“Blahblahblahblah  blahblah blah…

for you and I to get together.”

No. You lose all credibility with that one.

So that’s the theme here that I walked into (into which I walked?):

You should know better.

That’s my feeling about Shlomo Carlebach. I was reminded of him just now by the link provided by Jewish Ideas Daily from the Forward. I am wary in general of anything written in the Forward, since it’s going to have an anti-religious outlook, but this article is so blaaaand. It’s as if the person reviewing the musical had no idea of who this guy was. And I think that’s bad reviewing.

So I will review him without seeing the musical.

Which I will not do.

I will explain. Actually, I will refer you to what I wrote back on June 28, 2009 about my distrust of celebrity, charisma, etc., including my distaste for Shlomo Carlebach. I did not state it outright, but I’ll link you to an article from Lillith Magazine  that has been used as an example of Lashon Hara, since it was written after he died and so he couldn’t defend himself against such charges.

The fact is abuse basically by definition means the weak not being able to defend him/herself. So I have no use for this argument. The undisputed fact is that he took advantage of many women, and probably much of it (now this is definitely my opinion, for what it’s worth) could be called abuse.

So how does this figure into his music?

Last Friday evening, at shul, the person leading the services was a Carlebach devoté and he milked all the Carlebach tunes for all they’re worth.

Which, of course, in my book, is not very much.

Most of his tunes are quite simplistic, which most people think means that they’re easy to follow. It happens to be not true. There’s one in particular that people mess up, not able to handle the minor vs. major key that it dips into. But still, yes, I did use some of the tunes when I taught preschool. As I said, simplistic. Fit for that.

I will also link you to a wonderful article about music and prayer by Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks that I just received and I will include but a bit here (and you should definitely read the whole thing, if you haven’t already):

There is an inner connection between music and the spirit. When language aspires to the transcendent and the soul longs to break free of the gravitational pull of the earth, it modulates into song. Music, said Arnold Bennett is “a language which the soul alone understands but which the soul can never translate.” It is, in Richter’s words “the poetry of the air.” Tolstoy called it “the shorthand of emotion.” Goethe said, “Religious worship cannot do without music. It is one of the foremost means to work upon man with an effect of marvel.” Words are the language of the mind. Music is the language of the soul.

So if music is indeed the language of the soul, then it will inform what is in that soul. And I’m saying that just like I won’t listen to Wagner’s music because I know what an anti-Semite he was, (and I don’t like Renoir because I know what kind of anti-Semite he was), I will say that Carlebach’s lack of boundaries comes out in his music and we shouldn’t use it for holy purposes. And so the Forward can review the play, but that’s just what it is.

A play.

And he played with people’s lives, and we shouldn’t make music to sing to G-d without realizing where it’s been first.

We  should know better.

No, it was T calling, telling me she’d be over in a little while. When she showed up, I was surprised. “I called and left a message.”

“Oh…sorry.”

And that’s when I explained to her how ISHI is always getting these calls. I’ve written about how he is working with so many people right now, mostly with family problems. (I can assure you that this is nothing like “women problems”, or “that time of the month”.) So many people’s lives are just a mess, basically.

Each case is obviously different, but you can and should draw conclusions from the overall atmosphere.

Oh–the title? That’s what T said.

“He’s a chick magnet.”

It’s true. It’s mostly women who call him.

I guess we could say that they’re the canaries in the mine.

Yes, actually, the one who was calling and I was not answering was a down-and out woman, not even from our community, who was looking for another handout. Rachmoniss (’tis a pity). But mostly, they’re the ones that recognize that their relationships are in trouble. Or they’re the ones that choose to do something about it. After all, women are still more defined by their relationships than men are. So a man can have a really messed-up home situation and be extremely successful in his profession. I guess women can and should, too, but I think they’re not as easy to box things out. Is that being sexist of me or just realistic? Yes I know plenty of women who are clueless or who do not tie pieces together (and sometimes that’s how they get stuck in the messes that they want/need my husband to fix/clean up for them). But for whatever combination of reasons (women are dealing more with the children, they are not as afraid to ask for help, they have a stronger sense of what marriage should be, they listen to the words of Peggy Lee’s “Is That All There Is?” and wonder what where they are and how they got there)…

Here’s a version of Bette Middler sing the song.

So kitchen dancing, anyone?

It’s panic.

Yup. I really think that’s it. Some of us are not equipped to be able to switch gears. It’s too hard. Or we’re just lazy, which is the definition of the first, really.

Or we’re terrified. We are not emotionally equipped to deal with so many variations on a daily basis. Overload, too many choices.

What brings this on, you might ask?

Another adventure at the supermarket. I really didn’t have much to get, but I had to go today, since I won’t have the car tomorrow. So I was going through pretty quickly, stopping for my items that I just don’t want to be without. Especially my tea.

I’ve mentioned how much I like my tea. My Celestial Seasonings Decaf Sweet Coconut Thai Chai Tea. I developed an unreasonable attachment to cinnamon years ago when I had a student whose mother was allergic to cinnamon, so we couldn’t have any in the classroom. I went nuts with anything with cinnamon at home–moussaka, cinnamon-laced lentil soup, pumpkin pies, custards, and Chai tea. At least 2 or 3 mugs a day.  So I started to quietly panic when I saw that the store was featuring my tea at 50% off today. That could only mean one thing, I knew.

It meant that it was being discontinued.

And there was only one box left.

ONE BOX LEFT???!!!!

Okay now a bit more panic.

Until that point, I was paying attention to how people were not paying attention at all to what they were buying–they were randomly tossing things into their carriages while

1. talking on the phone
2. texting (really? in the store? why?)
3. sweet-talking to their babies
4. yelling at their kids
5. and just not there, ya know what I mean?

Of course, I was busy looking at everyone else, so I’m not sure I was really paying attention to what I was getting, either.

But then the tea thing happened and I was certainly not paying attention to anything. Or at least I was trying not to, in order just to breathe.

Am I overstating? Well, you be the judge.

I did get the other things that I set out to get, so that was good. But I couldn’t wait to get home in order to look up if they were discontinuing my tea.

MY TEA!

Um, it’s still listed on the website.

Panic averted for now.

In fact, they suggest substituting my tea for one that has been discontinued. I want to say “no, just leave that box for me”, but I can share.

For now.

And does this have anything to do with marriage? Probably, but my heart is still getting back to a normal rhythm, so I’ll have to think about that later.

You can see one woman in the photos below going up and down the steps. Endlessly. And that was just one part of her run. Great Scott! Great Dane!

And the trees…they also reflect how the world is so diverse, also.

There is just no reason for boredom, is there?

It won’t be too long before we go away again, but still…

But here’s an interesting aside. ISHI just told me that among the strange things that have happened to him, this morning, he found a bag tied onto his shul office door. It was from someone who lives in Israel, but comes here somewhat often to visit his mother. For some strange reason, he had in his head that we love oregano from the shuk (Machane Yehuda–see more about it here). So he left a bag of oregano on the door. Thankfully, oregano has a distinct enough smell that it could not be mistaken for something else.

Oh who am I kidding? Of course it could!

I don’t know how he got it through the sniffing security dogs at the airport though.

Oh silly me! They just sniff for money!

Anyway…

Here are some photos from our trip to the Met.

The first is from our hotel room and the second one reminded me of the framing that I seem drawn to. I do love Hopper.

You’ll notice that I got caught up in that one little bowl. I was trying out different settings on the camera, including 3D. I’m not sure that comes through, though, but I did like the effects! What do you think?

I think maybe I’ll save others for another time.

Well…

Especially with everything.

Laundry list of things that the world needs to work on? Okay, sure. And I use that word laundry pointedly, since it is about airing our dirty laundry in public.

So in no particular order, here are the big things that bug me. Today.

1. the mess of how women are treated.
2. Everywhere.
3. Particularly in the magical WORLD OF MARKETING. Legos for girls, you say? Why why why?
4. Particularly in Israel in the religious world. (And I say that as an observant woman, wife of rabbi, etc.) If you want to warm up on this cold day, here’s something you can look at to make your blood boil. Yes, they apologized but horse out of the barn, etc.
5. Particularly in the media. I’m not an Obama fan by any means, but why is it that going after the First Lady is always so acceptable? Why is she /the role such a target?
6. But how certain cultures are still given a free ride. It is disheartening to say the least (and that’s what I’m going for) that we in the Western World as still so paternalistic. Here’s a very interesting blog by a woman who is trying to bring some light into the Muslim world. Good luck to her.

Well, look at that! They’re all about how women are being treated! Well fancy that!

I think that’s enough for now.

But what did I start out with, after all?

Oh, I wanted to tell you how I can recognize when I need to see things differently. For example, I had a pretty rotten experience last August at Office Max, to the point that I promised to myself that I would not go there anymore, even to the point that I threw away my rewards card. I had written about it here.  Well, I had to get something else copied last week, so I went to Staples, my new favorite place.

They could not open my document. I stood there for at least 15 minutes. They tried twice. I took my memory stick and left. Crawling back to CopyMax, I asked them to do the same thing. Sure enough, not only did it open on the first try, but there wasn’t even an issue! He printed out the first copy to make sure it met with my approval, then suggested that we lighten up the photos to make them look better, and a few minutes later, the 75 brochures were printed. Oh, and when I mentioned that I didn’t have my card with me, he looked up my phone number and found my account. And then, the piece de resistence in terms of customer relationship, he apologized that they no longer offer discounts for printing, but he would be happy to take some off, since we were indeed a non-profit organization.

Whoah!

Conclusions?

1. Office Max is not Copy Max.
2. Staples printing is not Staples.
3. I can be wrong.
4. And I can try things again and not be categorical about it.

Is this an allegory?

You tell me.

© HEMERA TECHNOLOGIES/ABLESTOCK.COM/THINKSTOCK

You’ve only known each other for 4 months?!

Can I get 100% upfront?

And then there’s truth in #13:

You can always elope!

Okay, I found something. I think it’s relevant to the discussion at hand. Apparently, the word that Picasso would have used is saltimbanque.

In 1905 Picasso abandoned the palette and subject matter of the Blue period, turning to images of fairground and circus performers, whom he depicted in a range of chalky red hues. Accordingly, this phase of his work has come to be known as the Rose period. Picasso observed these figures firsthand at the Cirque Medrano, as well as in the streets and outskirts of the city, where a migrant community of acrobats, musicians, and clowns– saltimbanques–entertained passing spectators. Such figures commonly occur in romantic and symbolist art and verse (from Daumier and Seurat to Baudelaire and Rimbaud), where the saltimbanque exists in a perpetual state of melancholy and social alienation. In the poems of Guillaume Apollinaire, one of several poets who were among the artist’s closest friends at this time, the acrobat acquires an air of mystery and enchantment that clearly corresponds to Picasso’s tone. Through paintings, watercolors, gouaches, drawings, and prints, Picasso tends to show his fairground performers at rest, often in domestic settings that are genial and warm. Yet in keeping with their relatively impoverished circumstances and the saltimbanque’s traditional role as a symbol of the neglected artist, a pervasive ennui suffuses Rose period pictures.

Got it? I do think that works for Cattelan, too. I mean, look at what he presents! But really, what interested me more is how he strung everything up and even more, how people looked at the work. Huge crowds, really looking. And I love how people dress for museums. Especially in New York. So of course, I took photos. So here are some in a gallery I think best for this.

And yes, I love the photos of the little girl the most. What did she do to deserve this?

We were very very busy mice. After the babysitting, we went into the city to a very nice hotel, Hotel Belleclaire,  that apparently is the home for El Al flight attendants. We heard more Hebrew than since we were in Israel last year. Or maybe since we were in LA last month. Even the doorman met us with “שלום! מה הענין?”, which idiomatically means “Shalom! How’s it going?”  And he was not Israeli. Anyway, it was a good launching point for us to go to the Met on Monday, MOMA on Tuesday (wait–it isn’t open today? Oh that’s why we were going to go to the Guggenheim) and the Guggenheim, lunch here and there, and some nice dinners at Noi Due and at Ozu, walking through Central Park and all over the Upper West and East Sides, getting in a little shopping, of course, and we even went out to the movies (since we couldn’t find any decent plays that didn’t have music or nudity, etc.). So a fabulous time was had by both of us.

I forgot to mention that yes, I did take a lot of photos! We were lucky, too, that the weather was manageable so that we could bundle up but still be comfortable. So I had an extra good time playing with my camera. I will hopefully post some of those photos but I wanted to start with a sorry state of affairs. Really. At one point, we passed by a courtyard that was very dramatic, but we didn’t have time to check out what it was at that time. Later on that day, (or was it the next morning?) ISHI had to pass by there coming back from shul. He stopped in the pharmacy right past there to pick something up and so he asked the sales girl what was there.

“What courtyard?”

“Two doors down–it has the same name as your pharmacy–Apthorp.”

“Never heard of it.”

“How long have you been working here?”

“Two years.”

She was certainly not only forgetting to look up, but look at all!

Well, you can be certain that we went back to look. Here’s what we saw.

And we went in to explore some more.

We asked the man at the gate (the gateman?) what they were and he told us they were condos, but we could look at the sign on the wall for more information.

It had been there since 1905! This made me very sad. New Yorkers, along with all other city dwellers, are WUI, walking under their Iphones, or Ipods, or whatever is keeping them hyper-focused on a little box.  A box.

I wanted to give out gold stars to those people who were actually either looking around them or yes, gasp, talking to the person next to them! Maybe next visit…

Here’s a little sadness to go along with my observation–

Death by iPod

POSTED ON JANUARY 18, 2012, AT 10:23 AM

47
American pedestrians killed or seriously injured by trains, cars, and buses while wearing ear buds or headphones in 2010-11

16
Number of such deaths and injuries in 2004-05

29
Percent of headphone-related accidents in which the vehicle reported sounding a siren or horn before the crash

UGH! Look what you are missing, people!