Grief is like walking through mud

But Gadi Taub is hot.

I’m on winter break from teaching, and I’m getting my home ready for the Christmas lunch I’m cooking for my mom and a good friend. I finally decorated my ficus tree for Christmas, Hanukkah, and it still has glass Easter eggs on it so it’s very diverse tree.

It seemed to take forever to get up the energy. I got up late, went to a support group meeting on Zoom I usually attend at 6:45 am, and then just couldn’t get moving. This is not like me: I’m usually very much a morning person and up and about at five, energetic.

I miss my Dad. I keep seeing things I want to tell him about: emails I want to forward, news stories I want to share with him. It’s hard to imagine that I won’t hear his voice again in life.

Lots of people have said that the death of your parents makes you realize your own mortality. Since I’ve almost died before, I’ve had occasion to consider my own mortality. But the death of my father definitely puts a sharp point on how I spend my life. I want to spend as much quality time with my family as I can. I want to spend as little time worrying and gripped with anxiety as I can. I want to be fully present, in accordance with my Zen Jukai vows. I want to make mashed potatoes.

It snowed a little today, so we almost had a White Christmas. This never happens. It was just a dusting but pretty. I went for a walk when it got warm enough and just walked slowly, taking in the beauty of the winter. I walked by a car accident in the intersection I have to cross almost every day, where people run the stop sign without looking up from their phones. I have to be so careful here. Every walk is dangerous. It’s time to move on, and things are shaping up so that that may be possible sooner rather than later. I want to be close to my mom. I want to be somewhere with trees and a bathtub and fewer bars, less crime, and a real grocery store in easy driving distance. I am done with urban life.

I’m glad I have some time to walk through mud before I go back to teaching again, though I look forward to the way the kids take up all of your attention. Being “Miss” again is just wonderful. I needed a break after 2021-2022 but now I’m ready to be in the classroom. As I get older I find I am more interested in helping the next generation figure out how to live.

As a feeling of depression just wouldn’t lift, I decided to catch up on my Israel Update podcasts. The Israeli Gadi Taub and his American co-host Michael Doran are both insightful and hilarious. They remind me of the heyday of Crossfire, one of my favorite shows ever. Their motto is, “As sane as possible under the circumstances.”

Gadi cracks me up, and I’m not hitting on him as he no doubt hits the list of unavailable men on several levels, but listening to the podcast while I clean is cheering me up. Not so much because it takes my mind off things, but because it reminds me of what I love: intellectual engagement, spirited yet civil debate, and humor.

I’ll write a more complex entry soon. For now, it’s sweeping ficus leaves off the hard wood floor and walking through mud.

Wishing you all a happy holiday of whatever kind you celebrate, if you celebrate. I hope you have enough food, a safe place to live, some loved ones (chosen as well as biological family) and a cat.

Or seven.