Seattle 87, or While I'm Here...

I'd love some book recommendations. Nothing super heavy, but maybe some good fiction or memoirs? I also love short story collections, and YA literature.

Let me know your favorites.

Seattle 86, or Ice. Rest. Elevate.

The first time, it was on a ski slope. The second, in the woods of southern Vermont. This time, it's at work. On a staircase. I'm trying to avoid stepping on a kid, misjudge the distance, and go flying sideways down the stairs.

In midair, I hear a distinct pop in my left knee.

By the time I hit the ground, I know it's happened again. The pain is familiar - acute, ripping, the feeling of an anterior cruciate ligament tearing itself in two. I hear the kid screaming: "Is she okay? What did I do?! Dane, are you okay?? I'm so sorry!" She sounds a million miles away. So do the staff voices, "Dane, we're here. Talk to me. What do you need?"

I come back to the present. Ice. I need ice, and I need to get out of the way - all the kids will see me lying here in the hallway. Someone brings me an ice pack. I prop my leg up on a laundry basket. Elevate. Ice. Rest. I've moved myself next to the laundry room, out of direct sight. Someone comes and says "Can you walk if I help you? Let's get you up to the office." I can walk, with help.

In the office I start going into shock - shivering hard, as my body rushes to investigate the injury, forgetting to keep me warm. All the staff are outside, keeping things calm. I call my friend in California who's been there for the last two injuries. "I'm in crisis, I'm in shock. Help me make a plan."

Together, we come up with: blankets, for the shock. A ride to the ER. Get a housemate to meet me there. Make sure they bring the Rescue Remedy.

Someone comes in to check on me, brings a blanket and some paperwork. I start on it right away. It helps me calm down, focus. I'm pretty good in a crisis. I call Joel, Neal, Masha. No answers. I call Asya. She picks up on the first ring. She'll get help, she says. Sebastian will run down to Aleph and get everyone's attention, someone will meet me at the hospital. I call my boss, explain what's going on.

My coworker offers me a ride down. I bundle up, borrow a pair of crutches from work - they're meant for a kid, but I can use them for now. She drives me to the ER, which is calm, not busy at all. It looks very new. The lighting is soft, the intake workers are friendly. My brain is scrambled. My coworker gets the worker's comp paperwork started for me. Thank G-d she can remember the phone numbers. She leaves once I'm set up and waiting.

Joel and Debs come in a few minutes later. They've brought cookies, and a big thermos of tea. They settle in, assuming the wait will be long. Debs walks me to the bathroom. A few minutes after I get back, Neal shows up, with DVDs. As soon as we've all said hi, the nurse comes to get me. I hobble down the hallway, leaning on Joel.

Debs helps me get into the hospital gown. Masha arrives, her backpack stuffed with games, my Rescue Remedy, chocolate, a stuffed hedgehog puppet. Everyone's laughing, taking pictures, making jokes. The nurse looks a little surprised, says the doctor will be in shortly.

It isn't more than fifteen minutes before the doctor comes in. She listens, performs a few tests. I know this part of the drill. She says my knee seems fairly stable, but I remember this from last time; the swelling after the tear immobilizes everything, making it seem stable. She says this is possible. I should make an appointment with the surgeon tomorrow. I know the guy. He gave me a post-op checkup right after I moved to Seattle. I like him.

She fits me for a pair of crutches and sends me home with the same old instructions: ice. elevate. medicate. Not much, just ibuprofen. I'm dismayed at how easy it all seems now. It's been less than a year since the last time. My body falls into the old patterns of movement, of compensation, with alarming ease. My right hip aches familiarly from the weight already.

The Kibbutzniks drive me home. Debs is coming over tomorrow with a thick bone marrow soup. Masha says call when I get up; she'll come tell me stories. Joel and Neal offer whatever they can do.

I'll be calling on them for a lot in the next few months. Thank G-d I'm here. Thank G-d for them.

This time had better be the last time.

Seattle 85, or The Omnivore's Delight

Today's farmer market haul:
- 2 beets, about the size of softballs
- 2 delicata squashes (I like to dice them, roast them with rosemary and pepper, and eat them like popcorn while watching movies.)
- 3 Jerusalem artichokes (new root for me! Never made 'em before.)
- a bunch of dino kale
- a bunch of curly kale
- 1 dozen eggs from the farmer boy who looked at me incredulously and said "bugs, grub, leftover vegetable scraps...what do you think chickens eat?" when I asked what his laying hens ate.
- a half pint of spreadable cow's cheese that made my tongue dance when I tasted it
- a small jug of sweet honeycrisp cider

Lunch: the Jerusalem artichokes, sliced thin and sauteed in olive oil, rosemary, pepper and salt. One fried egg, served on top. Eaten in a square of sunshine, in wool socks and tough pants.

Sourdough: rising in the oven.

Cooked yams: cooling, and waiting to be turned into orange gnocci.

It's good to be back.

Seattle 84, or The Trip Home

As I made it to the front of the security line, the TSA agent checked my ID and boarding pass, stamped it, and without looking at me, gestured that I should move along.

"Merry Christmas," she said as I passed.

Without thinking, I replied, "Gut Shabbes to you too."

(I was grumpy. It was my second pass through the security line, due to an Xray machine malfunction.)

I was a few steps away when I heard her voice again.

"Shabbat Shalom," she called softly.

I didn't stop, or turn around, but I did smile. It's not bad to be a Jew in an airport on Christmas.

Boston 2, or Dane And Joel Do The Pike

(All the pictures in this entry are property of Joel Rothschild!)

It was supposed to be simple, yet serendipitous - I was taking a four day stint across western Massachusetts and southern Vermont at the same time as Joel, a fellow kibbutznik (of "Vote For Joel!" fame) was to be visiting friends in southern Vermont. Tickled at the prospect of seeing my Seattle neighbor out of context, we made practical plans: since Joel was traveling by train, and I by car, I would give him a lift from Brattleboro to the train station in Springfield - about an hour and a half drive - on my way to Worcester for my evening poetry feature.

So how did Joel and I end up in Albany?

It started with a snowstorm that walloped central and eastern Massachusetts, and everything south of there. However, we were safely west of the snow line, and so assumed we'd get to the train without trouble. We didn't stop to consider the possibility of accidents further down the highway that would put us in a dead-stop gridlock for over an hour. Silly us.

As we sat, unmoving, watching as car after car desperately pulled (very) illegal u-turns across the median, we realized we needed a new plan. Joel, the geography major, pulled out my mother's very well-loved maps, hooked his cell phone up to his laptop to get some internet access, and started making plans.

He thought he might be able to still catch a bus in Springfield that would take him to the next stop in time to catch the train, but those hopes died as we inched along. Then we thought I might be able to drive him to the next stop, once we got off the blasted highway, but time ticked on, and we soon realized that the only way Joel was going to make his train to Chicago was if he caught it in Albany, NY.

And hell, what was I going to do anyway? My poetry feature had been long canceled, due to the snow, and there was no way I was going to fight the roads to get back to Boston before nightfall.

It seemed as good a time as any for a little adventure.

We eventually got off the cursed highway, and (after being shuffled along a few detours) started plowing down the Mass Pike towards New York. We played road trip music and called Joel's partner, Tamar, in Israel, to say hi and share the ridiculousness. I marveled at technology - Joel's cellphone internet gave us turn-by-turn directions to the Albany train station, and helped us find a place to eat dinner, and my cell phone hooked up to the car so we could both talk without holding the phone or using speakerphone. It was as stress-free as if we'd planned the thing.

Once we got to Albany, we had some time to kill, so I introduced Joel to my great New York Lotto Tradition, and won two whole dollars!



I think Joel was amused. After that, we ate dinner in what could only be described as an Upstate NY pizza place - you know, six menu items, an Italian flag painted on the wall, a hockey game on TV, and a woman at the counter who seems perturbed that you should dare interrupt her recounting of yesterday's soaps to order a pizza. I asked for some tap water for us, and she handed me two cups and pointed me to the bathroom.

But, as is also occasionally the case with New Yorkers, she eventually asked us if we were waiting to catch a train, and we explained our whole saga, which she found amusing. Finally, stuffed on thin crust and canned mushrooms, I left Joel at the platform and headed back down the Pike for Boston, where, three hours later, I found my family's open arms and a welcome couch to crash on.

Boston 1, or The Stuff that Dreams are Made Of

Have you ever had a dream in which you knew where you were (eg home, at work, at school, etc) but the place in your dream looked nothing like it does in real life? How did you know "where you were?" Chances are, there was one thing in your dream to anchor the setting - a piece of furniture, a person, some detail that clued you in.

My dream goes like this: I'm at home, only it's not home because it's in Boston, and an apartment, but all my childhood furniture is there...and the phones ring the same and my parents are here too...and my mother and I even sat up until 2am talking on the couch we used to sit on, talking at 2am.

But it's Boston. So therefore, it's now "my parents' place." Not "home." Right?

There needs to be a new definition of home.

I like "Home is wherever there's someone you love to pick you up at the airport."

Jah?

Seattle 83, or Short, short synopsis. Elaboration later.

Had an amazing day - my first Seattle ferryboat ride, first time ever recording a song in a studio, tutoring a smart, imaginative kid, then getting to do comedy improv with Clean Slate/Unscripted folks! Recognizing that I live with a hilarious, smart, roll-with-it bunch of people, even when we're stressballs and arguing. Let me remember this enough to look back on it one day and remember how much I loved it.

Seattle 82, or Chanukah Questionaire

One menorah, or several? Hillel or Shammai? (just kidding about that part)

Growing up? Just one, the silver piece with movable arms on which I learned how to polish silver (with my father, after each Chanukah). In college, many – we each had our own, and on the final nights, dozens of candles gave us enough light to read/sing/do homework by. This year, I’ll be with my parents for most of Chanukah, which means one again. Depending on when it falls next year, I might see what the Kibbutz does.

Do you buy your children gifts for every night of Chanukah?

Oh, I will, eventually. Just as my mother swore every year that “this is the last year of presents-every-night” and then managed to always throw in an extra book or pair of good wool socks or box of colored pencils to make it last.

Do you and your spouse/partner or any other adults in your life exchange gifts?

In my family, the rule goes something like this “you’re a kid until you have kids but parents don’t get presents.” I was never expected to give gifts to my parents, or other adult relatives, but I do, sometimes. Both my parents’ birthdays tend to fall within a few weeks of Chanukah, so there’s a lot of doubling up. As for other adults to whom I’m not related – I give gifts to my friends, but they’re usually small and edible. I love giving presents, though.

Special family chanukah traditions?

Eh, the usual. Dreidel. Latkes. My father likes to seize my hands when we sing Ma O’tzur and move them around like he’s the puppetmaster and I’m the puppet. That’s about it.

Latkes or sufganiyot? If latkes, sour cream or applesauce?

We never ate latkes with sour cream growing up, but I fell in love with the combination in college. The last couple years, I’ve started putting salsa on latkes, and making sweet potato latkes with corn, scallions and cilantro. Totally not what my ancestors would’ve approved of, but hey, I’m a cook. Sufganiyot were never a big thing with us.

Favorite chanukah book?

Herschel and the Hanukah Goblins, hands down.

Do you actually play dreidl? If so, what do you use for counters?

Sometimes, yup. Usually pennies. I’m a dreidel master.