A Rare Judean Snow Day

Yesterday it was gusty and cold and the rain came down in torrents. It was the kind of rain that would soak through your clothes clear to the bone in the dash from door to car. I didn’t want to go anywhere. I wanted to crawl beneath a quilt and think warm thoughts. But it was Wednesday, and Wednesday night means choir.

There was a chance of snow, so I called to see if our choir director was going to brave the roads. But I already knew what she’d say. Judy’s too tough to let a bit of wind or rain push her around. Besides, she said, they always say it’s going to snow and it never does.

I got home from choir at 10:15 PM and the first reports of snow came in half an hour later on our local Efrat e-list. Dov sniffed. “It’s not going to really snow until Thursday night.”

No School

But I woke up this morning and there was my youngest on the sofa. “No school?” I asked.

I looked out the window. Oh my. It was a world of white.

I love the way that happens. That surprise of seeing thick snow first thing in the morning, when the night before, there’d been none.

Usually, I’m the first one out there making snowballs and angels. A good snow is so rare in Efrat and I don’t like to waste it. I love to play in the snow. But today, I just wanted to stay in and be warm.

Work, Work, Work

Besides I had to work waiting for me. *sigh* Thursdays are all about that rush to fill my weekly quota of articles over at Kars for Kids. Still, a snow day is a snow day and that’s not to be taken lightly.

My firm belief: a snow day can be celebrated, even with work beckoning and even from inside the home, all snug and warm. I put up a pot of soup and brainstormed appropriate snow music, but the truth is, it was a no-brainer. I give you The Snow is Dancing, by Claude Debussy.

Son number six stumbled out of his room on hearing the music, cocked his head to listen, and then looked out the window at the white. He said, “By the way, Eema, that music is perfect for snow.”

I smiled my secret Mona Lisa smile. My next step: I changed my Facebook profile picture to this:

Snow in Efrat (photo credit: Varda Meyers Epstein)

It was kind of cheating because I’d taken the photo during last year’s storm. Still, it was a nice photo and several of my friends asked if they could share it. I was happy to share.

My snow photo got me thinking about snowflakes and how cool they look when you magnify them. I googled “snowflake photography” and found this amazing side show: macro photos of snowflakes by Alexey Kljatov.

In particular, the first photo in this series caught my eye. Doesn’t it look like Superman’s logo? One of my kids asked me why it looks like metal. Great photo, right?

 

Optical Illusions

Anyway, more about snowflakes: you know how everyone always says that no two snowflakes are alike? It’s only somewhat true. Snowflakes fall into specific classifications. I found this page of stereo snow images. The photos are supposed to be optical illusions. Alas, my eyes didn’t see anything special. Worked for my son, though. Did it work for you?

Last but not least, crafts. In particular, you guessed it, snowflakes. For Game of Thrones freaks. Here. (I even made a new Pinterest board for this one. I called it, “Crafts I’ll never do.”)

It’s a peaceful day. The house is filled with the good smells of baking and cooking, my kids are playing a game, and with this blog piece, I’ve filled my work quota for the week. Life is good.

Until the next time, stay warm, wherever you are, and if you brave the snow, throw a snowball for me.

Annoying Encounter

and I have known each other for years but are only friends on Facebook for a short time. In a recent thread, "L" proposed I create a blog, since I draw numerous comments on my Facebook threads. She is well-meaning and hoping to encourage my professional prospects.

I responded that I do have a blog, but friends prefer to comment ON Facebook, rather than on my blog, and no one clicks the Google Ads on my blog, either, so I just don't make any money writing there. When I ran into "L" at the local mom and pop store, we fell into a continuation of that Facebook discussion and she asked me, "Do you write about politics on your blog?"

I hedged the question by answering, "Sometimes," since my blog doesn't have much of a central focus. Some blogs are about food, other blogs are about politics, but my blog doesn't have any sort of cohesive narrative running through the entries other than that I write up things that are central to ME. Politics are a big part of my life, but so is food and genealogy and music. I'm a mishmash of a person and so my blog is a mishmash of a blog.

I've also been a mishmash of a blogger. Months can go by without a single new blog entry, even though I make resolutions now and again to write something, ANYTHING, each day. I can't seem to stick to the commitment entailed by a blog and here's why: It's hard writing into a vacuum.

The nature of writing a blog is different than that of writing a diary. A diary is for the diarist whereas, the blogger demands (or at least prays for or fervently desires) an audience. The lucky blogger attracts a wide audience and makes money. The other 99% do not. (I am smelling an Occupy Blogs movement on the horizon and its NOT a good smell. Nyuk.)

But back to "L" who continued, "Because if you write about politics it's better I don't follow you because I don't agree with your politics and if you write something political and I read it there, I won't like you anymore.

I mean, you're an intelligent person and I like a lot of what you write, but I don't like your political views and I'm afraid that if your blog is political, it will ruin my liking for you."

At that point, I shut up because--nu--she was already repeating herself.

By mutual unspoken agreement, we changed the subject, finished shopping, and went our separate ways.

But the exchange pissed me off.

"L" and I both live in a city where political beliefs are just about unanimous. We're all right wing. We live in Judea, in disputed territory the other side calls the Occupied West Bank. We both wear the settler label.

What made my politics so unpalatable to "L?" And do I really care?

I believe that "L's" real motive in this conversation was to get me to ask her to elaborate on her political views. But what she said made my hackles rise. I dug in my feet and refused to ask. "L" was letting me know she thought my political views inferior to her own. I was insulted and annoyed. Not in a major way. More like irked.

The good part of all this is that nobody reads what I write here and least of all, "L." So, I need not fear she'll read this and take offense :-)

My First Blog

So many friends have asked me, "When are you going to make a blog," that I finally bit the bullet. Having started a blog, I now feel that I have joined the 21st century. Here I am World, at last.

I decided to call my blog, "Judean Rose," because I live in Judea, and because my first name, Varda, means "rose" in Hebrew. Actually, it means "red rose." Sometimes the name is translated as the English flower known as a "pink," which makes sense, since the root of the word in another incarnation: Varod, means the color pink.

I was named after my paternal maternal great grandmother Rose Paul. Her Yiddish name was Raizel, which translates as, you guessed it, "rose."

In the modern world, Yiddish names are not as popular as they once were. Ashkenazi Jews have a custom of naming children after deceased relatives, and some take some leeway here. If they don't like the name as it stands, they may fiddle with it and come up with something a bit different; more to their taste. A lot of people will substitute the name "Shoshana" for the Yiddish name Raizel, but I actually have no idea why this should be so, since the meaning of the name Shoshana is "lily!"

Varda is much closer in meaning to the original Yiddish. Still, Varda has become a bit old fashioned and many would choose the more modern Vered, or perhaps, Vardit. I even had a teacher who had the name Vardina. I think her parents must have invented that name as a combination of Varda and Dina.

At any rate, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, to paraphrase Shakespeare's famous verse, which should more properly read:
"that which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet;"

At any rate, that takes care of the "rose" part of this blog. As to the Judea, well, many people call my neck of the woods, "The West Bank." But that's not a very accurate label. The term refers to the west bank of Jordan. Even the most left of left-wingers would no longer call the area in which I live, Jordan. Perhaps "disputed territories," or, "over the green line," would suit the purposes of liberals, but for me, this is just politics.

Hear me loud and clear: I am not a Zionist, but just a Jew who wants to live in the Biblical Land of Israel, A/K/A, the Holy Land, or Eretz HaKodesh, or Eretz Yisrael. Whether or not the land on which I live will ever be legally considered a part of the State of Israel doesn't change what I call this area. I call it Judea, because that's what it was called in the bible.

At any rate, I love this land with all my heart. It's my favorite part of Israel, with the exception of Jerusalem. I love the terrain, the weather, the flora and fauna. I love the clean air, and the people who live here. I could wax poetic for days about the landscape, and now that I have a blog, I may just do that at a later date. For now, it's enough to say that we have the best weather in Israel: dry with cool nights--not humid and sticky like the coastal plains. Even in midsummer, we mostly have a lovely breeze at night to refresh us from the hot daytime sun.