Mah Nishtanah...?

I am up close to 2:00 a.m. why? Mah nishtanah ha-lailah ha-zeh mikol ha-lelot? Because it is the eleventh hour, erev chag: the biggest, most awesome holiday in the universe: Pesach!

I have been checking and washing romaine lettuce for karpas (tons of it), boiling potatoes, checking the chicken soup, putting the tzimmes in the fridge...but of course I will give credit to hubby, without whom none of these delicious delicacies would be possible: he cooked 'em all (ok, I peeled, cored and cut the apples for the tzimmes. Really).

He also cooked the brisket yesterday, four huge trays of 'em; he made a cranberry-orange side dish; carrot, potatoe and apple tzimmes with pineapple, the aforementioned chicken soup in a huge stock pot (we're having lotsa guests the first night), and genuine shmurah matzah balls (doesn't baseball season start now?) that are our specialty for Pesach (yes, we eat gebrocht).

So I am not complaining about being up so late, although I have a dr.'s appointment early in the morning. But he is getting up even earlier to daven, have a sium bechorim, and say Birkat ha-Chamah--so who am I to complain?

I was just instant messaging with my Rambo, who is off from Officer's Training for Yom Tov. Her apartment is around the block from her brother and sister-in-law, and she had just come back from running over there to borrow a vacuum cleaner to clean her place. Isn't family wonderful? Especially when you are in close proximity. I really feel the emptiness, without family here...but we have good friends who are coming to our seder, so I am looking forward to that, too.

Our older son, Mister Arnold, called us this morning, from the Tel-Aviv area...I was telling him how stressful Peach preparations are. He said, he loves the chag! And he was the one who cleaned his apartment inside out and did the shopping (did I raise a great husband, or what?). I am so happy for his wife, whom I love.

Thank you, Ribono shel Olam, for all your blessings which you bestowed upon our family, with our children finding their bashertes, and loving Yahadut so much...

With wishes for a wonderful, meaningful, spiritual chag, I am going to bed now. Lailah tov!

Comments

Anonymous said…
Lady,
The sedar was lovely and the food delicious. Enjoy the rest of the chag. Youe DH is a wonderful cook.
The hostess with the mostes!!!
11:00 PM
Karen said…
oops, it should say your
11:00 PM
Lady-Light said…
Karen: Thanks-except for my exhaustion and muscle spasm at the end (timed very well I might add, right after we said "nirtzah!"), I enjoyed it and am glad that you and yours did, too.
Hope your Florida contingent enjoys the rest of the chag as well!
3:48 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Great Debate: Is it Itsy Bitsy, or Inky Dinky, of Spider Fame?

Image
For the better part of a year, I've had an on-again, off-again debate with my D.H. as to the "correct" adjective in the children's finger-play nursery rhyme, "The Itsy-Bitsy Spider" (now you know which one I favor). My D. H. insists that the correct descriptive is "inky dinky," whereas I demur.  I vaguely recollect from my own childhood, either hearing " itsy-bitsy spider ," or even more familiar to me, the description "eency-weency," referring to said spider's miniscule size, yet plucky persistance, and how he (she?) braved the violent rainstorm which "washed it out" after the arduous climb up the water spout, yet doggedly climbed the spout again, after the sun came out and 'dried up all the rain.' Many, if not most of our American nursery rhymes originated on the other side of the pond, in England, for obvious reasons: the American colonists were British in origin, and brought with them the culture an...
Read more

The End. Is there a Beginning...?

This is my first post back on Tikkun Olam since April 23rd, 2015. It does not feel real. Why is it that we never think we will ever have a JOLT in our lives that will change the entire life course we have been traveling? We continue on, day by day, complacent, even in the face of serious illness--believing that what we are living is the only reality; that it is immutable, that it is PHYSICAL: you can touch it, feel it, and it will continue to be there for you tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow... But it isn't. And it won't.  Because the unthinkable can, and does, happen, in time. To everybody. As it happened to me, almost a year ago, on August 10, 2015, when my DH - Dear Husband, of 46 years, died. I am living in an Alternate Universe. Because the universe in which I was living all my life until now, is gone. I still want to slap myself in the face and wake myself up. It's a dream. A terrible nightmare.  It's a horror movie with a frightening ending, but I will...
Read more

Hijab for Jewish Women?

Image
Someone used this phrase in a comment on a post about the hijab wearing Jewish women in Ramat Bet Shemesh Alef: "modern Hareidi community;" this is an oxymoron. Just for the record, I rarely agree with a Hareidi interpretation of anything. This mode of dress is just a bad interpretation of a good concept ( tzniyut ) taken to extremes. Personally, I cover my hair because I feel it increases my humility by remembering that there is a G-d above me ( not because of the reason of less attraction to men). I chose many years ago to do so; but I have come to believe a woman can be Orthodox without covering her hair all the time; just while in shul, and where it shows respect for the Torah, such as at shiurim, or where it is the preferred mode of dress, such as at yeshiva dinners and the like. But to go to the grocery? Not necessarily . I think the whole message of tzniyut is lost in those hijab cases: where will they go next? Hiding in the home and not going out? Sitting behind a cur...
Read more