[as if in dreams] A newsletter from Joseph Zitt - 18 October 2023
For Facebook The office kitchen no longer smells of asparagus. That's good. We have an excellent coffee machine in there.
One of my bosses walks in as I'm making a double espresso. "I think you are the only one who uses that," she says.
"I've seen other people use it. I feel like I'm the only one who fills the tank or the beans when needed, or who empties the coffee grounds or --"
The machine beeps rudely right then and demands that I empty the coffee grounds. I pull out the bin and head to the trashcan. "Don't put it there," my boss says. "We put it in with the plants. It makes them stronger." I carry the bin over to a floor-standing flower pot and scatter the grounds on the surface. "You should mix it with water first," she says. "But look how healthy the leaves have been looking."
Later in the day, while I'm in a meeting, a text beeps into view. An elderly relative has passed away, a few towns from here, where the local bus lines end. She was the first of the family to move here permanently, sometime around 1950.
We weren't close, but she had a splendid 90th birthday party this past summer. Much of the family in the area gathered for it. She handed out copies of her autobiography. I feel as if we had already said goodbye.
The funeral will be tomorrow. I won't be able to get there. They'll be sitting shiva in the area, but I've already been feeling emotionally overloaded with the war and all that going on. (I keep my sanity by endlessly writing.) I desperately avoid these kinds of social encounters. Everyone is supposed to be born knowing what to do at them. I never do, and am so visibly uncomfortable that I feel that it looks like I'm trying to make myself the focus while I'm there. People tell me to just do it, and it will be OK. I find it terrifying.
It's another day of waiting. No sirens. No booms. The American president is meeting with leaders and giving speeches. It appears that everything that we thought that we knew about yesterday's blast at the hospital may be wrong. There's more fighting to the north. There's more tension to the east. They say there's a much better chance of getting humanitarian aid across the border to the south. Things may be quieter to the west. It's only the sea. We're told that our next move may actually not be a ground invasion. But our leaders are saying that the war could last for months.
Groups call for days of rage. The president reminds us that rage leads to poor decisions, including some after 9/11 that he himself regrets. Protestors have swarmed a UN building in Lebanon and a House Office Building in Washington, DC.
My lesson with my Hebrew teacher goes well. We meet online. She can't get at our Google Doc, but writes new vocabulary words with a stylus on a sort of electronic whiteboard tablet. She can somehow send them to me. Our government has told our citizens to leave the country where she has been. But there have been antisemitic attacks this week in the country to which she is headed.
Other countries are flying their citizens out of here. I read of an airlift of foreign workers back to Nepal.
A newspaper profiles the founder of the chain of hostels whose tours I have taken. His parents were killed last week when the terrorists burned down their home. The hostels are now hosting people displaced in the attack for free. The parents had asked that, when they died, their ashes be spread in the fields of their farming collective, to further fertilize the earth.
I get more word of delays and changes due to the war and its related labor shortages. My credit card company says that they won't be able to send out the usual monthly notices. We can check our information on their app or website.
After work, I eat supper at the chicken place where I go about once a week. Their big salad, with or without chicken, is wonderful. I tend to be there toward the end of their day. The worker often puts surprising things in the salad. I like them all.
At home, I get lost in a rabbit hole of tech support trying to get some software working. After several posts and comments in its forum, the developer pops in and explains quite clearly how to do what I want. It works almost perfectly. I send him a screenshot of the result. As I'm writing this, he sends another solution. I'll try it when I'm done.
I step away from the writing, to give myself a break before doing an edit. I need to fill a bottle with water. I'll put it in the refrigerator to mix with my cold brew coffee. I use a funnel to pouring water from the filter jug more easily. Somehow, the lip of the jug ends up under the funnel. Water flows across the table. I need to get more sleep (other than at work).
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L'hitraot.