Blog/July 2011/Jul 15th

Jul 15th (See this week's devar torah)

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Hi, again!

Another action-packed week in the Aaron household! Creatures great and small, guests galore and hot summer weather. What could be better?

Some of you think that since we live in a "desert" there must be a dearth of wildlife. Nothing could be farther from the truth! First of all, we don't really live in the desert itself, but that's a minor quibble. Where we do live is on the edge of the Great Rift Valley, at the juncture of three continents. As a result, we're in the migration path of millions of birds, and sometimes it seems that hundreds of thousands of them prefer our house.

Not long ago, we discovered a nesting dove -- the universal symbol of peace -- just outside our guest-room window. We forgot about it (even though it makes plenty of noise and mess), and then we discovered it was "nesting". Since I didn't want the bird nesting and making its mess and noise, I wanted to get rid of its nest. But you can't just destroy it, you have to send the mother bird away first (well, only actually if you want the eggs, or the mother, and I want neither -- but anyway ...). So I nudged the bird with a dustpan, and she just bent her upper body away without leaving her perch. Then I pushed more aggressively, trying to scare her into flight; and she rewarded my efforts with a vicious pecking attack. So I increased the pressure, and pushed hard on her -- and she responded with a Ninja Dove Wing Attack, nearly severing the dustpan from my shaking hands! Symbol of peace, my ass! Needless to say, we'll be taking up this bird's aggression with the UN.

And one evening this week I heard a shriek from my eldest as she was going upstairs. I yelled to her, "what's wrong?", and she answered that she "didn't want to say" just then. That's because the shriek-inducing event was her espying a gecko on the wall -- and she knew that Esther finds them frightening. I applaud my daughter's sense of filial duty, but we had a situation: and it fell upon my not so broad shoulders to eliminate the risk to the distaff members of the household. So off I went -- broom, dustpan and plastic bag in hand -- to make a concerted effort to rid us of The Gecko. I suppose not all of you are aware of this, but it's been scientifically proven that geckos move faster than light. Anyway, I was unsuccessful after ten minutes of frantic battle, and decided to call it a night. Then my brother-in-law came in the house, and also saw the gecko and let out a yelp of surprise. He also tried to banish it, to no avail. But in the middle of the night, he went to get a drink of water and found the gecko regarding him with a baleful glare; and trusty Sergio (my brother-in-law) finally managed to escort it out of our house. For that, he'll be awarded the Aaron House Star for bravery.

The aforementioned brother-in-law and his family have been staying with us since last week (they'll be with us until the end of next week). Esther took time off from work to "tour around" with them. So far, they've been to Tel Aviv (and the beaches there), Masada, the Israel Museum in Jerusalem... and numerous restaurants of varying qualities. Their girls (ages 5 and 8) are having a great time, and are particularly enjoying following the progress of the Pigeon of Peace.

They are enjoying the hot summer weather, since they're from the Southern Hemisphere where it's cold and wintry right now. But our summer has been relatively mild so far, only really heating up in the past week or so. Still, it's only been in the mid 30s here, not blisteringly hot (though not cool by any means). This shabbat they'll be staying near Tverya, where the weather is considerably warmer (and much more humid).

The guests have left for shabbat, leaving just the four of us. We'll force ourselves to eat: moussaka, bamia, short-rib cholent, red-lentil soup, salatim and more salatim...

Until next week,
shabbat shalom!

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