Joseph Zitt's [as if in dreams] 2024-02-17
Hi. I'm Joseph Zitt. I moved from the US to Israel in 2017. This is my newsletter about more-or-less daily life in my city in the shadow of war. You can select these links to subscribe or unsubscribe. There are more links at the bottom. You can also read this email online here. Here we go...
A bird awakens me, as usual, at about 6:30 AM. As usual, I get up, go to the bathroom, and go back to bed.
My alarm clock app, when the time comes, plays a loop that includes the sound of a nearly identical bird. I like that loop. Other sounds come in, adding up to something more urgent that always gets me out of bed. I keep my phone on the far side of the room, so I have to get up and walk over there to shut it off.
The bird moved in here, wherever it is, after I had been using the alarm loop for a while. Through the window, I hear other birds and critters. The cats make their own sounds. Dogs bark in the distance. If the lizards, roaches, slugs, snails, and our resident hedgehog make noises, they aren't loud enough to be heard in the basement. Oh, and the humans make sounds, too. I should probably count them among the other backyard lifeforms.
I haven't seen what makes the sound, but I think it's a hoopoe,1 a kind of goofily elegant looking bird with a distinctive crown. It's the national bird here.2 I see them frequently. I know it isn't a dove, which I also see a lot. And it isn't a starling, which tend to gather together in trees, hiding among the leaves and creating a tremendous racket.
The recent storms have made this a great time for birdwatching. We normally get a lot of migratory birds, and the weather has been pushing the seabirds closer to shore. A video in this recent article3 (with English subtitles) shows birdwatchers on the shore on a recent soggy day. One of them, just returned from Reserve duty, says that he prefers to hear birds, rather than explosions.
On the other hand, there's an outbreak of avian flu spreading among cranes here.4 Bird advocates worry that next month, when more migratory species come through, it may jump to them. There's an urgent need to deal with it, especially collecting the many corpses of cranes who have died. But, as with so many government responsibilities, there's a dispute as to whose job it is. No one has a budget for it.
Across the border, among, despite, or perhaps because of the poverty and devastation, there's a thriving market for songbirds.5 People, especially children, find them calming. While their songs can't drown out the sounds of bombs and gunfire, they can lead the people's focus away from the scarier noise. It's one of the few things available to help people deal with their crises in mental health.
As I walk home tonight, after the Havdalah ceremony with my family at the House of a Hundred Grandmothers, I see a loaf of dark bread sitting on a curb, in a puddle. Several pigeons surround it. They peck at it, but without their usual enthusiasm. They aren't thrilled with its sogginess.
They coo in conversation. From what I can decode, they're saying: "If this is what there is to eat, dayenu.6 But let's find a better dinner spot next time, OK?"
Further down the road, near my house, the starlings screech in their usual tree. They show up the moment that the rain ends. Some things here never change.
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You can find me via email, Bluesky, Mastodon, Facebook, and, just out of inertia, X/Twitter. There's more about me and my books, music, and films at josephzitt.com.
The newsletter’s official mailing address is 304 S. Jones Blvd #3567, Las Vegas NV 89107. (I’m in Israel, but if physical mail comes to me at that Las Vegas address, it’ll get scanned and emailed. I don’t expect that to happen much. If you want to send me physical mail, ask me for a real address.)
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L'hitraot.