5/23/2007

New Jersey 3, or Poem Draft 4

The Importance of Dialogue
(Draft 4)

Dear Sara,

This morning on my walk to school, I stopped to inspect a soft yellow
blur that brushed my ankle.
On the side of the three-lane highway,
a dandelion peeked through the chain link,
like a daisy stuck in the end of a gun, and I smiled.

I grinned because the sun was out for the third
day in a row, and even though the noise from the traffic
drowned out the birds, I swore I could almost hear them
singing, and I put my lips together to join them in a whistle
because as for as long I’ve heard,
birds never sing with words.
They’re an endless niggun,
a wordless melody to greet the rising sun.

And I may be a crazy kind of Jew,
but I thank G-d for bird nigguns
because if birds could use words
they’d inevitably offend someone
enough to grab a shotgun,
to try and bring down every singing bird, every laughing, mocking bird
that so offended him.

And normally I’d see
that as irrational, and cruel,
but when I read your letter,
with its images of Israel painted sweeter and simpler than bird songs,
I started feeling for the trigger.

But silencing you would involve more than that moment-
I’d have to take a four-hour plane ride first,
and as that plane was landing, I’d see
the white beaches of Tel Aviv, and listen to the plane burst out in
offensively off-key singing,
and then I’d have to put my gun down.

You see, Israel is my long-distance lover
who’s been cheating on my politics for six or seven years,
but the walk up the Carmel and the Arabic ramble of the shuk are like flowers
and teddy bears. And they’re are almost enough
to make me forgive this country I love with so much fierceness
that its betrayals feel like the end of a rifle jabbed against my heart.

And Sara, you said the grass is always green
in Israel, that people are always proud in Israel,
heads high, backs straight, people fighting to survive
instead of going meekly to the slaughter.
But green grass in a desert
is a mirage that’s fortified by pesticides, and underneath
is the curve of the bent back
of a mother whose daughter died as collateral damage
in a battle they won’t ever call war.

And Sara, if you want
to tell me about the history of our pride, don’t forget to include
Manny Ringelblum, who hid our people’s history in milk cans
for scholars to remember. Don’t forget the Warsaw ghetto warriors,
who faced their deaths with Yiddish fight songs on their lips
in a riot that’s remembered as a battle. Don’t forget the Mizrachim,
who celebrate our ancient victories with laughter
while our assimilation corrodes their culture like salt water.
Don’t forget the eastern bloc Communists who hated us for being leaders

in the revolution that freed Poland. Don’t forget
the thousands of our generation discovering their Judaism,
burning like persistent fireflies in a jar
as their grandparents bequeath them the long-held secret in their wills. Remember them,

along with the straight backs and strong faces
and the lives of Socialist farmers who thought
they could plant freedom in the sand, but no prophet could’ve seen
that their seeds would grow into spiraling weeds,
thorny and defensive, and impossibly snarled. Remember your roots, but

don't mistake your history
for your memories, and don't forget
that freedom isn’t real until everyone can taste it; don’t forget
those who are still enslaved, and remember
that it’s not worth it to have green grass always,
if it means you need to keep dumping pesticides, because Sara,
if I’ve learned one thing living near a busy highway
it’s how to find joy in the dandelions.

5/14/2007

New Jersey 2, or Suspension

I've been asked by a few folks if I'm going to keep the blog up and running now that I'm back in the US. The answer is, "I don't know." I wasn't planning on it, but I've gotten to really enjoy this blog, and its devoted readership. Here's an idea: I'll write a few more articles, less frequently than my travel ones. I want them to still relate to traveling and returning and culture and the importance of discourse. We'll see how it goes, okay? I'll depend on you all to tell me whether or not I should keep it up.


I've been back for about four days, and I think I'm still a little bit in shock. It's not that the US is so shocking, it's that I still haven't figured out that Prague is over 4,000 miles away from me. I haven't wanted to be in Prague, and I don't miss it (yet?), so I haven't felt the distance.

Here's what I suspect: some day, I will be pushing my bicycle up some hill in some town without a public transportation system, and I'll start longing for the metro. Or I'll walk into a grocery store without thinking and try to buy a bottle of wine. Not only will I be shocked to discover that I can't legally buy alcohol yet, but that there is almost no such thing as a two-dollar bottle of wine in the US. Or I'll buy my first beer in a bar, and be disappointed that it tastes bad compared to Czech beer and costs an arm and a leg.

But perhaps the reason I haven't yet realized how far away Prague is has more to do with suspension. Throughout this semester, I have had pretty good contact with my family - I had hour-long phone calls with my parents at least every other week, and long talks with Trudi and my grandparents every weekend. I feel like I've been kept abreast of the family news, and didn't have a lot of catching up to do at yesterday's Mothers Day picnic.

But friends are a different story. The lives of students move more quickly than do the lives of adults, and I know I have a lot of catching up to do with most of my friends. Even calling them makes me feel as though my life was put on hold while theirs kept rolling. When I finally do see them, either soon or in September, I wonder where we'll all stand. My friends have always been a better barometer of change than my family. How much have we all changed?

I have to admit, I'm nervous: will they have gone too far for me to catch up? I'm pretty sure they haven't, but until I see them all, I'll be asking myself that. Maybe that's what will make it seem like I'm finally back.

Or maybe I'll be in a restaurant and suddenly, I'll say, "Hey, this place has such a nice non-smoking section. I can't even smell cigarettes."

5/11/2007

New Jersey 1: Airport Adventures and Scrambled Eggs

Contrary to the promise of the title, this entry contains no stories. Just a note saying I got home, my luggage got home (albeit a few hours ahead of me) and here I sit with my coffee and cage-free organic brown eggs that I scrambled in a wonderful pan over a wonderful stove.

...and my hair looks like a lion's mane.

5/09/2007

Praha 55, or A Simple Way to Say Goodbye

Last night, I went to the park near my house, trudged up the giant hill in my clogs, and was rewarded at the top with the most beautiful view of Prague at Night. The lights were on at the castle, the Muzeum, up on Petrin at the Eiffel Tower of Prague, Starometska, and St. Nicholas's Cathedral, and the city looked bright with color and light. I took long, deep breaths. I had gone up there to say goodbye.

I admit that Prague is not a home for me; it does not enchant me, and doesn't love me. However, Kafka said that Prague is "a
dear little mother with claws" and that is exactly what has happened. Prague's claws are firmly digging into my shoulder, if not my heart, and I will wear the scars proudly when I leave.

On the evaluation I had to fill out for CET, it asked what my personal goals were and if I had fulfilled them. At this point, I've forgotten my original goals completely, but I think I will emerge from here with the beginnings of an understanding - a better, more complex understanding of where I come from and how I fit into the landscape of my family history.

And here is my final list.

Things I Will Miss When I Return (the Prague Version)
in no particular order

- Apricot juice
- Klobasa on the street
- Beer - Gambrinus and Budvar especially
- The way the Muzeum catches me every time I walk home from class
- The small pleasures of finding what I need in a grocery store
- Trudi's weekly phone calls
- Cheap food
- The 15 minute walk to and from school that lets me clear my head and gets me moving
- Useful, effective and efficient public transportation
- Store employees who leave me alone and don't try to sell me things
- Kristine's econ class and her constant assertions that the legal and public health systems are crap in this country
- The reassuring sight of 600 year old church spires
- The cheap wine picnics in Letna

I'll post as soon as I get my computer set up at home to say I got in okay and all that.

5/06/2007

Praha 54, or an Excerpt from A Night At 16 Vinohradska

"No, really, I could fix it! Look, your hair's been straightened, ultimately defeated anyway - what's a trim on top of that? It would look so pretty, please please please let me do it!"

"Um, well, I...you have to understand, Sally, I don't do haircuts."

"You 'didn't do' straight hair either. Come on. It would look so much better, so much healthier, I'm telling you."

"But...I...I have this thing. With long hair. People used to call me Sam sometimes, you know, like Sampson? Who got all his strength from his hair?"

"Right, and you're being weird. I promise I won't take off more than is actually dead. You see this? This is dead hair."

"But isn't all hair dead? Isn't it dead protein? Isn't that the point of hair??"

From another room...

"Dane, let her do it!"

"Damnit. Okay. But if I feel you taking off more than the barest possible minimum, I'll bleach your hair with clorox while you're sleeping."

"There is no clorox. This is the Czech Republic. Nice try, now go get me a towel and some scissors and a comb."

An hour and a half, sixteen insults, lots of deep breathing, small panic attacks later...



Here it is, folks. I call it the Sexy Muppet Look.

5/02/2007

Praha 53, or A Simple Day Outside

Around 3:00 today, I realized that I'd forgotten to have lunch. With over an hour to spare before my next class, I left school and went to the klobasa stand down the street. I got a Prazeklobasa - a Prague Sausage - in a soft bun with lots of pale, mild mustard. I ate lunch while standing in the middle of the Vaclavske Namesti, looking up and down the square.

I saw the homeless guys taking naps in shifts on "their" benches. I saw dozens of tourists, a pack of impatient businessmen, a kid licking an ice pop. Somewhere about halfway through my hot dog, a caraway seed got stuck in my teeth, and it occurred to me that I'm going home soon. No more klobasa on the street. No more giant landmarks on my way to school. No more 600-year-old history everywhere I look.

You'd think I'd be sad about all this, but (as I put it to a friend this morning) I'm more excited than a puppy who's just discovered his tail. I'm going home. Home is the view of the Holyoke Mountains, the smell of my Mammy's kitchen, the sound of my mother on her computer late at night. Home is being able to choose between organic food stores, being picky and specific about my politics. Home is 80% vegetarian. Home is sleeping next to Chris, eating takeout Chinese on the nights I don't want to cook. Home is finding more friends than strangers when I go to the coffee shop. Home is farmer's markets and sharp cheddar cheese and not having to schedule phone calls ahead of time.

And yet, this nagging solemnity. It's eight days until I come home, and I still can't figure out if I really wanted to come or not, or if I'm glad I spent the semester here. Amazing, eh? I'm anticipating the Big Question I'll get when I come home:

So, How Was Prague?

And I have eight days to come up with something witty or distracting to answer with, like "well, it wasn't a vacation" or "more complicated than the genealogy of the Hapsburgs" or "here, try this, does it need more salt?"

But honestly? This question, this general, vague "how was it" - it's the worst question. Worse than "so what are you doing after graduation?" Worse than "what are you doing this summer?" Worse than "which is better, chocolate or garlic?" All of these questions have one thing in common: I can't answer any of them right now. But "how was it?" is the worst because I don't think I'll ever be able to answer it.

PS. Points to those who can guess the origin of the title of today's entry.