Inauguration Day

Inauguration Day

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I can only say how happy I am. I remember, as a little girl, sitting in front of the TV, watching Nixon resign. I remember my father’s unhappiness as he told me that the president had lied to the American people. What an arc we’ve led, from that moment. I don’t think I’ve trusted a president, or a politician, since. I just expect them all to be, well, kinda sleazy.
I liked that wily rascal Clinton, and agreed with his politics. But trust, now, that hasn’t come until this moment, now. I believe in Barack Obama. His strong marriage impresses me. I admire his goals, his emphasis on service, his interest in a national dialogue about health care.
I believe again, in the American ideals.

I joined the Fans of Sully Sullenberger Facebook Group

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Sully Sullenberger

I joined the Fans of Sully Sullenberger Facebook Group

I was outside on Broadway yesterday afternoon when the icy Hudson River embraced a visitor. I was pushing a stroller which held a chattering 4-year-old, maybe a mile and a half from where a catastrophe was unfolding. Nothing in the frigid white-blue light hinted that something dreadful was happening. My husband called. “Hey, sweetie, did you hear that a plane went down in the Hudson?”

My heart constricted: Oh no, what about the passengers? The children? The mothers waiting at home for news of their adult sons and daughters? As soon as I got home, I bolted for the TV and CNN. There were those early pix of people standing on the wing, and the first captions that all passengers seemed to have been rescued.

The Governor spoke well: this was a true miracle. For once, in a world of war and terrorism and accidents and earthquakes and plunging stock markets, life and joy were seized out of the very teeth of calamity. I emailed my friend Geoffrey, who has been a pilot for almost 30 years.

He wrote back, “Next time I fly down the Hudson I’ll probably be looking for airliners descending through my altitude. Seriously though, the fact that there was no loss of life and not even serious injuries means kudos to the pilots and very fast acting rescuers.”

So, yes, I joined the Facebook group. Kudos to Pilot Sullenberger and co-pilot Jeff Skiles. You’re heroes!

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I don’t understand

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I don’t understand

Let me start by saying that I am a woman, a Jew, and a New Yorker, so I don’t have a good opinion of radical fundamentalist Islamists.

In my mind, the enslavement and mutilation of women that is institutionalized under radical, fundamentalist Islam is one of the greatest human rights crimes in history, alongside the slaughters of the Holocaust and Rwanda, and African slavery. It isn’t okay to maim and oppress women just because an interpretation of some holy book says it is. I have some strong feelings about the institutionalized misogyny of orthodox Judaism and the Roman Catholic church, also. Not okay.

So I am already biased. I stood on top of my husband’s parents’ building on west 66th street on September 11, 2001 and watched the column of black and brown smoke that was once the World Trade centers. I knew people who survived, had friends who barely missed being down there because they stayed with their kids in class on that first week of school, and knew of students who lost parents at my children’s school.

So I have some questions about why the world is blaming Israel for the Gaza war. If Mexico were continually lobbing missiles at the US, would we stand for it? If a group of Basque Separatists were firing rockets at France all the time, literally thousands of rockets, would France really say, “Oh, gee, merci beaucoup?” What if Turkey faced a daily ration of rockets from Cyprus?

Or is there just a subtext of anti-Semitism in all this nasty world criticism? Is it just that Israel isn’t supposed to defend itself?

Why isn’t the world more critical of Hamas for using ordinary people as human shields? Why is that okay, but it’s not okay for Israel to put an end to continual bombardment and threat?

If Hamas doesn’t want the war, it seems to me, they are in a position to stop it: by not firing missiles at Israel. If Hamas doesn’t want ordinary people to be hurt–and it is deeply painful to see all the images of bloody children and wailing women that the world press delights in running–then why doesn’t Hamas stop using civilian locations as military positions?

Hamas bears the responsibility for this war: Hamas has relentlessly baited and attacked Israel and then done the sleaziest trick imaginable by hiding behind innocent children and women. Hamas does not have a right to fire rockets at Israel, just like Mexico doesn’t have the right to do that to the US, Spain doesn’t have the right to do that to France, and Cyprus doesn’t have the right to do that to Turkey.

I have dared to voice a criticism against radical Islamism. Because radical, fundamentalist Islamists are the bullies of the world, I have to wonder, am I safe for daring to ask these questions? Look what was done to Theo Van Gogh.

And for those who will probably want to label me as rascist, I would ask you to read Irshad Manji’s essay in Newsweek (“Special Edition Issues 2009”)  about helping the Muslim world by giving micro-loans to Muslim women to start businesses. I support this and would agree to a special tax–say everyone in the US making over $20,000 pays between $20 and $200 for a special fund just for this purpose alone. Empower the women, and the religion will take on a more tolerant, modern-age-friendly shape: a shape that we can all live with in peace.

It isn’t women who promote constant firing at another country.

The Sparkling, Snapping White House

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I am a fan of Obama’s. I wept the night of the election, when he won. It felt like a vindication, like we people of the United States were finally getting a president for us. We triumphed over the shadow government, that tight little cabal who governs in the $$ interests of a select few.

So it is with interest that I watch Obama’s staff and cabinet choices. He seems to be picking people with teeth. Smart, capable, talented people with strong opinions, values, and intentions. People who don’t necessarily back down. People who don’t easily tolerate fools. I am eager to see how that works out. I can imagine some bracing discussions. Rahm Emmanuel and Hilary Clinton and Lawrence Summers, hmm. Wasn’t Summers disgraced at Harvard for saying women couldn’t be scientists? Clinton isn’t a scientist but she is one tough, brilliant, competent woman. Should be fascinating.
And I am impressed that Obama is choosing based on the feisty intelligence factor, not on who will say Yes to him easily. There’s a dynamic quality that can’t help but bring change. I believe that.
3RD ROCK FROM THE SUN
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3RD ROCK FROM THE SUN

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3RD ROCK FROM THE SUN

My friend Gerda is not only a gifted healer and psychic, she is also a friend who understands. We have had this discussion many times, to whit: What are we doing on Earth? We don’t belong here. This place is crazy.

I maintain it is because of Chocolate. I was happily zipping around the cosmos as a gas being, all cool and free, when I approached a pretty little blue and white planet with its sticky astral plane, and someone waved a gooey piece of hazelnut-filled chocolate. BAM! I was caught, like a fly on glue paper.

“Oh, yes, chocolate,” Gerda sighs. “That would do it. Have you tried Milka?”

I am lucky there is someone else here from my unit…. And that 3rd Rock can still be seen on dvd. My children gifted me with seasons 1-4 for Christmas. I laugh and laugh watching it, the laughter of truth and understanding. The laughter of, when is my mission over, when do I get to go home?

Meantime, this planet is rich in pleasure. It wasn’t just chocolate that lured me here. There are also hugs from my children, swimming in a warm sea, lying in the sun, stretching into trikonasana, love-making, beautiful clothes, the scent of lilacs and white flowers in perfumes like DelRae’s Debut or Yosh’s White Flower, an old ripe amarone or brunello di montelcino (I’m partial to the 1997’s), sliding between clean, crisp sheets at night, Krishna Das rocking out to Hare Krishna, or the Dixie Chicks wrenching my heart with Landslide, walking through the Vatican Pinacoteca….

It’s worth it, even with all the accepted, institutionalized insanity, even with all the suffering and loss that come with this bipedal flesh bag with opposable thumbs and uncontrollable emotions. This mission is valuable in and of itself.

Ho’oponopono and Happy New Year
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Ho’oponopono and Happy New Year

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ho'oponopono

As a spiritual seeker, I welcome these qualities of gratitude, reverence, rectification, and transmutation that arise from the prayer/meditation of Ho’oponopono cleansing: “I love you. I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you. I love you.” I’m working with this technique, which has come recently into mass consciousness. It reminds me of the Lord’s Prayer, another tool of reverence, gratitude, rectification, and transmutation. Or the Om Tryambakam, which has a similar sensibility. Or the Amidah in the Shabbat liturgy. Good stuff.

And Happy New Year to any who come upon this blog. May 2009 bring you joy, peace, love, beauty, good health, friendship, prosperity, and all the sweetness and more that your heart can absorb. My best wishes to You and Your loved ones. I honor the God that You are.