Getting ready for the next stage

Over the past couple of weeks I have been reading lots of posts on Facebook about how to survive being confined to home for a long period of time. This morning I recalled when I was essentially home-bound for not quite six months.

My youngest turned twenty four this week. When I was three months pregnant with him I went into labor. My doctors said that until I hit 38 weeks I was to sleep eight hours a day, lie down eight hours a day and was allowed to be up as long as I didn't start having contractions. Most days I could be up long enough to get our older kids up and ready for school, I could shower and I could eat sitting at a table with out having contractions. That is most days, but not all days.

In 1995 we were not yet hooked up to the internet. I made it through those months with the help of tons of friends and family. People took care of us.

I also had to adjust my brain so that I could survive mentally and not get too depressed at being home bound. I got showered and dressed every day. I brushed my hair every day. I exercised every day ( a neighbor who ran an exercise studio came over and taught me a series of floor exercises that I could do even in my condition). I realized early on that I could not survive without working with color and working with my hands. I ordered yarn and knit baby sweaters for some friends who were pregnant. A dear friend gave me a set of Sculpy clay. I used to lie down on the kitchen floor and make beads ( I ended up making necklaces for all of my kids' teachers and therapists.)

My friend Ida Fried had Dorot, an organization that cares for the needs of home bound elderly had me included on the organization's abridged Kol Nidre service by phone. I was sobbing so loudly during that call that I had to cover the phone so I wouldn't freak out the others on the call. I was so grateful to have been included on that call that for the duration of my pregnancy I made birthday cards for home bound clients of Dorot. This was another activity that took place on the kitchen floor.

Soon many of us, perhaps most of us will be home bound. That makes things both easier and harder. Having a routine will make it easier. Wear real clothes. Shower. Brush your hair. Exercise. Do mitzvot. Check up on friends who live alone. Connect with people. Invite friends for virtual meals or virtual visits.

So as our time of being home bound has begun, I start my day with a work out. All of us in our family take our turns working out in the living room.

Today I was especially aware of our view. These are my two favorite parts of my view, this ornament on a building on West End and 98th.

And this ornament on a building a block north.

It's only by zooming in with my camera that i realized that this was actually a peacock.

I have been noticing lately that as we are preparing for being home that people are buying large plants.

The Health Food store across the street always has a great display of flowers in front.

It does me good to see the flowers out my window.

Last night I made face masks at my super's request. Each one has a pocket to hold a filter.

This afternoon my youngest and I went out for a walk.

I felt like I have a physical need to be outside in the chilly spring air.

We avoided people

and walked to the park.

As we left the park I felt a huge need to pay attention to the familiar landscape of my neighborhood.

It may be a while before I can walk out at will.

Small details I hadn't noticed before stood out.

I don't know what the next few months will bring. I hope for the best for the people I love and for the neighborhood and city I love.

Stay healthy, stay safe.

Connecting with the past

A few months ago I had a craving for my father’s chicken fricassee. If my father were still alive I would have called him up and he would have talked me through the process of making it. My father is no longer alive so I turned to my cookbooks and the recipes I found for chicken fricassee were nothing at all like the stew of chicken necks, gizzards and wings in a watery sweet and sour tomato sauce that I enjoyed as a kid. I assumed that the dish was an invention of my father’s. I then attempted to replicate the dish from my memory of it and failed. A couple of weeks ago I saw an article on the internet, and I can’t remember where, that talked about Jewish fricassee and it sounded an awful lot like the dish I was hankering after. This afternoon I went to the butcher and picked up all of the chicken elements of the dish, a couple of packages each of wings, necks and gizzards. My father never cooked directly from a cook book. He used to re...

The light themed tallit has been shipped!!!

I had begun speaking to Sarah about making her a tallit in the middle of August. It took a few weeks to nail down the design. For Sarah it would have been ideal if the tallit were completed in time for her to wear it on Rosh HaShanah., the beginning of her year as senior rabbi of her congregation. For me, in an ideal world, given the realities of preparing for the High Holidays I would have finished this tallit in the weeks after Sukkot. So we compromised and I shipped off the tallit last night. I would have prefered to have more time but I got the job done in time. This tallit was made to mark Sarah's rise to the position of senior rabbi but it was also a reaction to this year of darkness. She chose a selection of verses about light to be part of her tallit. 1) אֵל נוֹרָא עֲלִילָה God of awesome deeds ( from a yom kippur Liturgical poem) 2) אוֹר חָדָשׁ עַל־צִיּוֹן תָּאִיר May You shine a new light on Zion ( from the liturgy) 3) יָאֵר יְהֹ...

A Passover loss

My parents bought this tablecloth during their 1955 visit to Israel. It is made out of linen from the first post 1948 flax harvest. The linen is heavy and almost crude. The embroidery is very fine. We used this cloth every Passover until the center wore thin. You can see the cloth on the table in the background of this photo of my parents and nephew My Aunt Sheva bought my mother a replacement cloth. The replacement cloth is made out of a cotton poly blend. The embroidery is crude and the colors not nearly as nice. The old cloth hung in our basement. We used the new cloth and remembered the much nicer original cloth. I loved that my aunt wanted to replace the cloth, I just hated the replacement because it was so much less than while evoking the beauty of the original. After my father died my mother sat me down and with great ceremony gave me all of her best tablecloths. She also gave me the worn Passover cloth and suggested that I could mend it. I did. Year after year ...

sarah in nyc

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