Buy a Bed, Sleep on The Floor

I used to love IKEA. Going there shopping used to be a nice way to fill a couple of hours. And I always bought something, even if I didn’t really need it. Now? Not so much. It became too noisy. Too crowded. It is summer, so if they have nowhere to go, nothing planned, the parents take their kids to IKEA. It is like a huge playground for them. The parents peruse at will, relaxed, while their kids run amok on the floors, screaming their heads off, stumbling on furniture and tripping everybody. It is a mad house.

And don’t get me started on the cafeteria The prices are good, so it is always super-packed. And dirty. And loud. And the workers there have the most bored, tired faces in the history of giving you the empty cups to make your own coffee.

We needed to buy a bed. But if you’re not young enough or fit enough you will have to look for somebody to help you lug the big pieces of furniture on your flatbed cart. Preferably an employee you will find after long minutes of walking though the labyrinth that is IKEA’s warehouse.

Then, you need to somehow push your trolley laden with the huge boxes towards the costumer’s service because you want them to be shipped to your home and assembled there. You have to wait for more than half an hour because, even if there are eight counters only two, at some point one, at some point no one is working them.

Finally, you are called at the counter where the employee is telling you that yes, we will deliver your bed in a couple of days but, the person that needs to assemble it will come in the middle on September. At first, you think you didn’t hear it right, but no, here it is. Middle of September. I mean, SERIOUSLY?

You don’t have enough staff? By God, hire some. I think you, as a big company can afford that.

What is supposed to do somebody who bought a bed until the aforementioned piece of furniture arrives? Sleep on the floor? Go to a hotel? Go to relatives? Better still, go on a vacation? Look for somebody else to put together the bed? You know how it goes with IKEA’s furniture. It is like Lego, so you need skills and imagination.

I think the long “contract” they made me sign when I bought their services should include some suggestions regarding what a client should do while waiting for the assembling of the blasted furniture.

What can I say? If one tries to buy furniture from some other shops, it is a bad experience. The furniture is ugly, expensive and not practical. So, IKEA is still the best choice. But it doesn’t mean it should be the worst scenario.

 

What I Bring Home From The Hospital… or…when the hospital comes home with me…

 

What I Bring Home From The Hospital…

                                            or…when the hospital comes home with me…

 

Sometimes, after we return from my husband’s treatment at Hadassah Hospital, I am OK. Relatively. The fact that the treatments work and my husband is feeling better, it helps.

But sometimes, no matter how zen and detached I try to be, it doesn’t work. The people there, their pain and suffering. It gets to me. And then it leaves me like after a storm wrecked the neighborhood of my soul.

It takes me a number of days to put myself together, to try and forget, or at least to push at the back of my mind whatever I witnessed. Because, whenever I close my eyes, the images play behind my eyelids, over and over. Sick people, so many sick people. Old and young, too. Faces trying to be brave, faces reflecting the suffering inside. Legs barely shuffling across the floor. Hushed voices. The silence pierced by a shrill cry. Somebody shouts; I hear feet running.

I wander the corridors of the hospital searching for a quiet, remote place to sit for a few minutes, to gather my thoughts, to wipe my tears.

But around me, patients and personnel are engaged in a strange dance, to and fro, like the waves of an unrelented sea.

How do they do it?

My husband’s doctor doesn’t have a moment for herself. Patients, colleagues, staff, they all want her time and attention. Which she gives, without pause, with a smile and a good word. The nurses and the other people that work there are in a perpetual motion. They come and go, talk to everybody, they know their names, their families. In between tests, treatments, filled forms they find that precious minute of empathy that means the world to a frightened patient. And the ladies, the volunteers that share snacks, food, coffees. They have the most brilliant smiles and are deeply offended if you refuse them.

Together they form this strange universe, stars and planets, galaxies that gravitate one around the other, in synchrony, sometimes perfect, sometimes terribly out of balance. Like life and death. 

 

When I come back home, distressed and sad, the feeling lingers with me for days. I carry with me their agony and grief, their hopes and desperation, like chains around my ankles. So let me be, don’t ask me questions and don’t try to make me feel better. I won’t. But it will pass. To blossom again, like flower made of ice, in my heart, next time I visit there.

 

The Things I Cannot Write About

 

I will to begin by telling you this: I cannot write therefore I am going to write about not being able to write.

I think it happens to all of us who live by words. There are days when our brains refuse to produce publishable pieces. For different reasons.

For me, it is the fact that I cannot write about the things that I am going through lately. Let me rephrase it better: I wrote about them, but they are too personal to be shared, so they will remain somewhere between the covers of my hidden notebooks, the ones meant for my eyes only.

And this puts a lot of pressure on me. I worked hard to revive this blog and I am afraid I will lose it again; it will disappear into the silence that deafened me before. And I don’t want it to happen. I love this tiny corner of the internet where I can come once in a while, sit and ponder on memories, ideas, past events, feelings. And share them with you.

So, you can understand my fear. I don’t want to fade away again, after I found myself anew. I don’t want to abandon this piece of soul of mine that kept me going all these years.

Believe me, I want to come here and shout from the top of my lungs everything I cannot share in writing. But I won’t.

I want to come here and tell you how difficult it is to be me, and complain and cry. Maybe I will. But not today.

Today I feel like all the doors around me are closed and I am trapped in this hollow place, with no light, no windows. Only walls and nothingness.

So, I’ll sit down here, on the cold hard floor. And let all the trapped feelings circle around me like hungry wolves.

And if you want to sit with me for a while, do it. If not, look, there is one door opening. Close it gently behind you.

The Cockroaches Are Not The Problem

 

Today I was so angry. So, so angry. Like a toxic cloud, the anger descended upon me. It was triggered by a stupid thing, an announcement tapped on the building’s door about a disinfection that will take place someday next week. For the cockroaches.

It happened so many times in the past. They came and did whatever they do and for a while the air would choke me and then I would find dead cockroaches all over our building, on their back, feet in the air. The survivors would try and sneak in our apartment, to the delight of our cats, who would chase them, play with them and then, of course, kill them.

I hate cockroaches, just like everyone else. But, look around, so much trash everywhere.

The first thing you fell when you enter our building is the smell of mold, of things rotting away in corners. Nobody knows what really lurks in our basement. People drag their trash bags from the elevator through the lobby, leaving a wet streak of slops. Sometimes, they throw the trash bags from a distance, missing the trash can altogether, the litter spilling everywhere. Nobody ever cleans it. In the summer the stench is unbearable.

Sometimes the sewerage is clogged because people throw all kind of stuff into their toilets, from diapers to clothes.

On the third floor it is impossible to pass through. There is a bike there, chairs and lots of carboard boxes. In case of a fire, a death trap. On the fourth floor, a broken, I assume, washing machine, a couple of small tables with pots filled with dead plants. And a heartfelt thank you to our neighbor who stopped smoking. Congrats! Before that, he used to throw on the window the still burning cigarette butts. Many of them landed on the roof of our car that was parked under his window.

There is so much filth and neglect around us.

Nothing works. The elevator is broken almost all the time, the water doesn’t have enough pressure to reach the upper floors. But we decided to wage a war against cockroaches. Not for a minute to ponder and ask ourselves why do they love our building so much. According to some tradition or other, it is forbidden to throw bread in the bin, so people put plastic bags filled with bread on the lid of the trash can or on the ground. It stays there until it rots. But they determined the cockroaches are to blame. Who knew?

We decided to kill the cockroaches. Their bodies will litter the staircase and the lobby for many days afterwards because nobody will bother to sweep them. We’ll feel a sense of righteousness every time we will look at them. We exterminated the roaches, they’ll say. While, in one corner, they are already scuttling. They would survive an atomic bomb, did you know?

 

Another Sunset To Witness

 

 

I thought a lot after writing and publishing my essay about old age, about old people, about the fear of growing old. I thought about the inevitable, about humiliation, about illness, about frail bodies and minds.

But then, my perspective shifted, like looking through a child’s kaleidoscope into the light.  Suddenly, the same pieces formed an entirely different picture. And I realized that while getting old is still a bother, it is also a privilege. 

Yes, maybe you are losing your marbles and the control of your bladder, but you can still see your family around you, growing and flourishing.

You need help to walk to the nearest park and your vision is a little blurry, but you can still smell the freshly cut grass in the morning, listen to the birds singing like crazed gramophones.  You can still fell the warmth of the sun soothing your weary bones and the deep lines etched across your face.

There are days when you forget what month it is, perhaps even what century. Yet you can still enjoy today, with all its moments, happy or sad.

And while your hands are old and veiny, mapped with a constellation of age spots and trembling just a little, you can still caress the cheeks of your children and grandchildren. You can still hold the hand of the one you have loved for decades, equally old and bony, while watching a movie, even if you forget its name the moment it ends. The memory of that touch will linger on your papery skin.

And as long as your nightstand still holds, beside the medication, eye drops and an array of face creams, a stack of books, a dried flower your daughter gave you, and books, notebooks and jars full of pens and as long as a cat still sleeps beside your head, chasing butterflies in his dreams, you are not giving up. You still have another sunset to witness, another tear to cry, another pumpkin-spice coffee to enjoy.

For all the small pleasures that remain, however many or however few, life is still worth living.

So, I understand now.

When I see their ancient bodies and hear their croaked voices, I won’t ask myself What are they still doing here? Because I understand now.

For every leaf that falls, every creek that murmurs, every blade of grass, every second and every eternity, it is worth it.

 

Not Yet

 

 

The last visit to Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital was supposed to be less depressing (if a visit to such a place can be called less depressing). My husband’s treatment was scheduled for the afternoon this time, so there weren’t as many patients in the department.

But we still had to wait, because there were fewer staff members, too.

Waiting is how you spend your time in a hospital.

Waiting for your turn for blood tests, for treatment, for your appointment with the doctor.

Nobody is in a hurry and most of the staff is speaking in hushed tones. At least until the woman across the room starts shouting into her phone arguing with her daughter, that she isn’t raising her own daughter properly.

You finished one appointment, only to wait for the next one, for another test, another consultation. 

In between I try to read but I always end up watching the hospital’s life unfold in front of me.

People of every age, color, religion, social status.

Illness forgives no one.

The endless trickle of people, some walking briskly through the corridors, others merely shuffling their feet, gets me thinking about old age.

Why do we have to go through it at the end of our lives? Why can’t we leave quietly while we are still young and strong?

Or better yet, why don’t we have it backwards?

Why don’t we arrive in this world as old people and then grow younger and younger with every passing day until we disappear into the clouds of Heaven or the pits of Hell?

I watch frail old bodies, barely able to walk, yet still clinging to life.

One more step.

One more day.

Why?

I look at my own hands.

Old woman’s hands.

I am getting old.

Fortunately, I wear trainers, so no one has to see my ageing toes.

Old age is such a humiliating burden.

Not yet.

Not yet, young polite nurse. I don’t need you to hold up my trousers because you took my belt on the way to the MRI machine.

Not yet, young cheerful doctor. Please don’t make silly jokes while you guide me through the corridor as I stumble along, pretending not to notice how unsteady I am.

Not yet.

I don’t need you to lift a cup of water to my lips because my hands tremble too much to hold it.

I don’t want anyone tending to my old, failing body. Not when they roll their eyes after leaving the room. Not when they laugh behind my back because I am not able to pronounce my words properly anymore because my dentures no longer fit.

We never think about this when we are young.

Why would we?

We believe we are strong and independent, with quick feet, steady hands and clear minds.

We never imagine what we might become.

A collection of trembling bones.

Weak muscles.

A mind slowly disappearing, lost in pain and memories.

I am terrified of old age.

Sometimes I think it would be better to leave while I still can walk without a walker.

 

When Did Summer Become Such a Burden?

 

Saturday morning. I open the window and a wave of humid, hot air hits me square in the face, taking my breath away.

“I won’t be going outside today”, I say to myself and quickly close the window.

When did summer become such a burden?

Back when we were kids, the word summer had an almost magical connotation. Summer meant vacanta mare – the summer break, “the big holiday” as we called it. It meant freedom and friends, days filled with fun and games and peeling skin on our shoulders and noses.

Summer meant waking up to cool, fresh mornings that smelled like buni’s washing drying on the line, eating a quick breakfast and then running off to my friends and neighbors. There I would spend my days, returning home late in the evening, dusty and tired but with a sense of accomplishment.

The same was true for my siblings, too. They would run wild through the streets and parks of our neighborhood, like a band of untamed natives. We were unsupervised most of the time and if you happened to be the adventurous sort, like my brothers, summer also meant countless accidents that ended up in cuts, bruises and sometimes even broken limbs.

I was happy during the summers of my childhood. I would go and stay with my great-aunt and then my days would dissolve into long reading sessions beneath the apple trees in her orchard, supervised by her cats. Summer with my great-aunt also meant long afternoons splashing in a huge wooden barrel filled with water warmed by the sun. I can still remember the smell of the wet staves – briny and woodsy, with just a hint of smoke.

Once a week, my great-aunt would place her wicker basket over her arm and we would walk to the farmer’s market just at a stone’s throw from her house. She would march determined between the concrete stalls where the farmers displayed their produce, searching for the best fruit at the best price. She loved to bargain, my great-aunt.

Then we would return home with her basket filled with fuzzy peaches, shiny orange apricots, fresh vegetables and sometimes a huge, dark-green watermelon, almost too heavy to carry.

The summers of my childhood were endless days of wonder and discovery, of real and imaginary adventures.

There are so many beautiful memories that is impossible for me to hold them all in my mind, at once.

But, if I stay still for a while and listen carefully, they will come back to me, one by one. And I will write them all down, making them real once again, if only for a moment.

I Am a Blur

 

 

Lately, the days pass so quickly one after the other they are all a blur. I am a blur. I feel like my edges are smudged, the image I see reflected in the mirror is not clear. I don’t recognize me anymore. I am not me. I am a blur.

And I feel this toxic cloud surrounding me, sending its tendrils towards me, sucking all my strength, my will, my everything.

I am a blur. An image you see in the window of a train, inconsistent, an impression that lasts a few seconds and then it’s gone.

I am a blur. A cloud of tiny insects, annoying for a while, buzzing and flying around your heads. But then a strong wind just blows them away.

I am a blur. A lonely figure in the desert, in the middle of a sand storm. Now, I’m here. You blink and I’m gone.

I am a blur. A lonely light in the dense fog on winter mornings.

A single beat of a wing.

One breath of a tree.

The sight of a setting sun.

I am a blur. Inconsistent and fragile. Forgettable.

Soon I’ll become a shadow, no blood will flow through my veins, just pain, acute and unbearable pain.

And after a while, tired and beaten I will transform into a stain on the sidewalk. No life, no feeling, just a smudge of lost humanity.

Somewhere Between Bean Dip and Plum Butter I Found My Way Home

 

No matter what I am doing these days, whenever I am in the kitchen cooking or cleaning, my memories come rushing in and I find myself in a different kitchen, the one of my childhood back in Romania.

A few days ago while preparing fasole frecata (white bean dip), the image of buni – my grandmother appeared very clearly in my mind. Sitting at our old, battered kitchen table, waging a war against the beans, as usual. We didn’t have any modern or fancy kitchen utensils so the beans had to be mashed with a wooden spoon or better yet, with a fork. I am sure we didn’t have a potato masher. In our house mashed potatoes were prepared with a fork, too.

So, if you wanted a smooth dip you had to confront de beans with strength and determination. It was also a good way to vent your frustration, to work on your anger issues.

But no matter the way, the result was always the same: the smooth, nutty dip that we ate with caramelized onions spread on enormous slices of dark bread.

Today I bought plums, we have here this type – purple and huge but pretty dry inside, I buy them to make plum jam, a feeble imitation of the jam from home. But the plum jam has nothing on the champion of all fruit preserves: magiun de prune (plum butter).

I don’t remember if buni used to make us magiun. I think it was a too slow and too long process even for her and she didn’t have the time or the energy. We didn’t really care about it, because she made us jams and compote from all the fruits she bought at the farmer’s market. During long late-summer days, our kitchen was full of sweet aromas and glass jars that waited to be filled with buni’s concoctions.

Magiun de prune could be bought at the grocery store in autumn, when they used to put a big wooden crate on the counter and the saleswoman would sell us slices of magiun that she cut with a straight, thin wire. We watched her work, our mouths filled with saliva, making the wait seem longer and the magiun even sweeter. Because sweet it was. With a hint of tartness, it was dark purple, almost black and it painted our teeth and we laughed with out mouths open and the people in the grocery store would hush and tut us with low voices and judging looks. Not that we have a care in the world.

Why all these memories now, I keep asking myself? Am I getting old and gaga? Or maybe it is my mind’s way to protect itself and me from the present reality?

Not all my memories are happy. But, fortunately, the bad ones are hiding somewhere deep in my memory and I don’t have any intention to go looking for them.

For now I am perfectly content to dwell on the days spent with buni in the kitchen or on the summer afternoons eating watermelon with my siblings, challenging each other who spits the seeds the farthest.

The kitchen is quiet again, the plum jam is ready. I spread it on the bread, taste it and somewhere, for a little while, buni is still sitting at the table across me. And she says, with half a smile: “Eat up…and don’t talk with your mouth full”.

Yesterday, I Cried Over Dust

 

Yesterday, I cried while cleaning the bathroom.

Not because anything terrible had happened. Not because there had been bad news or a family crisis. I cried over dust.

That may sound ridiculous. It certainly did to me. But the dust wasn't really the problem.

There is so much to do, every hour, every day. I have been dancing to this tune for the last eighteen years, after deciding that teaching in Israel is not for me. And that I would like to raise my daughter directly, not by proxy.

When I left the workforce, I did it consciously. I loved teaching, but it consumed more of me that I was willing to give.

It wasn’t easy. I felt as though I’d misplaced myself. Not because I’d made the wrong decision, but because I no longer recognized the person I had become.

And gradually, little by little I became the center of a small newly-born Universe. All of our house gravitated around me, matching its rhythm to mine.

I fought back. I wrote poems, a blog, essays, a book. I read a voraciously. I did whatever I could to keep myself above water, not to drown. Even though sometimes the storms were too powerful and I was weak.

When times were really awful, a sort of desperation followed me everywhere, like a toxic cloud. I asked myself all the what if’s and the why’s, I lay awake at night, listening to my thoughts telling me I am a loser, a good for nothing. As if one’s achievements in life are measured only by the number of zeroes in your income.

It is true, there were times I felt invisible. The mother in the back, the wife in the background. I felt like every chore, every task I ever done was weighing on me, keeping me down, crushing me.

Yesterday, while wiping away another layer of dust, that feeling returned. My daily struggle with the dust that settles everywhere with an incredible speed.

Everything felt so senseless, so useless. Yesterday, it was the dust. Other days, it was the dishes, the washing up, the cooking. You do all of them, and then, almost magically, you are back at square one. More dirty dishes, the fridge is empty, there are no clean clothes. You have the impression that you never finish anything. Most of the jobs have a sense of achievement, of satisfaction. A thing well done. Finished. Building something. Handing in a project. Even the school year. Housekeeping? Never. You wage a continuous battle with dust, dirt, mess, all at once.

After I finished cleaning and I washed the dust, mixed with tears from my face I just took a break. My arms hurt, my back, too. I am not young anymore.

I took a big breath. I made myself a coffee. I even frothed the milk. I took Klara the cat with me and sat on the couch. Watched some old, silent black and white movie with Buster Keaton, and I surprised myself laughing at it.

And I’ve decided, yes, I finally decided I will stop fighting the dust. I will accept its existence in my house. With a busy road underneath our building, and the sea filling the air with salt and humidity, fighting dust is a lost battle even before it starts.

I won’t happen overnight, this “transformation”. I know there will still be days when armed with a rag or a mop I will wage war on the dirt and dust. But I won’t have unreal expectations from myself, I won’t judge myself by the cleanliness of my house or the number of home-made meals I serve in a week.

I will try to be me. The mother, the wife, the caregiver, the cat rescuer, the writer, the blogger, the bookworm, the poet, the housekeeper. And I know the world will still be here tomorrow, with good and bad and messes and judgmental people and trouble and heartbreak. But so will I.