Swirling Thoughts #75 – lice, rain, & Gilligan

Required Reading
Yesh kinim b’Gan. The dreaded words – we have lice in the Gan – came home on Friday. Of course I missed them completely. They were printed at the bottom of the sheet detailing the parshat hashavuah (weekly Torah portion). I guess I got a little lazy about struggling through school flyers without nekudot since I started ulpan. Thankfully, a very not-lazy friend of mine pointed the message out to me today at which point I started compulsively checking each of my kids for lice. So far, so good.

I know I packed rain gear somewhere…
In Brooklyn we would grit our teeth over a rainy day. Here, the short bursts of water pouring from the sky, which we now call rain storms, are cause for celebration. Thursday when the skies opened up for all of 6 minutes during ulpan my teacher ran to the window with her arms up and called out – “What beracha (blessing) – we should make a shehechyanu!” (a blessing for special firsts). So Friday at 12:45 – exactly the minute I needed to pick up Rosie from Gan – the skies opened up again. And since her Gan pickup could not wait the necessary 6-8 minutes until the rain stopped, I had to run out.

One rainy day when I was early for a doctor’s appointment in Central Park South I took 2 kids into Barney’s New York and made a single purchase. A big black umbrella. One I envisioned I would use to help the kids in and out of carpool on rainy days. I actually opened it in the store and made the kids stand under it with me to be sure we fit comfortably. Bob laughed and laughed when I brought it home – I’ve never NOT lost an umbrella. We calculated that if I could keep it for 5 years, the price would be the same as if I’d just continued my practice of buying and losing cheap umbrellas. It’s been 3 years and the umbrella is still with me. Somewhere. In a box. In my attic. And so under the cover of Rosie’s Dora umbrella which, by chance, was unpacked early on, I ran to the Gan, scooped up Rosie and ran back home. Just before the rain stopped.

I’m coming, Little Buddy!
When I was little, if I had to stay home sick (a rare occurrence), my mom would plug a tiny black and white TV in my room and let me watch from bed. I was so thrilled at the novelty of watching TV in my room (in my bed!) that I didn’t care that the TV was small or that it was black and white. Fast forward to Israel. My kids watch videos once or twice a week on our super screen but otherwise, nothing. We didn’t sign up for TV. We got through season one of the Brady Bunch (which they loved) and now we started on season one of Gilligan’s Island. From 1964. In black and white. The truth – the black and white was annoying to me! I didn’t realize how spoiled I’d become for Technicolor. But aside from a few murmurs of protest from Becky, the kids didn’t seem to mind at all. They are savoring every black and white episode. It will only be a short matter of time before they are assigning each other characters (you’re Gilligan, I’m Ginger! Aba is the professor.) – like they did with the Brady Bunch (I’m Marsha! You’re Bobby! Rosie is Cindy! Mommy is Alice!).

There are words more dreaded than 'yesh kinim'...
At 5:30 in the morning: "Mommy! My (cough, cough) stomach is (cough, cough) killing me!!!" You know what comes next. Let's see how getting sick on Yom Rishon compares to getting sick midweek...So far we are waiting until the doctor comes in at 4:30pm. Benatayim, at least there's Gilligan on the big screen.