Ok, folks, im back in action. So, here is what I've been up to: moving into my apartment (!!!!), hanging out with amazing new friends, gearing up for the year, unpacking, settling, traveling, dating, studying some hebrew....
i moved into my apartment a week and a half ago and have been settling in ever since. Did some fixer upper work, unpacked, bought necessary items, realized how tough it has been over the last two months to be homeless and couch hopping. i am loving my new apartment. It is in Katamon and within a reasonable walking distance to school. I am living with two wonderful ladies - an israeli woman named revital and a very cute dog named libby. things are going well with the roommate situation...i was a little worried having only ever lived with a significant other or family. Me and my veggie-friendly digs are getting down and i am enjoying my time there.
I finished ulpan last week, which I am happy about. I was getting a little tired of the intensity of the hebrew learning...and a little tired of one of my teachers. both teachers that i had were very nice and were solid teachers, but one had some shady spots in her pedagogy and i was pretty done in general with the 8-1 hebrew thing. i am glad that i did it and i do feel like my hebrew improved. I am supposed to do an ulpan every summer, but the thought of doing another 6 weeks in a classroom again...learning hebrew for the 7th year in a row doesnt sound too enticing. I am thinking about doing something called "ulpan or" which is an ulpan but where you have one on one teaching. i would study for about an hour a day with a teacher and then spend several hours a day doing work...i think that would be better for me at this point. How many years can i study hebrew in a big group setting before enough is enough? :^/ but that is far in the future and not something that i wanna be thinking about now anyway because in a day is start my classes at pardes! I know that it will just be orientation and we wont be getting into the flow for a few days but i am so ready to dive into my studies here and to meet the people i will be spending the year with. I took my placement test which was so-so. hard but not impossible...although i couldn't do parts of the test at all really because i simply wasn't taught certain things growing up as a reform jew. In my next post i will try to explain where I am at with my struggle with/against/through/whoknowswhattherightwordis? reform judaism.
i have gone out on several dates since that first...it just proves further how wise those writers of Sex and The City are,
One quote goes something like this,
Carrie: After I got a date with Burger another guy, who had my number for months, called and asked me out on a date, which goes to prove that all you need to get a date is another date.
Im tellin ya, when it rains it pours, folks. But this whole dating thing, which I am entirely new to is so unattractive...so unnatural. I miss my relationship where I knew what was what - it wasnt perfect by any means, and I don't want to change history, but at least i knew i was loved, liked, even if not while feeling entirely appreciated. I have been dating several guys over the last few weeks, but i don't even know for sure what i want...i figure if the confusion starts with my own desires, that isnt too hopeful for anything. I was into one guy for several weeks, but its the same story, timing is everything and if one person isnt ready then it cant work. this is one messed up game that we have to play in the hopes of finding a person who brings us higher, puts a smile on our face and opens themself up to the love we have to send their way. i can see how this will get old real fast...but then again if i have to do this to find my next core shaker, aint it worth it?? I'll let you know when I find him.
Speaking of core shakers, my ex boyfriend emailed me last week. I have to say that i felt a relief when i saw his name in my inbox. i miss him terribly, i miss my best friend. Mostly i think i was hurt that he hadnt checked up on me the entire time i had been in israel - war and all. it seems impossible that someone can go from being the most important person in your life to having no part of it within a years time. I don't like the way it feels. The book I am reading right now would use the phrase, "A Jer shaped whole in the universe". the whole became a little less gnawing, though, with that simple little email. It made me very very happy. it only takes small actions to make me a happy woman. and thats usually all life usually shoots my way so thats a damn good thing!:) tee hee:)
hmmm...ma od...what else to tell yall. I went to the dead sea this shabbat with my friend jessie. we stayed at the youth hostel and our room overlooked the dead sea and was bordering the ein gedi reserve. There are several hikes on the reserve and we did one on shabbat called nachal david - david's brooke/stream. It is a series of waterfalls that originate (i think?:) from rainfall that seeps into the ground in the judean hills and makes its way down through the earth to the dead sea - the lowest place on earth. I did the hike when I was here back in 1999 with NFTY. It was a neat feeling to know that I recognized the place, that I had shared it with my trip mates so long ago and it still is a memory crisp and real in my mind. jessie was a great travel buddy, i have to say. it was chill, relaxing, fun and lots of laughs. we met a nice israeli family, a fundamentalist christian from Colorado and an arab guy who always wore a regal blue speedo, no shirt and a grin. is it fair to say "only in israel"? jessie and i made shabbat together on erev shabbat, spent a long while on a comfy patch of grass looking up at the desert sky and watching the date trees blow around, bend around, the desert wind. Besides nasty ass pita and it being not long enough of a get away, it was exquisite. Pardes is actually taking a tiyyul there in a few weeks and I can't wait to go back.
i am so happily burstingly gleefully ecstatically smiling right now thinking of all you back home who i love, and of all the things in store for me in the coming three years, year, today...life is good.
today: cook myself a damn good dinner, go on a date, maybe go see pirates 2, get a good nights sleep for my first day of school!
ill post some pictures soon of my latest adventures.
i send big hugs. the kind that knock the wind right outa ya and replace it with copious amounts of love.
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