Bang-bang...

... you're dead.

Hi, My name is Uzi Saghi and I was hit by a tidal wave.

Which is a pity, bcs today you would have been 30 years old. I celebrated my 30th with you remember? You and your brothers threw my chair in the air, as Jews are wont to. You wore a black turtleneck and a ponytail and looked absolutely smashing, as you were wont to. You didn't even own a jumper when we first met and all of a sudden there you were, looking terribly European.

It is your birthday today and I think that is why my words have gone. I haven't had a lot to say in a nlong, long while. If I had words, I'd have to use them to talk abt you, and to tell people how I hoped I would be brave enough to face your photos this year so I could scan them, and show the world how absolutely beautiful you were, face of an archangel and the soul to match. I thought I might send them to your mum as well.

I cannot bear to look at them yet, I simply cannot bear to.

You would have been 30 years old, and now you are, what? Where? They have therapy on earth, which is a good thing bcs this little death of yours it doesn't seem to be getting any easier to accept. If anything, the feeling of unrealitty, of surreality has increased. Sadly, I should have been in therapy before your death, not sought it after it, for I flee and isolate myself when reality just doesn't live up to its expectations so I tend to only visit my psychiatrist once in a very irregular while. Not conducive to a greater well being but I am too weary to care.

Remember how your mum once gently urged me to not rely on my lazy ovaries to ensure I'd not get pregnant? It was a very horrifying moment, only surpassed by your sister explaining to your mum and I, using your penis as an example, how to apply one of those penile fishing flies or something or other we'd just come across in a magaine. Your mum was just so worried I'd get pregnant (ha!) and we'd have a baby (ha!) and your life woudl be ruined (heheeeeeee!). I suppose we all wish your life had been ruined, yes? It'd make missing you easier to bear.

Happy fucking birthday.


------------------

And look at what lovely Cat wrote. They share a birthday. She remembers.

The pink elephants in the room are a river in Egypt

Let's see if I can write this post [don't want to write this post] without mentioning said elephants.

So. February, yes? February, whom I've been studiously avoiding for the past week.

[don't want to write this post]

Remember him? The slightly less famous one. The event mentioned in the before-last sentence of the 2nd paragraph happened on the 7th. As luck would have it, today would have been his birthday [don't want to write this post], today, the 2oth of February. [I think I hate February] It has since been a tradition that his pseudo-harem (i.e. tweedle, my friend Shrimpy, my friend B., T. - another former President of AI whom I've mentioned bfr, myself and a few other Zémanoupies) meet for dinner on his birthday. Today. While I was in Israel I missed all these dinners, obvioulsy, and then some years it wasn't possible, and then last year I was otherwise engaged - this will be the first time I will actually be able to attend.

As luck would have it, remember him? [don't want to write this post][hate my archives] Yes, as luck would have it, little elephants everywhere a year ago today.

People find it odd I can't be bothered abt Valentine's Day. I've always found it a bit daft, truth be told. Everyone, love your partner today! Now! No. But, as luck would have it [don't want to write this post], guess when I learnt this? Good thing I never did enjoy Valentine's Day.

Well fuck this, time to say Voldemort.

.

VOLDEMORT

There.

As luck would have it, both Uzi and Zé Manel are dead, in case there were any remaining doubts, and both would find it very funny that Voldemort means Flight of Death, though Zé Manel falling must have been more like the crumbling of a chain of mountains and I can't still believe I didn't feeel the vibrations all the way across the earth on the kibbutz, , and my Tig never did stand a chance with this fight or flight thingy. [Tsunami, flee - get it? Ha! Hysterical, I know.]

As luck would have it, am still sick. Had a fever again last night. Want to hear something funny? Funnier than the tsunami/flee thing, even. Remember the kaddish? Ah, we've all met my psyche and my psyche was most displeased with the schedule. At exactly 7 pm I started shaking and shivering and all of a sudden I had a fever and would you know, I could NOT go? Isn't that the most amazing coincidence? As luck would have it, bcs Uzi was not buried within 2 days of his death it's the funeral date that counts for the Yahrzeit and that will be the 11th of March. Psyche or not, it will happen. As will tonight.

So I will be going out in a while, and we will remember Zé Manel and eat more than we should. He taught us well. We will laugh and tell stories and be sad and very happy we had him, and then we'll curse loads in his honour and make him proud of us. And Uzi will be there as well, as he is always, nestling somewhere beneath my solar plexum, in the very core of me, my centre where all else is peripheric. And he will be toasted and remembered as well, and they will be remembered together next year, and the one after that, and the one after that, for as long as we can, and after we no longer can I'm sure we'll find a way.

And my Porties will know exactly what I mean when I say that my elephants, even the pink ones in the room, are so very worth it, and I will sing them with my words, with my actions, till my voice aches, from water lilly to water lilly, AMEN.

Yes, yes, we're rather dull these days and the heartbreak doesn't vary much either

I could talk at length abt the latest Islamic insanity, i.e., *enter Calimero-esque voice* Oh we're offended, we're offended, we're so very hurt bcs you depict our prophet in compromising positions, you may mock all religious figures, we couldn't be bothered abt the others, but not our prophet so here's Hitler in bed w Anne Frank - *covers mouth* eh eh eh, SEX! - and we'll see how you like it, you bloody Jew pigs, damn you and the mare you rode in on.

*YAWN*

Yes, scary, yes, expected, yes, demented, yes, hardly surprising. Don't feel like talking abt it, couldn't even if I did bcs HAVE INANE EXAM SCHEDULE, in case you had forgotten. Actually passed the exam I was sure I'd failed. Actually had one of the best grades. Said grade was a sad one really, 12/20 - exam was bloody awful, the failure rate was 63%, terrifyingly, but the teachers fully took the blame which is always a refreshing thing to have happen in my faculty. More often that not we are called lazy and stupid and it's all our fault and no, am not joking.

Also.

Got to the end of my binder just now and there was a blue sticker w a phone number on it which was very familiar. Took me a moment to place it, it was from our kibbutz room, when I still lived w Uzi. Punch to the gut, yes, hardly surprising but still, here we are. I rang him, how could I not. Just to see if the number was still working, just to see if I could still reach him, symbolically speaking. Well, he didn't really answer, death being in the way, the phone rang for the longest time and then the voicemail came on, after all this time, and all of a sudden he was talking to me and God, I know his voice so well. Worse, there was a beep and he told me I could leave a message if I was so inclined.

On the 20th it will be a year since he was buried. Already. Already a year since I last set foot on Israel, not that I have good memories from that time, or many for that matter, I seem to have surpressed most of them, Lisa keeps telling me abt things I don't remember we talked abt at all. My Tig, my Tig, my Tig is buried, my Tig is STILL buried and yet he still talks to me when I ring him, echoing the voices in my head that whisper his name constantly.

I left a message.

Accurately so

(Word cloud with my blog's word frequency)

[Found via Persephone]

The Bloodgates of Hell

I am taking my leave *curtsey*

I do not feel like writing. I do not feel like reading. I do not feel like doing much of anything, so I suppose I'll just carry on writing reports for school and studying as well as I can.

The 27th was as expected, which left me thinking the worst was past and it had been worse to fear it than the actual day itself. Here, experienced, gone, goody. but no. the 28th caught me by thr throat in a manner that scared me. The Corpse Bride was the trigger I suppose but on the 27th i had a nightmare, i was in a space station w the furry ones and there was an earthquake and the whole station turned on its axis - I once dreamt I was in a bombing and itb was synaesthesic, there was this profound lavender-coloured feeling, most nauseating, this was close to it. After it was over i knew there was no food for the pets and i was in despair over how to feed or carry them. and then something i cannot remember and then a rebel Jewish faction was shooting and killing my friends. psyche knows no bounds. That day in the evening i went to see the Corpse Bride, it's so beautiful as to rob one of one's breath at times. that would have been enough but there was also the beginning and the ending, and if you read me and have seen it, yoiu'll know. plus i am obsessing abt Laika, even bfr the movie started i was thibnking abt poor poor Laika, hhow she must have felt so alone and terrified and how she must have cried all alone in her little space shuttle, millions of years away from any other living being, and slowly starved and died of thirst, all alone up there, not even knowing why it was happening, it breaks my heart so much i become paralysed. laika figures in my thoughts a lot these days and while replying to an email from Manuela (Thin Pink Line) it clicked, Laika and the space station in my dream, don't even need my psychiatrist for this, plus the nightmares every night now, the phobic thoughts i'm having while driving, only while driving, as in "i need to change lanes, i'm going to die" etc, several times a minute, very disturbing and upsetting but not really bcs i know what's causing this, it's like post-traumatic stress disorder minus the trauma of sorts, so,

all this to say i sometimes click on my blog and am actually surprised not to see a new post, i've discussed how well i do this schizoid thingy so no need to delve deeply, but if I do see one it won't be the one I'd like to see, i need to stop this blogging thing bcs everything is driving me mad now and i feel depleted and tonight I'll stand up in the synagogue and say Kaddish for my best friend and i don't see how i will do that in a way that will honour him if i burst into tears which i am praying won't happen but who the hell knows these days, and i don't feel like writing, or reading, or anything really. I know I'll be back, much like the plague, we can all depend on both of us, could even be tomorrow for all I know but for now i need to be away from this for a while, yes?

*curtsey* and Portie smooches all around. I hope 2006 is a kind year for all of us.

The way in which we're fortunate

LUIS, se leres isto manda-me um mail por favor, lionessblog@gmail.com

Do you know, I have been ensconced in my news-less fortress for quite a while now, to avoid Tsunami references. I forced myself to stay up really late last night hoping it'd make me sleep longer and make the day shorter. Ha. Didn't. I slept only a few hours and have been fumbling w the computer not knowing quite what to do.

Then I turned on the telly.

See, all of a sudden I wanted to see what kind of ceremony was held for my Tig, and all those thousands who died w him. I wanted to see it, since I could not be there. (I close my eyes every time they show images of the Wave, as I0've read somewhere In life pain is unavoidable, suffering is optional). What I saw was good. Proper, I suppose. Dignified. It’s horrifying to look at the ground he walked on but also heartwarming. He was surely having the best time, lizzarding in the sun. If we are going to die anyway, then enjoying it till the very last minute is surely a Very Good Thing. They are now showing images of Khao Lak, where he was staying, where we think he was killed. I’ve seen relatives and friends of the victims. Wish they blogged. There is a brand new Tsunami warning system in Indonesia. Do you know how many lives this could, probably will, save? Uzi would be so pleased. Now they reporter is being daft and questioning whether it’s not too soon to do it, whether this may not be construed as being abt rebuilding everything for tourism rather than those who died. I have been avoiding the news everywhere especially now but in general I stay away fropm them, especially on the telly. One hour and a half of misery, and misery portrayed in such a manner as above, is both choosing and taking advantage of suffering and I refuse to.

It has now been exactly a year. As much as a part of me wants the sky to turn black etc – kindly refer tp previous post – I know it is a good thing it doesn’t. I know that life goes on and, more importantly, I know it must go on or else we are killing those we loved again, and this time deliberately. They are dead, we are not, and us remaining standing requires rituals that provide us w the foundations for said verticality. One of those is acknowledging their deaths on the day of their deaths. The exact day, yes. More so when it’s been exactly one year only. So no, it’s not too soon. Surprisingly, the timing is exactly right.

I was talking to my friend G. last night. She said something that warmed my soul, she said thanks to me people will probably remember Uzi long after they’ve forgotten abt me. This has been playing on repeat inside my head. Yesterday something else made me smile. I’d forgotten all abt my Guest Map and then I remembered and clicked on it. Some people delurked there. And that’s why I wanted to tell you, again, there will be times you will be confronted w someone else’s pain and you may not know what to do or say. You may feel it will never be right, never be enough so why even attempt it. But see, those lurkers delurking weren’t even trying to make me feel better and yet they did. You never know. And telling someone you’re sorry they’re hurting and that you’re thinking abt them could never be wrong, no matter how inadequate you may find it. And talking abt those who died is actually a relief to us, bcs people so often avoid mentioning them in case they hurt us. You could never remind us of something we never forget. That you don’t forget either is cause for joy, I hope you see that. Do not underestimate the power of small things. Do not underestimate small words, small gestures.

And why are we fortunate? There was a woman in Thailand holding the pictures of her two children and showing them to people who might have seen them and know where they are. Bcs they are still alive, see. She simply knows they are still alive. And then, with a schizophrenia so familiar it made me shiver, she added that if no one comes forward within the next month with news she will accept their death. But for the grace of God that could be me. That would be me. Remember my February posts where I was still loudly banging the drums of hope, lalalaIcan’thearyou? There are close to 40.000 buried in mass graves, close to 40.000 who never were identified, close to 40.000 who never came home to rest. Uzi is home on the kibbutz. Uzi is home, we can go visit. Or not. But he is home, he is right there, he was returned to us. The alternative is too horrific to contemplate. I may still struggle to bring home the drowned gorillas of my dreams but when I wake up the nightmare stops. Reality is its own nightmare of sorts but this one I can live with. Not having had his body found and returned to us – I cannot even imagine what that must feel like. Must feel like insanity, and this sometimes feels too much like it already. Those poor people.

A few of you asked abt Tzedakah, whether you could donate something to a charity of my choice in his name. I couldn't think of this bfr but I think it is time now. I think he’d like that. Magen David Adom is an organisation that provides first-aid training and medical aid, here:

1. Providing auxiliary service to Israel's Army Medical Corps in wartime, including providing emergency medical care for the wounded and war refugees
2. Providing civilian emergency, medical, and first-aid services and temporary shelter in emergency situations
3. Maintaining a blood bank for civilian use.

This is the site in Israel, the US, in the UK.

But it doesn’t have to be money, it doesn’t even have to be Magen David Adom. I’d love it if those of you willing to donated blood and enrolled in the bone marrow program closest to you, people always forget abt the bone marrow. There never is enough blood in hospitals, never ever. And every year so many people, so many of them children, die bcs no matches were found even though there are billions of us on this planet. Nowadays if you turn out to be a match all they do is draw blood to get your cells, it’s no longer painful. You could be saving someone’s life. You could be saving a friend’s or a relative’s life. I have psoriasis and my most personal grievance is that I cannot do it, my blood is so filled w inflammatory blood cells it’d do no one any good to receive it. If you do do it, I'd love to hear abt it, anonymously or not. I know Tzedaka should be nameless but this is abt Uzi and I think of it as donating a nice, visible plaque. His full name is Uzi Saghi, btw.

And if you’ve read Silwormks you will not be surprised if I tell you that I will now go out and buy a book for him. And then I will come back and watch the Gilmore Girls, which always makes even my innards smile. And I will lie on the sofa and will his death to move over a bit so I can see his life better. And I will cry and I will sob and I will smile and I will gag and will be headbutted and scent-marked by little furry heads, it’s been going on for a while now. But I will go out and buy a book for my Tig and I will read it and I will bloody enjoy it, rest assured.

[Boyfriend’s just rang me and told me to go and get the book, yes, it would be his gift. And could I buy something for him as well? I asked if he meant something for Uzi as well. He said buy it as though it’s for him, only you give it to me. And then we can open them after lighting the 2nd candle tonight, did I see. And I do see. Uzi touches even those who never met him, which didn't surprise her at all.]

Yahrzeit

My friend V. is amazing and is arranging things so we can have a Yahrzeit ceremony for Uzi at our synagogue. That is actually what I needed but I couldn’t bear to do it myself. The media references have started so no more radio for me while driving - no more much of anything related really till this is all over. Thank you all who’ve been writing and commenting to say you’re thinking of us now, it’s lovely to hear. I know Uzi won’t be forgotten but it’s lovely to hear how much you’ve made him yours as well. I’ve finally written something for his memorial next Friday:

In the very beginning of our relationship my boyfriend won me over completely when he told me I want you to know you can always talk to me abt Uzi, I understand and I'd never be jealous. And only you could make me start writing something for an ex-boyfriend by quoting the current one, you two'd get along so brilliantly - though what I remember most abt you and I is that you still are my best friend. Today, maybe as Lila stands here reading this, we will be lighting a Yahrzeit candle for you at our synagogue. I don’t know what happens after death so I’ve decided you are sitting outside with Yaniv, laughing, drinking beer, greeting passersby with “alan”. I am so sorry that I never found you among the pictures of the victims, I would have liked to help bring you home sooner, that much I could have done. Some people were horrified that I could look at them for a week, others were surprised I flew to Israel for 4 days only to be at your funeral. Some people, apparently, have never had someone like you in their lives. Haval. I would do anything for you in life, how could I not say goodbye to you in person? This past year has been absolutely horrendous and I very often still don’t know what to do with myself. I still sometimes dream I am underwater saving lives. It’s usually gorillas I save, for some reason. Or at least I recover their bodies so they can be returned to their families. (I know you would find this gorilla obsession hysterically funny. Actually, I hope you were around when Lila, Zohar and I made all those terribly morbid jokes, you’d love them. God I miss your inappropriate sense of humour.) But see, I may not know what happens after death but I know what happens after your death. I promised a year ago that I will have as good a life as I possibly can, not only bcs you would hate it if your death broke us, but bcs this is my way of thanking Life, The Universe and Everything for having given me you. I still think that your being dead is obscene and we shouldn’t be standing here, the earth should stand still and the sky should turn black and dragons should come screaming to wage war against all worlds bcs you cannot be dead. So I think about you, I miss you, I am sad every day, but every day I am more grateful than sad. How could I not be?

I used to have a cat that I brought w me from Eilat. He’d been very ill, lost an eye, had a broken pelvis. He loved to chase butterflies on the lawn. He was killed by 2 kibbutz dogs and after that, whenever we saw a butterfly we decided it was his way of saying “hallo”. A few months ago I had a particularly bad day and didn’t see how I would survive any of this with my sanity intact. I asked you to please find a way to let me know that you were all right, that you weren’t too sad you were dead, that you weren’t too worried abt us. I barely slept and when I got up, very early in the morning, I went into the living-room and found a huge yellow butterfly trapped between the window and the netting. Just like that. There was no way really it could have got there but there it was, and it was absolutely perfect, like a headbutting from a silky cat. I have a place where I write things and people can comment. I have been obsessively writing abt you, and people from all over the world have prayed for your life and think of you now when they see butterflies. They even send me reports and pictures from their gardens. Recently someone who never met you (or me) wrote something amazing, something which encapsulates it brilliantly, something I know many of them feel: Everyone who reads you misses Uzi. And this too is absolutely perfect, the sort of beautiful only you could inspire. You are remembered.

You are still my Tig, I am still Pip, only the rules have changed a bit.

[This still reminds me of him and forever will, 2nd link in this post. And Lamb's Angel Gabriel.]

The Big Wave That Ate My Best Friend, now in a theatre near you

So it begins.

Remember my very healthy dislike for all things Decemberish? And remember my countdown thingy? We have officially entered Tsunami season.

I've just received an email from Lila. I have been dreading receiving such an email bcs it was rather obvious that it would, and now I have and now I - .

Kibbutz memorial service on the 23, I am to write something pleasepleaseplease. Again. Let's all get together and collectively remember how very and horribly dead he is. Last time, at least, we still had hope. Of sorts. I don't think this will be very good. In fact, I have just caught myself rocking back and forth. I know I will do it, I know I'll survive it but I don't see how I will manage to write something even half meaningful. I wanted to, I wanted it to honour him. I don't suppose I can have Lila hand out the link to my Uzi category, though that would be fine by me. Peruse the hundreds of posts or something and pick what best suits your mood.

You want to know what's really killing me? After Uzi was killed everyone pretty much was told or found out, one way or the other. Mostly not by me, I don't think. I vaguely remember having my Tweedle ring people for me and spread the joy. I don't really remember a lot abt those months, my psyche has served me well. back in the Summer I went for a coffee w a friend of mine. Not exactly a friend, maybe. We once had boyfriends who were brothers and spent a lot of time together. I really like her and I know she likes me as well but we have never got really, really close. I mean, she's not the one I call when the sky falls on my head but I very much want for her to have a fabulous life and enjoy her loads, and I know it's the same for her. So we were sitting at an outside cafe and I realised she didn't know. I certainly didn't know how to tell her, it's been months since I'd last been in that position. Above all, I didn't want to tell her. To her Uzi was still very much alive and gorgeous and a part of me wanted it to remain so. But something had happened to me a few weeks earlier and that was a horror of such epic proportions I knew I didn't want to risk it happening again. See, I wrote a post abt going to the beach house w my Tweedle for a few days, remember that? While we were there we went for coffee w a former professor of mine, w whom I became friends and Tweedle got to know as well. We were sitting there, enjoying our drinks (going for a coffee might involve all drinks but coffee here, so it was Caipirinhas for them and Coke for me) and all of a sudden he asked How is our Israeli friend? I couldn't think of whom he meant and thought he might mean some Criminologist in israel, I remember trying to look someone up for him the first time I was there. But I was wary and so I said What do you mean? And he said That Israeli boyfriend of yours that I met, he is amazing, remember you came round to see me, how is he doing? And I simply sat there, horror-struck and couldn't even breathe and I remember Tweedle looking panicked and him asking What's wrong and later she told me I looked as though I'd been punched in the gut and went white but my memory of it is slightly worse than that and I sort of remember trying hard not to burst into tears while Tweedle told him and he must have been shocked and said the things you say at a moment like that but that's the last bit of our reunion I remember. My psyche, it serves me well.

So I didn't want to risk that happening again, over coffee (coke and juice), again, and so I said You remember Uzi, right? And she said, yes, of course she did. And I said Well, he was in Thailand in December and she looked at me blankly and the sky did fall on my head then bcs see, too many months had gone by and even though to me the Tsunami was a daily experience it no longer was for the rest of the world, and that little sentence had always served me well, people immediately knew what had happened but it was no longer so and I was going to be forced to spell it out so I sat there and started crying and said He was in Thailand in December when the.. When the... and then, I think mostly bcs of my tears she finally understood and her eyer were all of a sudden very shiny, which didn't help me at all, and I also don't remember how the rest of it went.

People have forgotten, people will forget even more. When Yaniv died the first Jahrzeit loads of people showed up at his Mum's. The next year there were a bit less. And so on and so forth. I don't want that to happen to my Tig, I want the world to stand still, the earth to abruptly come to a screeching halt with objects flying off shelves and dragons flying in to wage war bcs it IS the end of the world, it is, IT IS.

I don't see how I will find the words.

And now, bcs it's Wednesday, I must go and be trampled further by some big animal, or worse, be forced to inject some dog intraperitoneally. I'm in the mood for a fight so I hope it's the bloody donkey and Donkey, be warned I'll be the one doing the kicking today.

------------------------------------------------

UPDATE: it was the cow, the cow that usually is meek and patient, the cow that today started kicking the manger and us the moment we walked in the box, the cow that decided this morning she'd had enough of being pierced by incompetent hands. There was ass-kicking done, as Cow literally kicked my colleague in the buttocks. It hurt. Cow also slapped me with her ears a few times, also not pleasant, and managed to slap my cornea with the ear plastic tag, which was even less pleasant and made me go blind for a short while. The highlight of an otherwise lovely day was when Cow, huge Cow, all 650 kg/1400 lb of Cow, stood on my foot, for many seconds, while I screamed for my colleagues to move her. When they did she lifted the other foot thereby increasing the pressure some more. I am now limping and foot hurts like the bloody hell, taking off galoches and putting on regular shoes was memorable. One colleague remarked I looked as if I were in labour but that was a tad exaggerated. With a bit of luck nothing was broken and I can avoid the ER. So I am icing my raised foot (frozen peas work the best, FYI, bcs they adapt to the shape of whetever it is you need to ice, much better than icecubes) which is lovely bcs really, this heat wave was driving me bonkers, and Voltaren was duly swallowed. But I won bcs I did manage to engorgitate the vein, at the expenses of a formerly healthy left wrist, and inject her jugular and the needle stayed put and then I screwed in the syringe and did it and so did my 2 colleagues, and we are proud bcs the cow kicked and rolled and shook and tried to horn us and moved the whole bloody time and us with it and one of my collegues is huge and tall and really really strong and he was seating too from the exertion, and the teacher later told all of us she isn't worried abt us, most big animals we will come across in the future will not have any behavioural vices and will have had very little contact w humans so by the time they realise what is happening it should all be over, from her lips to God's ears, see, we are the lasts shift, by Wednesday afternoon the animals have been inaptly poked and pierced till kingdom come, they are fed up and sore and frankly, I'd be too, no ill feelings, I think it's only fair. And it only took us an hour and a half and some monor injuries! Cannot wait for the stable exam.

Spot the beauty!

Can you see it? Can you? Can you? Isn't it sweet? Melted my pericardium right off my, well, myocardium.

I loved it, it was the verification word over at Faggots on the Third Floor (BRILLIANT blog name, BTW, simply brilliant). And that is fine in so many ways, fine with a sultry US Southern accent, bcs, see, faggots? Faggot-y men? They wanted Uzi, my pretty boy, they dehydrated looking at him, such was the drool. They LOVED him.

Fuck. Who didn't.

Countdown

I've just realised something. It's true I have been overwhelmed w work lately at at most I've had time to briefly check how you lot are but. BUT. I have been avoiding Israeli and Jewish bloggers. Also, I STILL have not talked to Lila, at all - that also has to do with the fact that she hasn't downloaded google talk yet, but mostly not. Also to do w the fact that she's to understanding to properly kiss my bloody ass into shape.

You know why, right? Well I do. It's been almost a year. I also realised I have started an inner countdown and quite frankly, am terrified. I know I will want to hide away but as luck would have it, it's right bfr the beginning of exams, which MUST go well this year. I know I won't be watching any news at all, or listening to the radio. It will come whether I'm ready or not and I know I'm not. Above all, I'm terrified of my lack of words regarding him, am afraid that I have buried him too deep to be accessible anymore, and that I have lost part of us, part of him, in the process. Most of all, I don't understand how he can have been dead for almost a year. I still dream of saving drowning people/animals (or trying to anyway, I'm never successful even w a wetsuit, even in my sleep), I think abt him every single day, several times, I talk to him - do you know, I knew I was going to earn some money in the game show bcs a white butterfly flew right across my windscreen when I reached the last roundabout. I just knew it. I still sometimes toy w the idea that it was all a mistake. I don't want him dead, I don't want him gone, I don't want the rest of my life without his smile and his voice and his faces. Last year, bcs I was still a bit ill and deranged w worry, I managed to fall asleep at around 7 pm and sleep through the New Year. I didn't want to be celebrating, I didn't feel there was anything worth celebrating, he was missing and I was missing him and fearing the worst, nothing else mattered really. I wish I could fall asleep today and wake up some time at the end of February, past most of the ritual horror. If I were very rich I'm sure I could. The first time that X, the first time that Y, am so afraid of it. There are decades worth of it awaiting us. How will I do this? And a bang on the ear.

[UPDATE - Well. 4.30 am is also called the hour of the dead. I'm right on schedule.]

19th of October

fell asleep at 22.something holding my Microbiology book after 7 straight hours of classes and much bureaucratic running around

woke up now, 3.15, psyche won't be fooled

contemplating life and death, mostly the latter, moving on, nothing new to see here, psyche

jaw hurts a bit, must have been grinding teeth again

makes sense because:

dreamt of him yesterday, we were on the phone and he was pretty listless and seemed to have lost his ability to understand english, hebrew and portuguese bcs i kept repeating myself in all 3 languages in the hopes of something getting through. he was listless bcs his girfriend had died you-know-when. i had just been to eilat(!) where he now worked(!) on an animal shelter(!) and we'd missed seeing each other for some reason. i told him such a shame [haval][ha] that we missed each other. he said oh well and you could see his I-don't-care shrug through the telephone. i became upset bcs after all he'd been dead and i'd been desperate and now he was alive again and in eilat and i could have seen him again and he couldn't be bothered to even pretend he cared abt any of it - i said well fuck you, just like that, and then the housekeeper rang the bell and i woke up and then i was awake and rather mad at myself for wtf way to speak to people is that even in a dream, and this was him, and then i couldn't go back to sleep and was even madder bcs telling him to go fuck himself and having appalling conversations on the phone is so much better than my being awake again and him being dead again and i not hearing his voice again

[wish i could cry properly instead of all this is a river in egypt discombobulation of sorts]

i live in fear of losing my mobile, i do. i thought i had the other day and my stomach contracted and my mouth filled w spit and I thought i was going to experience the 2nd spontaneous vomit of my life. don't know how to upload the recording. wish i did. wouldn't mind paying a fortune to nokia if only they could help me. can't bear to ask in case they say they cannot

still haven't emailed lila. (created new skype account, in case you're reading, but have forgotten what username is again.) (and i'm sorry, i really am)(you know avoidance becomes me, yes?)

it's very hard to google old posts and then link to them and ensure nothing of said post is actually read by accident - accidents will happen

(thanks Udge but the whole category is verboten for now)

am trying to decide it's ll right not to ring his family today, will email instead

i really, really, REALLY, PLEASE NO! don't want to ring his family today, can't even bear to think of the conversation we would have. and it's not like it changes anything or even helps them is it. or me

have emailed instead

his older brother is getting married, his mum told me when i called a few weeks ago. i am also terrified we will eventually lose contact, see, i had to ring them to find out. if he were alive he'd have rung me immediately to tell me

there will be a wedding. a happy occasion. he'd have loved to see it. and then many a joke abt dysfunctional families and may this break the curse could and would have been made

his older brother is bound to have children himself - that would make uzi an uncle

except it wouldn't

(...) and all we need of hell

Sorrow still floats, Irving still right

Feel helpless, nothing worse than that.

[Don't want to sleep bcs every time I do I dream of the people in the Dome and the people in the Convention Centre and the people on the freeways and highways and the people on the streets and the bodies floating in the water and oh the bodies in the water and I don't know why I am having flashbacks of those images I saw when I still hoped Uzi was still alive and spent hours looking at pictures from the tsunami and the bodies trying to identify him bcs this was a natural disaster but one that was expected, I cannot explain it and didn't know until I woke up at 5 am last night that it was affecting me so thoroughly, I knew I'd been avoiding all coverage of it but I thought it was merely part of my general life strategy these days - i.e. no misery in my life if I can help it - but I suppose it isn't bcs I've also been thinking abt all those who haven't heard abt their family and pets and friends but I choose to believe that most of those will receive the right sort of phone call please God let them receive the right sort of phone call bcs life becomes a bit of a nightmare otherwise and I am so bloody tired of all these Life-Before-And-Afters. I fear I may become thick-skinned, I fear I won't.]

Read post below for what you can do to help.

Four years today and the slime that rules us all

[If here via Tertia please scroll down, links under "HOW YOU CAN HELP"]

Four years ago today I was spending my last day in Israel on the kibbutz. I was supposed to have flown home the day before but JIP, with that uncanny cat sense they have, had decided not to come back to the room at all. Uzi and I looked everywhere for her and in the end he drove me to the airport so I could postpone the flight. She showed up immediately after our return and was very much distressed bcs she was forced to stay in till the next day, and then it was Humungous Pet Carrier Time for her and the baby (Tripod was abt 4-5 months old then).

And I remember being on that aeroplane and knowing that coming back was the right decision bcs Vet School was absolutely the right thing for me [HA!], but that it was breaking my heart. Uzi and I had spent a good 3 hours at the airport just sitting on trolleys and talking bcs we were early, and we also took pics of us and the cats in/on the pet carrier. The notion that everything was never going to be the same was so strongly w me I couldn't bring myself to have the film developped. I don't even know where said film is, much to my added grief now. I believe I'd have overcome my reticence if I'd known that was the last time I'd see Uzi alive. Don't cry Pip, you'll be back so very soon, and we'll visit each other often anyway, it will almost be the same thing.

Yesterday was a bad Uzi day even bfr I remembered the date. Then I did. Then it was an even worse day.

New Orleans... I've just woken up after 3 h of sleep, I woke up at 5.17 am thinking of all those at the Dome and everywhere else. I have been very effective at watching even less news than usual but information does filter in and my stomach has been increasingly heavy. Last night I was reading a blog by a nurse, a blog I used to enjoy loads bcs she often goes into detail abt clinical cases and procedures. She was talking abt a man who is devastated bcs he doesn't know what became of his 3 cats, which he had to abandon behind as he evacuated. And then she said something like "Oh well, as long as that is your biggest problem." And I was left staring at a computer screen wondering how on earth someone who chose nursing for a job can show this much compassion.* I know leaving my animals behind would kill me - actually, I wouldn't leave them behind, EVER. That would be as unconscionable as abandoning children, I think. It breaks my heart into minute pieces just thinking abt all those pets and strays. I've accepted the responsibility, it is mine till the end. How could I ever live w myself otherwise?

This was the last straw and now the floodgates of hell are open again. Imagine your city w all the supermarkets under water, all your familiar landmarks gone, imagine your house is only visible at roof level and you have got nothing but the clothes you are wearing. You have lost everything. EVERYTHING. It's unimaginable really, and there's too much water in it again, too much death and misery through water again. But this time, unlike the tsunami that killed Uzi, so much could have been prevented bcs WE KNEW IT WAS COMING! Hey Bush boy, how's the holiday going? You enjoying yourself there, love? How's that golf handicap? Should be close to 0 w all the practice you've been getting. Must be good to rule the world, all this free time and pahtying.

Bush is a murderer and a worse one w every day that goes by. Iraque wasn't bad enough, apparently - where is he now? Where are you, you coward, now that women are being raped in the Dome and no one does anything to prevent it? Now that armed groups have claimed their power back in the worst possible way, now that people are left starving and dying of thirst because life as we know it is over in New Orleans and there is nowhere to turn to for things we take so granted every day such as bread and water, WHERE ARE YOU, YOU BLEEDING IDIOT? There are people stranded everywhere and no one coming to their rescue! Katrina was devastating enough but that the very poor (and very black, how surprising, and no one mentions it - reverse racism at its best, see how PC shit can kill?) are now being blamed for not having done what they were told - they are POOR, how could they have evacuated? With what money, with what means? And how were they to anyway, after traffic came to a near halt due to the human stampede, even if they had found the means? Where were you, Bush boy, where are you still?

Bush is a criminal, is what I think, and he belongs in jail, preferably Guantanamo-like. He makes me sick with disgust and shame and I curse the day this man was elected - and America, the world thanks you, really we do, how could we not, our fate in the hands of an acephalous wannabe cowboy. If there ever are photos of him in his underwear in the newspaper, believe me I'll keep mum. Forget abt fair, let's talk justice now. I wish I could spit in his face or smack him soundly across that lying mouth of his. The man makes me lose all composure and I feel my blood boiling!

Read this, he says it so clearly. And she does as well.

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HOW YOU CAN HELP:

If you're feeling overwhelmed, donating IS something you can do and you may save lives and help give thousands some dignity and hope back. If you're concerned abt whether your money will be used properly, make sure you choose a bona fide organisation.

• The Fug girls have put together an amazing collection of links for money donations here, as has The Truth Laid Bear.
• If you want to donate goods go here, these people are gathering comfort goods to make life easier for those who have lost everything and will at some point be relocated to hotels.
• You can register to house the now homeless here.
• You can help the animals here and here. Please find out how to and help them and their worried owners.
• And blood, you can give blood even if you can't afford to donate money. There never is enough and now it's certainly needed. Some of us would give a lot to be able to and aren't allowed, please don't waste what is a truly wondrous gift.

Update: I put my money where my mouth is and have donated both to people and to animals. Do you know, I could never donate for anything Tsunami-related and it increased my sense of loss bcs those people, the survivors who lost their houses and their families or part of it, were victims as well. Less than Uzi, of course, but victims nevertheless and I have been refusing to help. I simply couldn't and I still cannot even look at advertising banners. This time I wasn't a coward, see, and my money will help, my money will make a difference, I will make a difference instead of simply wringing my hands and crying and breathing on in general.

*Update 2: I went back to that nurse's blog bcs I wanted to leave a comment and as it turns out she didn't say what I thought she did, it was a misunderstanding, she is heartbroken over the animals as well, and I am very grateful that I can keep on reading and thinking good things abt her. Sorry abt that again, HN!

Update 3: Kayne West is my new hero. It took balls indeed, and more anger than I like to think abt. And through Dovbear I found this: Ted Koppel slaying Michael Brown, Director of FEMA. Indeed. Astonishing! He didn't even know the difference between the Convention Centre and the Dome! [The American habit of over-using one's first name when replying is rather annoying, gah!] There's also this piece where Shepard Smith tells you how people are locked inside the Convention Centre, and how a checkpoint has been set up on a major road preventing people from going into Gretna, Louisianna, where there is electricity and hope, how anyone walking out of New Orleans is sent right back in, and a very disturbing Hannity person says he wants to get perspective and an absolutely shell-shocked Smith yells back THIS IS PERSPECTIVE!

Update 4: In awe of her, as usual.

Confessions 1-7

Confession #1:
For the past 5 nights I have been waking up at around 4.30.

This is not my typical insomnia pattern. The typical pattern, however, does manifests itsef slightly in that regardless of how little I sleep, I don't fall asleep easily.

Confession #2:
For the past few nights, I have been able to fall asleep only bcs I stayed in the living-room, reading.

This is nothing new to me. Uncomfortable as this sofa is, I remember the last time I was studying for Bones I didn't sleep in my bed at all during the 4 days of exams or the days immediately leading to them, I always stayed in the living-room. I dislike this subject very much and studying for it truly is a sacrifice, a physical one in many ways as well. By staying away fom my beloved bed I am keeping it untainted and will return to it when the nightmare is over. [It is also entirely possible that if I'd used the bed during those days I'd have simply taken to it and refused to get up again, ever.] And I am deeply anguished over the Bones exams and it doesn't help that in the first 9 days of September I will have 6 exams - and I don't even know whether some overlap yet. It could also be due to the novel lack of nicotine galore coursing through my receptors, I suppose.

Confession #3:
CENSORED CONFESSION BLABLABLA

Much more impersonal, yes?

Confession #4:
This whole post has been a veritable sand-in-the-eye fest.

Everything I wrote is true, that is not it. Everything I wrote is contributing to my physical and mental discomfort.

Confession #5:
To a varying degree, this fest has been happening for a good while now.

However, those are not the reasons I wake up w a start and some pressing question trapped behind my lips. Usually, some elaboration of Did you suffer.

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Confession #6
My exams start on the 1st of September
September is almost upon us
September will soon be over
October is almost upon us
Uzi was born on the 19th of October
The 19th of October is almost upon us
December is almost upon us
February is almost upon us

.
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I spin the questions my fingers know by heart endlessly. [Did you suffer, are you very sad, exactly how dead are you, do you know it, do you see us, are we holding you back, did you suffer] They resemble fractals in their deadly beauy and reliability.

I seem to dream of him more and more, and w increasing detail. Sometimes the dreams are a gift in the sense that he will do something specific, however tiny, and I will remember it and realise he used to and I’d forgotten. Inevitably, I will start crying and wake up. But never bfr I remember. I seem to have lost my ability to keep him alive through my words - I seem to never taalk abt him anymore, write abt him anymore, or ring is Mum or Lila, and I certainly never email them.

I will have to soon. I will have to ring I. on his birthday and oh good God the horror, THE HORROR, how will I do this, how. I miss taking to Lila as well so it’s a mystery why I don’t want to do it. No it isn’t. I can’t very well be in denial anymore and I am not - but I can not fancy acknowledging that he is dead and I haven’t fancied acknowledging it.

It is more typical of me to dissect things obsessively and word out the poison than to not want to or no longer not know how to. I feel like I'm having an out-of-body experience while trapped in mine. Dissociation, yes?

Confession #7
I need to shed my skin

Well, fuck. FUCK.

Sometimes, very often, Judaism is a struggle. I could never understand the point of, say, not eating certain foods for no good reason other than it being a fortitude test. Well, they cannot eat pork or seafood, eels, what else? The ostrich, you say? But that’s a bird, we've established they may eat birds! Oh, to throw them a bit, eh? Excellent, good thinking, let’s do that! If you thought kosher was abt dietary hygiene kindly re-think. There is so much abt Judaism that is ruled by this reasoning and I don’t see the need bcs life takes care of testing us most efficiently. I find it a bit cruel. [The idea of the Jewish God as a cruel one may come as a shock to you.]

There are also things I find downright hypocritical. The shabbos goy is a gentile that is responsible for doing all things on Shabbat that a Jew is forbidden to do. What bothers me is, if YOUR God tells you you cannot do XYZ, you either accept it or you do not. Hiring someone to do it for you simply bcs he has a different religion is circumventing the issue, feels like deceit and is entirely too self-serving. Not to mention that it implies that all gentiles are somewhat less worthy and therefore it won’t harm them [I know theoretically is bcs God commanded only the Jews to do this but see, I have this notion that we all have the same God and this preciousness and specialness of ours is a tad hard to swallow. And don't get me started on pikuach nefesh, the notion that saving a life supersedes all restrictions and how some Jews disgracefully think it doesn't apply if it concerns a non-Jew, or how some Orthodox will not save their pets from a fire bcs IT VIOLATES SHABBAT. Fuckers.]. And the ma’alit shabbat? Bcs you are not supposed to create fire, and electricity may cause sparkles, you are not allowed to turn on the lights etc. In Israel you have, in hotels frequented by religious Jews, an elevator that goes from floor to floor automatically, stopping on every single one. Someone please explain to me why this is ethical and any different than pressing the button yourself. The elevator is moving, ON SHABBAT, and is run by electricity and yet you're allowed to. Miraculously, you are allowed to profit from it simply bcs it was already moving, you had nothing to do with it, metallic shabbos goy at your service. But you wouldn't get into my car even if it were already running as well and I hadn't started it for you - and how is it different? The ma'alit shabbat to me embodies all that is wrong with a certain type of Judaism and you know what? You do what you want and you'll never find me by the door urging you to take the stairs but I am bloody entitled to my beliefs as well.

I am not a rabbi and it's not up to me to decide who may do what within the bounds of Hallachah. And I realise Hallachic living is hard in modern days and rabbis do indeed try and find ways to integrate thousands of years of obligations and what not into our present. More power, I say. But to NOT admit it's hypocritical drives me mental especially bcs it is possible, if much harder, to live like our forefathers did. Hey, the Hamish still do it (and are for the most part very well adjusted and live very contented lives). So you choose not to, and good for you, but go on, having a second circuitry in an electrical connection so you can press the button and raise a hospital bed on Shabbat if you happen to work there and are religious doesn't make it NOT your action, are there perchance house elves living in that second circuitry? And isn't pikuach nefesh enough? Is it respecting the spirit of the law that says no pigs shall set food on Israeli soil to have said pigs live on wooden planks? NO. The letter maybe, they certainly never touch the soil, but I am reasonably sure that's not what was originally meant. So, again, choose to live in the modern world, very sane of you honestly, but don't try and convince me that a fair amount of hypocrisy isn't what allows it. There really is no way to avoid it but pretending it's perfectly normal and not a deception of sorts is just beyond me and my patience. And as for seriously religious Jews seriously debating whether one ultimately is allowed to read Harry Potter... That's having your priorities sorted out indeed.

I am having a very hard evening and my point is, I don’t care if it’s Shabbat and right now I couldn’t care less abt the destruction of the Temple. If that makes me a bad Jew, so be it. This is my personal rebellion against… something. We are still here, we are still thriving, my best friend is dead and quite frankly, that is far more important than all the buildings in the world. Religion is abt people, not places, ultimately [leave Jerusalem out of this]. We do not worship idols, false or otherwise, but, even though the line btwn the Temple obsession and avoda zara (idolatry) exists, it seems thin to me at times. [Oh I know it’s not really the Temple itself, it’s the way of life, the loss - I don’t care. I’m pissed off and lashing out and I don’t care.] And if God has a problem with my using the computer on Shabbat he can step right down and address me directly or I will not care one bloody bit. And if he happens to take the time to, I’d love to ask him if my theory is correct and God is indeed above such pettiness as deciding who lives and dies [ignore fallacy in argument, i.e., if God indeed stepped down and talked to me - or smacked me abt - he’d be an involved God and therefore my question would be automatically answered]. And if it turned out that he wasn’t, well then - I’d have to hurt him. [I think I’ve now burnt all the bridges I could, Lioness The Heretic. I still don’t care.]

I DON'T CARE!

My best friend is dead and

[LONG CENSORED BIT, BASICALLY SHOWING HOW MENTAL HIS DEATH HAS MADE ME AND CENSORED BCS IT INVOLVED PEOPLE MADE IRRELEVANT]

I’m just heartbroken bcs Uzi remains adamant abt remaining dead and I’ve been having the nightmares and the flashbacks to prove it, and I thought I was doing rather brilliantly but today I was with a friend at an outside café, the sort of friend you talk to maybe once a year but you pick up where you left off and life being what it is why the hell don’t you talk more often, and I had to tell her and all I could say was “Uzi was in Thailand…” and this horrendous knot formed in my throat and I realised I might yet cry, and she didn’t even understand immediately, it took her a while to realise what I was trying to say but my face eventually got the message across, and then she looked horrified and teary-eyed, and suddenly I was crying in an outside café, so: Uzi = dead and I couldn’t find the words to explain to him the desolation I am feeling bcs we were talking, see, not writing, and so here I am and Uzi looms smaller than death and I truly don’t know what to do with myself and feel I am quite efficiently going out of my mind.

And that was a tendril of hair, you think I’d post a bloody hickey? IT’S A TENDRIL! But I do feel a bit better now and God? You’d better be happy for me, Shabbat or not.

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UPDATE: A bit better but fully demented, I left an apalling comment on some blogger's site in the wee hours of the morning, always a bad decision, she'd been wondering whether the ocen doesn't sometimes just up and eat you - ha! I leave it to you to imagine what that did to my macabre sense of humour, I have sent an email and apologised.

[SAME]

The Av within

On Friday the 13th, August 2004 I thought of creating a new blog. And so I did. How fitting.

The Jewish month of Av (July/August of the Gregorian calendar) is not a good month for Jews. This upcoming Sunday is Tisha b’Av, literally the 9th of Av, the culmination of nine days of remembering the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem, and a few more terrible events. [The Jewish calender is lunar and therefore the date of Tisha b’Av varies. Last year, when I created my blog, it had been safely behind us for 2 weeks.]

The whole of Israel and the Jewish world are busy w the disengagement from Gaza these days. Dany wrote a post that absolutely explains how I feel abt it: heavy and hopeless and full of dread. Av, again. Again, how fitting. Tisha b’Av should be ended on a hopeful note bcs we, after all, have survived. And we will, after all, keep surviving. Shabbat starts soon and Sunday is a day of fasting so I am posting this now. And this is all I have to offer you:

1. I celebrate my one year blogging anniversary tomorrow, 13th of August
2. Loverboy and I will celebrate our 3-month anniversary on the very same day by finally going out for Sushi
3. The pictures from the post below
   

Bcs, see, I am grateful, so grateful that I started blogging in my blissful ignorance. And I am certain I will want to say more abt it at some point. But right now all I can think is, My blog is one year old and my Tig is gone. Uzi is dead, UZI IS DEAD,

UZI

IS

DEAD

And I have really nothing left to say.

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Letters from Miluim - 2

See here for the ones before this, and to understand what this is about. I'm black, Uzi is green. There's something to be said for tidying up, I've found the baby pics of his I had misplaced. [As I said, there's loss in chaos.] Both him and Z. looked absolutely scrumptious when they were small. Still do. Well, you know what I mean.

I am at the beach as you read this, sun sand and ocean. This post is brought to you courtesy of Loverboy. (Lila, ani etkasher alaich besof hashavua, besseder? Tagidi li im ate babait.)

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29 May 1999
18.30

I’m on a guarding post, 4 metres high or so. 30 metres from me there’s an Egyptian guarding, probably as bored as I am. We’re not allowed to interact. I nearly finished a whole book in this shift that ends in less than half an hour. And then I’m on again at 23.00 at the gate. These guarding shifts can make you lose track of the days (much like you). But they make days move really fast. Three more nights and I get to have two whole days home with you.

The ravens here are huge and totally black: no wonder Alfred Hitchcock made a movie about birds, they really are scary. There are a few dozen others of them around the base. That’s the time of year they can be dangerous, before their chicks mature finally. Don’t worry, I didn’t see any aggressiveness from them. The desert it marvellous but there’s hardly a mountain that’s not cut in half by the marks of an errant jeep. The miserable Egyptians are doing the patrols on foot. Can you imagine that? I really feel sorry for them. A bit.

Letters from Miluim* - 1

Tig, this is everyone. Everyone, meet Uzi.

These are his words.

24 May 1999
22.39

O Pip,

Well, end of first day.

I got to that office I had to report to at sometime before 15.00 and there we waited till about 18.00 doing nothing at all, except getting the gear and that metal stick I have to carry around to anywhere I go.

Amazing, just when you think you saw everything in the army something surprises you. They want us to sleep in these cement buildings, the type you see in Forrest Gump. I thought IDF got rid of them all. Now I’m waiting for a bed and a mattress. They said they’ll get here within half an hour an hour ago. The guys are great. We’re a very small unit. I like the officer in charge so far. Although he’s kind of arrogant.

I was taught the difference between trance, hip hop, techno, house and trip-hop music.
Trance: the UFO music with changing beat and changing loudness.
House: constant beat, loud bass
Hip hop: black rap music - like Will Smith
Techno: constant beat with addition of things such as saws and engines
Trip-hop: Prodigy-style

[Then a bit here that Lila would love]

Anyway, I’ll continue tomorrow.

Tig

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25 May 1999
23.00

Another wasted day.
All we did today was shoot 10-20 bullets to see that the rifle works properly, and some explanations about our job here. The mosquitoes here are killers and I didn’t bring my anti-mosquito product. Tonight I’ll buy the army one. I took a freezing shower, wow. Horrible. But it was unavoidable. As far as I know I’m gonna be guarding for the next 10 days or so.

Good night, Pip.
Tig

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28 May 1999
18.58

Well, time does move here. I neglected writing for 3 days and didn’t even notice it.

Yesterday some guy wanted to have me tried for not checking the people at the gate. Who the fuck does he think I am? I am a civilian who temporarily wears a uniform. Anyway my officer got me out of it saying that if they charge me with anything both me and him are out of here.

I had a mouse in my bag, he ate some of my wafers. Cute, fast little bugger. I slept 3 ½ hours tonight, finished guarding at 3 and got up again at 6.30. Somehow I don’t feel so sleepy. I’ll try to sleep now cause I’m free till 3 am

Beijo**

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* Reserve duty. Israeli men, after they’ve served in the army, are called back every year for some weeks, consecutive or not, until they reach 45? 50?
** Kiss