End of Kipple #4

December 28, 2010

My Immigration ID- תעודת עולה

This is a story of immigration but we must remember that behind every immigrant there is an emigrant that cannot be erased.

People ask me why I'm leaving America and I tell them that I'm not leaving. I'm going. People get very lofty ideas, ask me if I'm following a dream, following my roots back and becoming one "with the salt of the earth". I don't say aloud that I learned Israel with my feet and that the knowledge of it crept up from my soles until it reached my mind. That the primary reason for going is that it is the only place I have ever been where I am happy without trying. I don't tell them that I made the decision to go only after much pondering and collecting the salt of my eyes.

I will always be an emigrant from America and I'll always remember. I'll always remember what I came from and what I left behind me. It's why I sing my own arrangement of Woody Guthrie about how this land was made for you and me. Now, it's that land.

Frozen Pond in Boston

As usual, the flight was on time--Israeli style--over an hour late. I made friends with the officer from the משרד הפנים (Ministry of the Interior). She invited me over for Shabbat, along with another עולה (immigrant) I befriended on the check-in line. This is why I've moved to Israel. Because even the משרד הפנים officer invites me over for dinner and gives me her cell phone number.

"You must call me," she insists. I will. Once I get a phone.

I'm smiling already. This is home.

I also befriended the stewardesses. Martin wouldn't fit in the overhead bins or the closet. I hung out waiting and talked to No'a, the stewardess about why he can't go under the plane and why I've chosen to move. She told me she lives in America now and that even though she enjoys it, there are still things she cannot understand on a fundamental level.

December 26, 2010 Blizzard, Old Bridge, NJ

"My husband and I were driving," she told me, "and there was a huge accident. And not one car stopped to help. I couldn't believe it! Nobody cared! In Israel, everyone would stop. No question."

This is the difference. In the United States, we can go to jail for acting the Good Samaritan if those saved decide to sue us for saving their lives. "Because I wanted to die and you took away my rights." Look it up.

No'a couldn't find a place for Martin, so she took him and put him in the staff storage on-board. "Don't forget him," she told me. "Don't worry," I said.

Once Martin was squared away, I attempted to return to my seat, 51H, an aisle. Very religious man was asking me if I could switch seats because one of the stewardesses knew a married couple who had been separated and gave the groom a seat next to his bride--the man's seat.

The man's problem was that the new seat arrangement placed him next to a woman and he is forbidden from doing this. Now I'm sandwiched in a middle seat across the plane, but the company is great, other than the screaming babies (about 20 children all under the age of 4) in the seats behind me.

Bud the Frog

We just ate dinner and a crowd of people is dancing and clapping in the aisle benching (saying the Grace After Meals prayers) right now...Actually they're apparently getting married on the plane. What the hell! Only on El Al. Oh, just found out that they're not getting married, they're saying the Seven Blessings after the ceremony. Still what the hell! Only on El Al.

One other thing you'll never find on another airline: thirsty passengers taking charge and pouring their glasses of water. Flight attendants waving them by and taking care of the crying bride who can't find room for her wedding dress in the closet.

Despite this, there are still things I'll miss. People. Connections and how I had to cut them short. Beef hot dogs, cheddar cheese, fried chicken and biscuits.

Blizzard Dec. 26, 2010 Plowing Aftermath

I'll miss the way leaves burn on fire, brilliant at the cusp of death in a New England autumn. I'll miss the lush green of the South, the flooding wetness and the thunder of an atmosphere charged with the energy of a summer storm.

I'll miss warm rain in summer and the Massholes in Boston.

I'll miss driving, being in complete control of my vehicle of motion and the curves it traces down the road. I'll miss the glitter of raindrops sparkling in the pre-sunset light on the back window from the driver's seat. I'll miss the distinct smell of cold rising up off fallen leaves.

Netanya from my friend's apartment. Yes, that's the Mediterranean.

But the world opens up before me. It emits light like an explosion and of days with clear skies.

America gave me a good send-off: the blizzard of the decade. New Jersey was buried in 2.5 feet of snow overnight. I plowed.

As it fell I wondered at how the snow fell like universes, descending flakes ad infinitum. Flakes descended in drifts and soft waves. It is beautiful until we have to become part of civilization again.

I know I won't miss the snow.

More Netanya

Calm has descended upon me, like the snow erasing the lines we humans have carved into the earth. I'm going home and it will be hard. And it might not work out. But it is right. Sometimes logic doesn't cut it and I have to follow my emotion. For the first time, I really have. It is like gliding on wind, a rush and a calm all at once. And nothing can describe what I felt when the plane touched down: happiness swelling until I couldn't contain it and so it came out again, through the salt of my eyes. And so my emigrant met my immigrant and they canceled each other out.