I was going to start this post with a comment about how I just watched the first episode of Felicity again (because I am that bored) and make some jokes about my life, but then I remembered that my parents read my blog and... yeah... Hi Ema, Hi Abba, you can go back to today's issue of the Wall Street Journal now.
The last blog post I wrote was probably the hardest ever. Hard to really follow it up with something... anything really. A few days after the funeral I made the trip to Maale Adumim to see Miriam. She of course had no idea what had happened, just that her mother was away in America. It was fantastic seeing her. We had so much fun. It was a big relief (maybe for both of us) after all the sadness the week before. Then on the last day of Chanukah she came back to gan for the day. While she was there, friends of mine came by to sign their kid up for my gan. I made a comment about Miriam being our favorite gan kid ever. Apparently we're not supposed to say things like that. But... she just is. We really miss her! Let me tell you, some of our gan kids set really high standards for gan kids to come.
Speaking of gan kids to come... remember two years ago when Gila and I were begging on the streets looking for kids to join our gan? Well a few weeks after gan started this year some parents started contacting us asking about next year. Then a few more called. Then we told them all to wait because we didn't want to deal with it yet... and then more called. Right now we have 14 out of 16 spots filled. We never advertised. This was all word of mouth. I have yet to hear anything bad about my gan. We have a lot of people to thank for this. Our gan parents have been huge promoters and their kids are kind of poster children for the gan. You know- they're cute, they speak English well, some are bi-lingual, and they know how to say please and thank you. Apparently we did something right. I find that part particularly impressive considering in so many ways we had absolutely no idea what we were doing. I seriously tell people when they asked how we started the gan that we totally winged it. Maybe not totally, but there was and continues to be a lot of learning along the way.
Some other things that happened in the past few months: There was a war. As someone on facebook wrote, this country has rockets falling and life goes on as normal, but there's a threat of snow and the entire country shuts down. Of course life didn't totally go on as normal. Gila's husband was in the army all week waiting for word about whether or not the army was going into Gaza. One morning the father of one of our gan kids showed up after breakfast, gave his son a hug and kiss, and said he was going into the army. We taught the kids the prayer we say to keep soldiers safe and the prayer for the State of Israel. We also went over with them what to do if they heard a siren. The first siren sounded in Jerusalem came on a Friday after shabbat had started. One of our gan kids was home with her mother and said "I need to find a grownup!" to which her mother said "I'm a grownup!" and the kid said "Okay! Where are we going to stay safe?". It gave me an entirely new prospective on what it means to be an educator in this country. The second siren came during gan hours when all the kids (and Gila) were taking a nap. The street outside the gan was being destroyed and rebuilt so there was an incredible amount of noise. I was awake with one kid who heard the siren and said he heard an ambulance. A full thirty seconds later I realized that the siren was not one from an ambulance, and took him to another part of the gan. Residents of Jerusalem have about ninety seconds from the time the siren goes of to get to a safe place. How did people with less time (and far more frequent sirens) cope?
Like with other events like this in Israel, they quickly become the past. A ceasefire was declared. Our soldiers came home. Life returned to normal. There's just no other way to do things around here. Things still come up though where we'll think "Oh why didn't that happen?" or "weren't we supposed to go to...?" and we remember "Oh right, the war" as just another thing that happened in our lives. It's just something that happened to an entire country- a very, very small country.
In other news, hopefully in a couple weeks Gila and I will be going on a babymoon. This is something I insisted on, in anticipation of Gila becoming a mother in a few months. As the gan grows and as our ganenets' families' grow there will be all sorts of changes, and it will be good for us to take a step back and feel confident that the place will be in one piece when we get back. This essentially means that Gila and I will be sitting on comfy chairs by the pool, checking our phones constantly, and talking about how much we miss the kids in gan (you know, like all good parents do when they're on a date). And then we'll probably come back and think how ridiculous it is that we have nothing else to talk about, and that maybe when Gila's baby is born and she only wants to talk about her baby nonstop that it will be a nice change of pace (no Gila, I do not see you as the type to do that).
My niece turned 3 in November. She is fantastic. Just had to stick that in there somewhere. I could elaborate, but for now I'll stick with saying she is fantastic.
Good night from cold, rainy, and windy Jerusalem. So so so cold.
