Jewish @ MindSay 
judaism
Today is a day of self-reflection and forgiveness seeking, a chance to purge all the wrong-doings you've committed in the past year. You ask forgiveness of those you may have wronged, and hopefully receive it.
So that's what this post is. Incredibly informal and impersonal, I know... but it's just kind of a cover-all. I do not consider myself to be overly offensive or abrasive on here, but I can't guarantee it. For this, I want to apologize for any off-color or off-the-cuff remarks I may have made or seem to have made (sarcasm does not translate well on a computer, as I'm sure many of you know) that caused you pain or suffering, or just made you question my character. I enjoy my time on Mindsay immensely, love getting to read updates from all of you, and only have the best intentions when conversing with you. If I ever did or said anything that led you to believe the contrary, please let me know so I can work to repair it further.
On Friday, Kathie successfully walked to the van using a walker with some assistance from Jenny, her therapist at TIRR. You can see the picture of Kathie sitting in the back of her Mazda van after she walked to it and opened the back. Unfortunately, she did not have the strength to lift her wheelchair on to the van. But she was able to walk with her walker around the car to the driver's seat and get in with her new prosthesis. (See Kathie in the picture in the driver's seat with her hand controls installed and ready to go!).
Unfortunately her left prosthesis kept coming off. This is normal. We have to go back to the prosthesist on Monday or Tuesday and get that problem adjusted. Fitting of the prosthesis is most important as it is suction to the leg stump and it must fit perfectly or it will fall off and cause an amputee to get injured. Kathie has a wonderful prosthesist and I'm sure he will do his best to fit her well.
Friday evening we went to orthodox Jewish services at the Chabad House where we are staying. Kathie was just a visitor as she is Catholic (she went to church this morning in fact). But she is a good sport. It was her first experience of an orthodox service where the women and men are separated by a wall. She complained about not being able to see all the "cute men!"
After services, the Rabbi invited us back to his house for dinner. The dinner was wonderful with all the traditional prayers and songs. But there was a surprise. First we said the blessing on the bread and the wine. The Jewish bread or challa was homemade and sprinkled with salt, poppy and sesame seeds. It was the most delicious challa I've ever tasted! The Rabbi had seven of his nine children at the table with his wife and nine guests including Kathie and me. He poured the wine into what looked like a pure silver server that poured twelve cups of wine at once!
Then they served fresh trout stuffed with squash and carrots (with the head on). After we ate the delicious fish, we thought that was it. But that was the surprise, it was just the appetizer. The next course was homemade matzo ball soup, then fresh green beans, asparagus, a wonderful eggplant casserole and then baked chicken. After that they served homemade apple struddle a la mode.
Saturday night we went to Kenny and Ziggy's deli for dinner and wonderful desert followed by going to the Laugh Stop comedy club with some friends we knew from Midland who got transferred with Marathon Oil: Don, Sue and Brian Hall. We had a great time. Sunday I met my cousin, Michael at the Buffalo Grill for breakfast. He too is married to a Catholic girl, Ilene. Both of them are attorneys at the top of their game. Both are type A personalities. Ilene took Kathie to church this morning and Michael and I met them afterwards for breakfast. After that I spent the day catching up on work for Fasken Oil and Ranch where I work.
As Mumbai and the rest of India come to terms with the carnage in Colaba and count the long-term costs of the devastation, there are two small points of reassurance.
First, the prolonged 60-hour shot-by-shot, live TV coverage of the siege of two hotels and a Jewish community centre, has bluntly brought home to Indians — particularly the country's opinion-makers — the ugly face of terrorism. The threat to national security and the well-being of the country could not have been driven home more unequivocally. India is no stranger to terrorism and Mumbai in particular has suffered incessantly since March 1993. But the sheer audacity of this particular operation and the spectacular publicity surrounding it ensured that every Indian, with access to TV, lived through the horror. If there ever was a wake-up call to rouse a Kumbhakarna, this was it.
Second, this was one outrage which finally snapped the endurance and infinite generosity of India. In the past, every assault on Mumbai — where, at times, the death toll was higher — had produced a flicker of anger, followed by an astonishing display of fatalism. What was often flaunted by the angst-ridden section of the media as the ‘spirit of Mumbai' wasn't a display of the gritty, stiff upper lip resolve Londoners showed during the Blitz in 1940-41. It was actually a demonstration of lofty aloofness which very easily translated into indifference or, worse, denial.
The mood is different this week; it is palpably angry. It is one thing for the three Thackerays to spew indignation. That's habitual. But when pillars of Mumbai society such as Ajay Piramal and Shobhaa De say enough is enough and when Ratan Tata expresses his understated dissatisfaction with the administration's unpreparedness, it suggests that something has finally given way. Those Swami Vivekananda once caricatured as “the patient Hindu, the mild Hindu” may well have become angry Indians.
The transformation was waiting to happen. For more than a decade terrorists espousing unacceptable causes have blown up trains, bombed crowded markets, hijacked a plane and attacked places of worship. Indians have suffered stoically but left it to governments to take remedial action. Instead of building on that trust, the political class has approached terrorism as a game of political one-upmanship, stoked subliminal fears and then left India vulnerable. Every terrorist atrocity was followed by assurances of “tough” action, greater preparedness and continuing laxity. The fanatically motivated terrorists who held Mumbai to ransom for 48 hours have made a mockery of the state's ability to protect its citizens. They not only killed but made a whole country suffer.
The men in uniform did a wonderful and professional job under difficult and even adverse circumstances. They showed what the country is capable of achieving when driven by a common resolve. But India has been shamed by the incompetence of those it entrusted with running the country. Mumbai wasn't a victim of ordinary intelligence failure; the grim truth is that there was zero intelligence. India was caught napping.
It is important to vent our anger through the ballot box, to reject those who preened while our cities burned. Unfortunately, this isn't enough. The collective choice must be shaped by a candid realisation that India is no longer on a conventional flight path: it is at war. Another wrong turn and a Mumbai that is already suffering the burden of a government's mismanagement of public finance will end up as a Beirut, a Karachi.
India doesn't need to replace an uninspiring tweedledum with a dreary tweedledee. It needs someone inspirational, someone blessed with guts, imagination, energy, integrity and application. It yearns for a leader who has the self-assurance to prescribe a bitter dose of medicine. India doesn't need a leader to manage the peace; it needs a leader who can lead us in a war. We are through with a Chamberlain; it's time for a Churchill.
By far as a result of the Jewish protests Pope Benedict XVI has halted beatification of Pius XII. Tensions are heightening between Vatican & Israel. According to Rev. Peter Gumpel, a Jesuit priest who is directing beatification efforts the pope would not visit Israel until a plaque criticizing Pius XII is removed from Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust museum.
Halting the beatification of Pius XII doesn't mean that Vatican is abonding the Pope's legacy. Last year, the Vatican passed a decree recognizing Pius’s heroic virtues, a key step toward sainthood, but Pope Benedict XVI has not yet approved the decree. Earlier this month, Pope Benedict XVI said Pope Pius XII had worked secretly & silently to save Jews & that he hoped the beatification can proceed happily.
Can now some one tell me why the people are making unnecessary controversies when the world needs whichever peace that is needed - whether between Nations or between Religions?
then since I was done at 12:30 I went to the Gardens for the horticulture tour required by my docent training.
Later Jim and I took off to a wonderful riverside park to do tashlich with rice paper and rose petal leaves.
Then lake oswego to eat dinner on the lake. pecan crusted salmon. corn chowder and a heavenly cosmo
followed by a hot bubble bath with jim
then home, hugs and games with the abster and crawled into bed with Jim, Abi, a few greenies, and Katherine Anne Porter's Pale Horse Pale Rider.
perfect day. I hope the following year is safe and calm and uneventful except for the joyous to all my mindsay friends . oh and I have been obscure film quizzes on Facebook. Join. it's great but ya gotta use your real name. I did. and the world did not end.
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