a great deal of housework done and decided I deserved some mindless fun on Facebook playing Pathwords and Bejeweled Blitz. I made two friends and lost another. Isn't it interesting how fast that works on Facebook?? I wound up the evening by watching Al Pacino in Scarface, hoping to generate some passionate emotion that would end up here, having taken form and achieved new heights of linguistic prowess, a kind of word apotheosis. But no. Nothing came to me. A big zilch.

However, today is another day and ideas are beginning to peep: "Write about me! No, write about ME!" like so many broken twigs trying to rearrange themselves back into a semblance of hope holding potential for productivity.


I am now trying to sift through the possibilities and settle on something. This entry is really about nothing at all except the process. Housework is easy: you see the task in front of you and so you set about completing your work with as much industry as you can muster. But writing? Ah. There's the rub. It just doesn't work that way with writing. Writing comes from within.

I will adjust to this new schedule, I feel certain. Maybe I will have to have a burnout day every month on completion of my assignments? It could very well be that yesterday was not a wasted day--that the brain-fog I experienced is also a part of the process. Or, maybe I just need a period of adjustment to my new job situation. I will try to be patient and wait for clarity.