Tikkun Olam

This coming Monday we celebrate the 'official' holiday of Columbus Day, ostensibly recognizing the great explorer who "discovered the New World."  Not only is this technically not true, as there were numerous others who came before him , also here .  But worse, Columbus may not have been the wonderful humanitarian explorer we thought he was.  In fact, if the following is true, he was a horrible human being .  The page just linked above is very compelling.  Go there. Read on (excerpted below).  And happy Columbus Day. Eric Kasum Columbus Day? True Legacy: Cruelty and Slavery Once again, it's time to celebrate Columbus Day. Yet, the stunning truth is: If Christopher Columbus were alive today, he would be put on trial for crimes against humanity. Columbus' reign of terror , as documented by noted historians, was so bloody, his legacy so unspeakably cruel , that Columbus makes a modern villain like ...

I was trying to figure out what to write about the holiday of Thanksgiving, when I decided to revisit the posts I had written on this subject in the last four years. These posts brought back memories, good ones, and terrible ones ; and changed my mood from happy, to somber. In 2007, I wrote about our family tradition of making homemade pizza on Thanksgiving day, and having a Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings (except for the green beans; we rarely made green beans, I don't know why; 'cause I love 'em) Friday night, for the first Shabbat meal. In 2008, Pakistani terrorists murdered 164 people in the Indian city of Mumbai, including torturing and murdering Rabbi Gavriel and Rebbetzin Rivka Holtzberg in Nariman House, the Chabad Jewish Center there.  Rebbetzin Holtzberg was six months pregnant. As we have not learned the lessons from this attack, and evil still exists in the world and is called by many other names but its true one, I have decided, upon this Than...

My children, wherever they now live, all had a Thanksgiving dinner together with family.  We, the parents--are the only ones in the family who had no family to have Thanksgiving dinner with, several consecutive years now. Instead, we were together with good friends for the third year in a row (which makes it a chazakah )--from now on as long as we're here, unless there are special circumstances, we will have Thanksgiving dinner with them.  Even if, say, our kids come back here for a visit at this time next year, we will all be together--family, and our friends. Our daughters in the States (Toodles and Baby K'tan and family) were together with the entire mishpocheh at Tia D.'s house, with all the Aunts and Uncles and cousins and Grandma, too. They get together every year--there's a lot of family down there, in sunny hurricane land. But what about our children living in Israel? What did they , like a lot of ex-pats, do for Thanksgiving?  Our youngest, Rambo, sear...

(nablopomo day 6) This might be my only post for today, as I've got to get ready: flying out on Thursday to see my two daughters and grandkids, in that other state. So meanwhile, enjoy some of our pics from our Fourth of July trip.

(nablopomo day 5) Funny, a day after our day trip to that mountain town to see fireworks, I am still tired.  Traveling with a bunch of people (as opposed to a group of bananas) including two inquisitive, active kids with minds of their own and a baby who needs almost constant attention--let alone the parents --is exhausting work.  And lots of FUN! But it shows me how my energy level has dropped since I was. . .thirty!  Believe it or not, the friends we went with are around that age.  You might consider it strange, but I get along with all age groups.  Another good friend of mine is 79 (as you probably surmised, my age is somewhere between those two friends'...go ahead, start guessing...).   I can't help comparing my situation when I was that age, to my friend's: when I was thirty, I had just had another child, making our number 2.  Our friends ( The Shreimels ) already have three! Do you remember what is was like to travel with kids? Multip...

(nablopomo day 4) We got home after midnight (my excuse for a late Nablopomo!) so there was no way I could post before the day was over.  We and our good friends and neighbors, the shtreimels * , went with their three kids under five to a town two and a half hours away northwest, to have a two-meal picnic and see fireworks. The kids were great, the company was wonderful, the meals were yummy, and the fireworks were nice, too--over the lake. Will write more tomorrow (bli neder), because I am too pooped to peep.  Hope you all had a happy family day on the Fourth, and remembered why America was once--and still could be--a great country. *shtreimel: a type of large, round fur hat attached to black velvet center skullcap which married men of certain Hassidic sects wear.

I have written previously about my feelings on Thanksgiving, and am linking my post from 2007 on the subject, here . This year, we are going to friends on Thanksgiving Day, and on Friday night-as per our years-long tradition-we are having another Thanksgiving/Shabbat dinner, this year at another friend, our regular 'Thanksgiving buddy' with whom we started this minhag , many snows ago. But being that I still wanted to share a post related to the holiday, and seeing that I received this interesting holiday wish by email (from my now-famous "sister-in-law's sister-in-law"), I decided to pass it on to you, my loyal readers. ( No animals were harmed in the making of this picture ). May your stuffing be tasty. May your turkey be plump. May your potatoes 'n gravy have nary a lump. May your yams be delicious. May your pies take the prize. May your Thanksgiving dinner stay off of your thighs. HAVE A BLESSED THANKSGIVING (as always, thank you so much for...