For the uninitiated, mahjong’s goal is to achieve a prescribed combination of tiles using your best decisive powers to determine which tiles to keep and which to discard.  It is a game of tough choices and, more than anything else, it is a game of rules.  Pairs are subject to one set of regulations, consecutive tiles another.  Dealing is done with the solemnity and precision of a papal succession.  I pity the novice who doesn’t deal in an Easterly direction using only one hand, and Lord have mercy on the gal who touches another player’s Joker without permission.  [I learned the hard way.]

Such a regimented game might be a turn-off to some, but I couldn’t love it more.  For those like me who struggle with the easiest decisions -- sparkling or flat, aisle or window, Pitt or Cooper -- I live for the environment where ritual rules the day, the stakes are low, and questions are not encouraged. Why only one hand when dealing? Shut up, Alice. 

It’s mahjong’s way or the highway and if you think I’m kidding, I invite you to play with Lorraine from Cedarhurst, a leather handbag of a human being who will bite your hand to the bone if you try and call for a tile she’s already racked.  Lorraine is my sun, my moon, and my star.

Unlike Lorraine, I am someone who doesn’t have the fortitude to ask people to remove their shoes off before coming into my home.  Even when I feel my throat closing, I can’t bear tell a friend she’s wearing too much perfume. I suffer in silence when people double dip, and I breezily laugh off your lateness without ever revealing the terrible things I wished upon you while I waited.

But the ritual of mahjong allows me to unleash my most direct self. I am fueled by the stern construct of the game to say the things I could never say in the outside world:  Move it along, Betsy.  Too late, Lisa.  Your hand is dead, Denise.  While in real-life I am spinning about every life choice, and cower from every confrontation, mahjong is all tile, zero tribulation. 

It is true story that I picked my wedding cake by randomly opening up to a page in the very thick catalog at Katherine’s Bakery because I could simply not make one more wedding-related decision.  I picked the first cake on the page I opened to because that was easiest, even if it was a carrot cake swathed in orange satin ribbon. I just didn’t have the wherewithal to contemplate other ribbons or frostings or other cakes.  That feeling of being overwhelmed by too many choices is ever-present these days.  Give me prix fixe menus, work uniforms, thematic dress codes and assigned seats.

Or just give me mahjong.  I love the game, not just for its respite from reality, and limited choices, but for the comraderie. It’s more than women vying for a win; it’s women vying for one another. [Except, Lorraine.] I’m delighted to spend time in a world where I can revel in the tiny thrill of choosing correctly, among choices that are pre-ordained, without ever the risk of being wrong or making anyone hurt or sad. Because that’s a win. Or, as we say at the table, Mahjong. 

Aunt Ruth’s routine was to pat the sofa spaces next to her prodigious behind so that we should sit beside her as she and my grandparents chatted.  Slyly, we’d side-eye the frightful sight of Ruth’s legs, a veritable New York City subway map of varicose veins.  Her arms, tanned beyond human recognition, looked as if the skin might just slide right off, like the casing of a hard salami. 

While swigging her Scotch neat and chain-smoking her Benson & Hedges, Ruth regaled us with her health woes: diabetes, chronic bronchitis, and night blindness…to name just a few.

To us, then and now, Ruth was an aged woman as old as we could possibly imagine someone being.  Someone whose health issues, looks and concerns seemed as remote and faraway as whatever Club Med held our parents.

Ruth was 60.  The age I have just turned.  Big sigh.  I don’t know how this happened.

I know what you’re going to say: Ruth was from a generation that touted the health benefits of smoking and midday cocktails. In her era, calisthenics were more of a dance craze than a lifestyle. Well, to quote Bread, it don’t matter to me.  And if you don’t know Bread, that’s because you’re not 60. 

I can’t be sixty. I won’t be sixty.  It’s not possible.  In my head, I feel 24.  I can still clearly see that 24-year-old me, running though New York City streets in the rain, tee shirt soaked through, unfazed by wet hair and soggy shoes.  Not just undaunted: energized.  It would be decades before I’d consider that rain runoff from Manhattan rooftops was a toxic stew of pigeon poop, scaffolding rust and sewage but back then it was only exhilarating.  The tee shirt was white and see-through and that braless 24 year-old girl didn’t care because her breasts were still high and tight. It felt good be ogled by passers-by pedestrian enough to own umbrellas and bras.  Their judgment fueled me, assured me I was living my life differently, more wildly, with maximum joy, little responsibility and zero worry.

These days I fight against worrying all the time about everything.  Carefree is now only a gum I once chewed, before I got TMJ.  And those breasts? Well, that’s a very sad story for another day. Now the only ogling I get is from my very serious dermatologist, who studiously presses a magnifier to all my brown spots during my annual exam, looking for danger signs. The sunburn from my Capetown, South African foray up Table Mountain with a man I met a day before and pledged to move in with two days later?  Scars from accidents of carelessness, tempting fate, from just not considering/worrying/overanalyzing?   I think of these scars and marks as badges of honor.  A jumping off point to tell a story of a great adventure.  But my very serious dermatologist cares nothing for any of my stories.  Risk has no cachet in her business.  My skin tells her a much more sobering story.  A story of a 60-year-old impudent, careless woman.  Worse, a woman with a family history of moles. 

To her, I am Aunt Ruth.  My skin belies years of living hard and large, who dared not to care about SPF or hats, who survived a life without seat belts, bike helmets, or fentanyl testing strips.  Who played on railroad tracks with my parents’ approval, drank vats of red dye #2, ate Twinkies and a steady diet of never-perishable foods, and tanned using a mirrored reflector doused head to toe in baby oil.   I tell my dermatologist none of this. I don’t think she is the audience for my exploits.  After her exhaustive inspection of me, my very serious doctor delivers her prognosis with a single line: “Nothing remarkable.”

Well, doc, I beg to differ: I am remarkable. Even at this age and despite the skin I’m in. I’ve long given up the baby oil but still hanging on to the bikini.  I’m going to continue to say yes to dancing on tables, to too many dirty martinis, dangerously high heels, and that occasional Marlboro Light.  Though I am older than many Supreme Court Justices, and the door has likely closed on my opportunity to medal in Olympic ice dancing, I am not succumbing to this number. 

So if you see me running in the rain, just let me.  I’ll try and be careful but I don’t want to be fearful.  Turns out, you miss out on a lot of candy that way.

“Honey, I watched the rest of The Bear without you.”

I should have known watching together was going to be problematic based on how ridiculously hard it was to find a show we both could agree upon.  The intersection of our content preferences: cowboys, zombies and aliens (him); rom-coms, period dramas and anything Munchausen-by-proxy syndrome (me), is scant at best.  Glaciers formed and melted in the time it took to scroll through and pick something.  But finally, we settled on The Bear, a show about a chef from a dysfunctional family working in a dysfunctional restaurant. [Here’s hoping Munchausen’s might be on the back burner!]

It started off well enough.  After consuming a few episodes, we fell into a routine.  We got comfortable in bed, lowered the lights, and pressed play.  But I should have sensed something was amiss when husband, confused, asked who the character of the Bear’s brother was. Troubling, given that the brother is central to the entire plot and key to understanding the back stories of most of the cast. Still, we kept on, while I side-eyed my betrothed to see if those fluttering eyes were closing. I’m sorry to report that they were. He was out like a light, clearly, not for the first time.

Sigh.  I was so sorry to watch him miss our program that I kept watching.  He works so hard all day and all week and has such little time for relaxing entertainment.   This was his time. Our time together.  Too bad he blew it.  I don’t know if it was Sartre or Nietzsche who said it first but I believe the phrase is “Snooze you lose.”  I avowed to carry on solo, feigning ignorance to his slumber.

But then, something happened.  Like a bolt of lightning, my darling startled back to waking, loosening his death-grip on the remote - as dictated by the patriarchy - and with a choking rattle, awoke!  Coming to, he seemed aware of missing quite a bit and then (again) STARTED ASKING QUESTIONS.  Plot questions.  Character questions.  Timeframe questions.  Questions, questions, questions. QUESTIONS???!!!!  Bitch, please.  I’m watching over here.

“Is that the brother? Who is that again?” he asked.

“No one,” said I.

“No one?  Are you sure? I kind of feel like…”

“SSSHHHH!!!!!!

Alas, the next night, we started that episode over.  I know you must be enraged on my behalf - thank you - and wondering why I’d agree to a rewatch and the only answer is that I am an angel from heaven. And also because I had already watched Episodes 4 and 5 solo.  I kept up the charade with him for several nights.  We watched Episode Three six times. He never stayed awake once.  That is why, dear reader, I am not ashamed to say that I watched the remainder of the season while my husband was out providing for our family, in a single solitary, glorious afternoon. 

Don’t judge.  I love my husband so much and he’s a good man in every way.  Well, maybe he shouldn’t open things with his teeth the way he does …but mostly, he’s such a fine person.  But if you are working so hard that you can’t stay awake for The Bear, I feel it unfair to hold others back, one might even say hold them hostage, stuck in the endless purgatory of Episode Three. I seem to be able to stay awake for The Bear.  To be fair, that is likely because I am on a work sabbatical and have much more free time than my husband.  And it is also fair to say that my sabbatical has been 21 years-long and so I really have nothing to do, any time, ever.  Whatever, whatever.  I still need to lead an entertaining life and I deserve to know what happens in Episodes 4 and beyond. 

And so that’s what I did.  I sopped up every morsel of The Bear by myself, a solo and satisfying enterprise.  It felt illicit and sneaky, like watching porn, or how I can only imagine it must feel like to watch porn.  Because I don’t watch porn.  Like ever.  I mean, check my history and you will see it is cleared.  I mean clean, not cleared!  I don’t even know about clearing a history…is that even a thing? I meant clean.  Clean as those industrial restaurant surfaces that the chef in The Bear cleans with hot soapy water, metaphorically washing away one day’s drama and preparing for the next.  

I wish my husband had seen that part. 

Did you know that Maria Shriver was raised by her parents to stand up every time one of them entered the room?  Boy, I love that and so regret never thinking of it but frankly it took everything out of me just to stop the public fart contests.  Now I’d settle for you to stop texting while speaking to me.  Let’s make eye contact when you hand me that gift you bought.  I hope it’s heavy and made of gold.  As a mother who may have been the beneficiary of some less-than-stellar Mother’s Day presents, let me spell it out. There should be no bought-on-the-way home-from-the-gym bodega daisies, no Walgreens candy, and definitely not just a card. The phrase “It’s the thought that counts” was coined by a mom who cried into her pillow after receiving scented soaps.

When I undress and see my C-section scars, I am not awash in the glory of having brought forth life, but rather firm in the thought that “I deserve a Chanel bag.” Hear this, fam: If you buy me a robe and slippers again, I suggest you emancipate.  Potpourri signals you wish me dead.  Gardening sets are for trad wives, aprons are for Laura Ingalls Wilder, cooking accessories are for someone else and mugs with the word “Mom?” Fuck the fuck off. 

You see, kids, you were not easy.  And you, my betrothed, didn’t help.  So I need you all to stand up for me, if not like Maria Shriver, then for these six hours.  Make a speech, gift-wrap that Chanel and write me an ode.  Celebrate the shit out of me.  Make me forget the prim and horrified headmistress who called me to her office to read aloud the Urban Dictionary definition of a blowjob sent to the entire school by my child. You don’t know the depths of shame until you are forced to listen to a prim woman in St. John’s knits and a brooch say the word “cum,” over and over and over.

Let’s forget that one of you wanted your bar mitzvah to be dedicated to the Dos Equis guy or that one of you locked a babysitter outside in our backyard for three hours.  In the winter, without a coat or shoes.  Forget all coaches and tutors and nannies and carpools and crises.  Forget my pregnancy weight gain, the sleepless years and the constant and still ever-present worry.  And while I certainly didn’t do all the things mothers do for their children because I expected to be rewarded somehow…oh wait a second…I actually did expect to be rewarded somehow.  And not with scented soaps.  So get it together fam.  Those six hours are fast approaching.

Three hostages, young women named Romi, Emily and Doron were freed from their 15-months-long captivity in Gaza.  Like the rest of the world, I held my breath until they were back on Israeli soil. As I write this, they have just been reunited with their mothers.  Perhaps you need to know nothing more than that.

How these women survived more than a year of mental, physical, and likely sexual torture defies explanation but survive they did, and now, on day 471, they are home.  Or better put, as the IDF says when hostages are returned, “The diamonds are in our hands.”

No matter your politics or opinion of this deal, whatever you might find wrong about it – and there’s plenty — I urge you to support it. Thousands of vicious terrorists released for so few innocents?  Yes.  The calculus is cruel and uneven but still the answer must be yes.  Because despite the cost — and the cost is high — all the hostages must come home. 

The psyche of Israel was shredded by the hubris of the leadership that allowed this nightmare to happen in the first place – a sentiment expressed by many, including some of Israel’s top generals.  The Hamas terrorists who planned and executed this attack, while beaten down, are not beaten, and will continue their hateful murderous ideology for generations to come. The prisoners being released will surely join their ranks.  There will be no détente, no peace, no mutual understanding.  There will be no reckoning, no kumbaya, no solution.  I wish it was otherwise, but that’s the hard truth.

In the aftermath of October 7 – otherwise known as October 8 — the world pointed fingers at the wrong aggressors and anti-Semitism breached long-shaky levees, letting floodgates of hate flow unchecked, exposing many fronts to be fought.  But returning stolen Israelis to their homeland must be the priority. Until what was taken is restored, Israel cannot move on. Like a jigsaw puzzle with missing pieces, Israel is incomplete without all its parts.

I urge those misguided college crusaders to look at these three women. Not much older than you, they were dancing or sleeping when they were attacked, two of them shot, all thrown into terrorists’ cars and forcibly taken into dark tunnels where they were likely raped and starved and worse for 15 months.  Do these women seem like colonizers?  Are they your vision of oppressors? Look at them.  If you’re honest, you will see that they are not.  

Romi called her mother when she ran from the Nova festival, staying on with her for assurance while the terrorists argued who would get to kidnap her and while her friends around her died from their wounds. Romi’s 87-year-old grandmother recently knocked on the doors of Cabinet members to plead for Romi to be freed. Emily was abducted from her home where she was ultimately blindfolded and forced into a car…but not before she watched the terrorists shoot her dog in the neck. Doron was on the phone with her parents while she was taken from the same kibbutz as Emily. Her last words were “They have me.”

I have two children near Emily, Romi and Doron’s ages.  I like to kiss the neck of one and take in his scent.  My habit with the other is to tuck his hair behind his ear and watch his slow smile as I keep my hand on his head longer than I need to.  Today I am reminded what a privilege those small gestures are. One can only pray that the mothers of the three are doing just that, holding their daughters, rubbing their heads, touching their cheeks, telling them that they will never again be separated.  Equally important is to acknowledge the mothers who will never again know the privilege of touching their child’s cheek.  I think of Rachel Goldberg Polin and all the mothers who have lost their children, or whose children will not come home alive, and mourn with them, well aware of the complexity of a day like today.

Today was a good day in an ocean of very bad days. I wish Doron, Emily and Romi healing.  I hope the national joy felt by their return unifies Israel.  And I pray that in days ahead that we have many more diamonds in hand. We need them all.

At first, the abuse was limited to name-calling—“big nose,” “k*ke.” Then, a game: Throw a penny in a bush and make us fetch it. I could retrieve the penny, but not without muddying my knees. When it escalated to hair-pulling, my parents started waiting with us at the bus stop.

But they couldn't always protect us. One night, my sister and I were home with a babysitter when we heard a commotion upstairs. Some of the older brothers of the Sacred Heart kids had broken in. They painted swastikas on our walls and threw our furniture down the stairs while we hid in a dark closet, nightgowns wrapped tightly around our knees.

The babysitter dragged the phone to the closet and called her father, who came quickly, as did the police. The perpetrators’ parents made excuses—“Boys will be boys”—and my father sold our house at a loss. We moved away and tried to forget. In a birthday video I made for my mom decades later, I included a single image of that time. I captioned the photo: “We Don’t Talk About Mary Street.”

I don’t know if it was because of the antisemitic harassment or not, but my family was almost completely non-observant. No bat mitzvahs, no synagogue—not even on High Holy Days. We celebrated Passover with Maxwell House Haggadahs, my mother breaking out the Dustbuster if crumbs of matzah fell on the table. We ate kugel on Rosh Hashanah and got presents on Chanukah, and that was the extent of our Jewishness.

After graduating from college, I moved to Manhattan, where cultural Judaism was omnipresent. Even my Dominican super used Yiddish phrases: “5B left their farkakte tub running.” It finally felt safe to be Jewish, and I began to crave a more observant lifestyle. At a St. Patrick’s Day party in Chelsea in 1995, I met a handsome Jewish man even more detached from tradition than I was. Something made me ask him, that very night, if he would be willing to marry in a Jewish ceremony and raise our children Jewish. Too fast? Yes. Too forward? Maybe. But I didn’t want to waste time with someone who didn’t want a Jewish family. 28 years and two Jewish sons later, I’m glad I asked.

We observed the holidays, joined a shul and sent our children to Hebrew school. But we rarely celebrated Shabbat and, over the years, our synagogue attendance dwindled. Our Judaism was merely an accessory: something we knew we had but didn’t bother reaching for, like a box of photos on a high shelf.

And then October 7 happened.

Like anyone who saw footage of the attacks, I was heartbroken. But one day later, when the world turned on Israel with a vile torrent of antisemitism, I was enraged. October 7 awakened a beast inside of me. That little girl cowering in her nightgown had grown up into an activated Zionist. I vowed to never again make myself small.

To that end, I knew I had to go to Israel. I traveled with six equally anguished girlfriends. We moved from dawn to dark, learning, seeing, listening, crying, but mostly admiring. We could not help but be in awe of the strength of the Israelis: their grace, their humanity, their incredible optimism. Men who had lost their legs in battle spoke of how grateful they were to be alive. Women who had survived the Nova massacre adopted the motto, “We will dance again.” I vowed to adopt a more “Israeli” outlook when I returned to New York.

Being Jewish today is like going through puberty: hearts are broken; emotions are at an all-time high. You can’t stop talking about how terrible it is. And yet, from that morass we emerge wiser, more mature: able to face challenges of greater consequence. I will survive the growing pains—and stand beside my Jewish brethren, my Israeli compatriots, to say, proudly and loudly, “Am Yisrael Chai.”

Hello?

Hi Mom.

Hi, sonny boy.  What’s up?

I’m calling to see if we’re doing anything for Thanksgiving this year. I was thinking of flying to Switzerland with a friend.

What??? Of course we’re doing something for Thanksgiving this year!  We’re hosting Thanksgiving as we have every single year of your life.  Why in the world would you go to Switzerland?

My girlfriend asked me to go.

Girlfriend?  Since when do you have a girlfriend?

Since a few weeks ago. We met at a Trump victory party.

Silence.

Mom?

Yes, I’m here.  You will remember not to bring up politics at the Thanksgiving table, right?  Your sisters and brother will be very upset.

So you’re saying I have to come to Thanksgiving?

You don’t HAVE to.  You’re 20 years old and can do what you want. But it would be sad not to have our whole family at the table because you went to Switzerland with someone we’ve never even heard about.

So if I come, can I bring my girlfriend?

Silence.

Mom?

Yes, I’m just thinking. Umm, sure, I guess… will she understand that we are NOT discussing politics at the table?  Can she be, well, Switzerland?

Of course.  I mean it’s not like she’s immediately whipping out her tattoos at the dinner table.

Silence

Mom?

Tattoos?  Would I be offended by her tattoos?

Do you really want to know?

Perhaps it’s better that I not.

Agreed.  I’ll tell her to wear a turtleneck.

To cover her arms?

And her neck.  The neck tat was supposed to be Tucker Carlson but it got messed up so now it’s just a tunafish sandwich.  And Mom, please, can we have something other than turkey?  We all hate turkey.  And Malgorzata won’t eat turkey.

Malgo…?

My girlfriend. Malgorzata. She’s Polish-Swiss and she hates turkey.  Can we have kielbasa?

The answer is no.  We are having turkey.  That’s what you eat on Thanksgiving. Polish-Swiss…say that three times fast. Ha!

Mom, you’re so weird.  And, ugh I hate turkey.  We all hate turkey.  What about Korean beef?

We are not having Korean beef for Thanksgiving. 

So you’re sticking with turkey even though the only people who eat it are you and Dad?  Does that seem reasonable?  We need to shake things up.  Make Thanksgiving great again.

Stop.  We are having turkey.  So please, dial it back and tell your friend to do the same.  No politics at the table.  I just want peace.

That’s what my girlfriend says. All she wants is peace. And another neck tattoo.

Silence.

Mom?

Yes, I was just…oh wait, your brother is calling on the other line.  Hold on.

Hi sweetie.  I’m on with your little brother.

Yeah, that’s who I’m calling about.  Did you know he’s going to Switzerland for Thanksgiving?  With this girl he introduced me to who instantly showed me tattoos you wouldn’t believe…

Stop.  I don’t want to know.  He’s not going to Switzerland.  He’s coming to Thanksgiving.  With the girlfriend.  Who happens to be Polish-Swiss.  Say that three times, ha!

Mom, you’re so weird.  And I wanted to tell you that I’m bringing our emotional support dog.

Since when do you have an emotional support dog?

Since my roommate working on the Harris campaign checked himself into a facility after the election and left us his emotional support dog.  Poor guy.  He’s obviously devastated and he keeps vomiting.

Your roommate?

No, the dog! His owner just went AWOL.  Before he left he just sat on the couch repeating, “All seven swing states?”  So I have to bring his dog to Thanksgiving.

Honey, a vomiting dog is not something I can deal with at Thanksgiving.  And your brother is still on hold so let’s discuss this later…but maybe there’s a crate you can put him in.

Not sure they make crates for Great Danes but okay talk later.

Dial tone.

Sorry for keeping you on hold. Are you still there?

Yes, what’s up?

Your brother says hi.

Did he bring up the Korean beef?  Are you cool with that?

For the last time, we are having turkey for Thanksgiving.  Bring your friend. Avoid politics at the table.  Don’t aggravate the emotional support dog and let’s just be grateful that we are all together.  Okay?

Okay.  Love you.

Love you, too. Polish-Swiss, Polish-Swiss…it’s so impossibly fun to say.

Mom, PLEASE!.  Not at the table.

I know, I know. Not at the table. 

Responsibility for the deaths of innocent Palestinians was placed on Israel, not the Hamas terrorists who strategically stashed their weaponry in civilian apartment buildings, kindergartens and hospitals. The world cried foul…for the Palestinians.  Divesting from Israel, boycotting Israel, charging Israel with crimes, and blocking Israelis from various borders - I see you, Maldives – compounded the devastation of people who had not experienced such savagery since the Holocaust, which, by the way, actually happened.  Mass slaughter on a quiet peaceful Saturday morning was shocking; the rampant condemnation of Israel for its defense, stunning.

Never mind the grotesque sexual violence, the barbaric murders of people whose only crime was dancing or sleeping, and the taking of innocent hostages kept in dark airless tunnels for months, many starved, beaten, and murdered.  No, that barbarism was a mere backdrop; from the reporting in the The New York Times (the paper that recently printed an obituary for Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah that read like a love note) to the campuses of some of our best institutions where keffiyeh-wearing students took up the mantle of Hamas, chanting “From the River to the Sea,” not knowing which river or sea or the murderous meaning behind the phrase.  Ignorantly, naively, they lent their youthful enthusiasm to a movement as old as time: Jew hate.

This odious lot tore down hostage posters, threw rocks at Jewish businesses, painted ugly messages of hate from the comfort of their quads, terrorized fellow classmates and gave themselves the privilege to be reflexively Marxist, seeing only an oppressed/oppressor model and thereby relieving themselves from the mind-bending exercise known as critical thinking. Like lemmings, they co-signed anything the Hamas propaganda machine put out.  So vast was their ignorance that signs like “Queers for Palestine” were carried without irony. Keffiyehs became the hottest garment on campus, replacing caps and tassels as graduations were cancelled due to threats of violence.  Marches featured signage like “Hitler was Right.” 

Another keffiyeh-wearing group got on a crowded New York subway train one night and asked if there were any Zionists on board, threatening that they should get off before violence ensued. I torture myself by asking what I would have done if I was on that train: Stand up and say I’m a Zionist?  Or cower in fear?  I want to believe the former; I’m ashamed that I even consider the latter. 

In the year since October 7, I, like many others, have found myself transformed by the events of that harrowing day.  Having experienced my own anti-Semitism as an 11-year-old – a home invasion while my parents were out, destroying our belongings, and painting swastikas on our walls while my sister and I huddled in our nightgowns with our babysitter in a downstairs closet without a lock - October 7 reawakened my trauma. Though instead of huddling and hoping it would go away, I chose to use it as fuel, fuel to do anything and everything I could to help Israel, the hostages, and the families.

To that end, I have followed the lead of the Israelis: fighting back against anti-Semitism, marching, signing petitions, and lobbying politicians. Friends and I hung hostage posters, saw them ripped down, and hung them again. I traveled to Israel with like-minded friends, met with recent amputees at Sheba hospital, visited an IDF base teeming with patriotic young soldiers. We met with tank commanders, generals, intelligence officers, hostages who had been released, and family members of those who had not.  We cried alongside mother warriors like Rachel Goldstein-Polin and Shelly Shemtov, with survivors of Nova, survivors of the attack at Sderot, leaders of the Hostage Family Forum, United Hatzalah, and a myriad of Israel-supporting organizations.  It is notable that every Israeli we met, even the soldiers whose limbs had been torn off their bodies by enemy fire, expressed concern for the innocent Palestinians caught up in this terrible war.  Every single one.  I aspire to reach that level of grace.

I ask myself what those efforts, and the efforts of so many American Jews and allies, accomplished. Well, reader, here I’d like to be optimistic.  But truthfully, much of my optimism died when Hersh Goldberg-Polin was murdered with six other hostages on the cusp of an all-but negotiated hostage release that would have seen Hersh return to his family. And to be frank, my optimism was hanging by a thread after viewing the Hamas Go-Pro video footage of their murderous rampage.  It wasn’t just the epic violence, though the ferocity of the attacks did indeed jolt my faith in humanity.  But more so, it was the jubilance of the Hamas terrorists.  The sheer JOY.  By now we’ve all seen footage of Hamas calling home – taping themselves- to report to mom that they slaughtered 10 Jews.  I saw a terrorist creeping around a home with a baby stroller on the porch, raise his gun, and shoot an old dog in the face.  I watched another help himself to food in a home where two little boys are weeping having seen their father shot by that monster.  I saw things I can’t unsee and yet know my horror does not even begin to approach the horror of those who lived through that day and the aftermath.  The 365 days of aftermath.  And still counting.

There has been so much death and destruction.  101 hostages are still held.  Many are presumed dead, much like talks of negotiation and their release.  The war rages on, now on multiple fronts, with direct attacks from Iran, and Jew hate continues to metastasize like a cancer, for which the world has no cure. 

Today, on this grim anniversary, while there are many reasons to despair, instead, access hope.  It won’t be easy.  But in the words of Rachel Goldberg-Polin, hope is mandatory.  Be buoyed by the mastery and badassery of the Mossad and the IDF who are taking down one terrorist after another.  Be proud of the Israeli people who continue to fight against jihadism and hatred, who value peace and the right to a homeland… not just theirs, but our own.  Be open to the promise of a better year, of resiliency, of resolution, of the promise of a better world.  Please. You must. There are 101 reasons.

Why was I so certain?  Because I met Rachel Goldberg-Polin, the indefatigable mother of Hersh.  If you met her, you’d feel the same.  With six of my friends, I sat in a Jerusalem conference room and listened to this small woman subsumed by titanic fear, detail the herculean actions she and her husband, Jon, had undertaken to bring home their only son.  That included meeting with us.  We were mothers of sons close to Hersh’s age, not power brokers, or intelligence officers. But because we had traveled to Israel to try and help, Rachel was willing to meet.  It was day 152. Rachel was weary but spoke at length of her efforts, including her plan to attend her daughter Leebie’s play that week, which meant declining an invite from President Biden to the State of the Union address.  But Rachel wanted to be there for Leebie. During our meeting, she was, at times lighthearted - we even shared some laughs - and we poured out our hearts and our eyes telling her of our commitment to her, Hersh, and the other hostages.  I told her that if Hersh shared one iota of his mother’s strength and determination, he would soon be back in her arms.  Later, as our meeting concluded and I hugged her goodbye, she whispered, “Maybe he’ll be home in time for Leebie’s play?”

How was she able to be so hopeful I do not know, but I know that she gave me and my friends hope.  That day in Jerusalem, I left convinced Hersh was alive. I became a proselytizer of Hersh’s and the other hostages’ survival. There were many people who sought to assuage me of this idea by telling me not to fool myself because, “The hostages are all dead.”  To these naysayers, I would politely say, “I choose to believe otherwise,” and countered with stories Rachel had shared: Knowing Hersh’s arm was blown off below the elbow, Rachel sought out veterinarians – the only doctors attending to hostages - to see if a below the elbow human amputation was something they would be able to do.  It was…a sure sign of hope.  Similarly, there had never been news about Hersh from the IDF, another sign of hope. Rachel and Jon adopted  the phrase, hope is mandatory, and it became gospel.  And then, the miraculous proof of life video featuring a gaunt, fearful Hersh, yes, but an alive Hersh, perhaps the best sign of hope one could ask for.  And though more grueling months passed, Rachel and Jon appeared like beacons, basking audiences in the light of their optimism. Just recently, they spoke at the Democratic National Convention, their desperation palpable, their certainty edifying, their son, America’s son. 

Only a short time ago, Rachel and Jon and other hostage families went to Israel’s South to scream their loved one’s name through a powerful microphone, in hopes their voices would carry across the border.  Rachel’s cry was guttural, primitive.  With all the top diplomats in the US and Israel working (unsuccessfully) on a hostage release, the families had taken to screaming their children’s names, hoping against hope that their voices would be heard.  And maybe they were.  Because they were still alive then.

Hersh and five others were murdered days later.  I still believe I wasn’t foolish to hope….just foolish to underestimate the toll that the absence of hope takes on the soul.  It is an ache in a place that can’t be reached.  A hollowed out cavity, now replaced by a powerful fury and a paralyzing sadness.

As I write this, I am in a state of disbelief.  Though I have just planted a bush to honor Hersh’s life and watched his funeral, I find myself locked in this vortex of magical thinking.  What if.  What if the IDF had reached them earlier?  What if they had been able to break free?  And the biggest what if: What if Netanyahu had put his own political interests aside and instead focused on his own people?  What if, what if, what if.  The thoughts flutter around my brain like a plastic bag in the wind. If I still have the impulse to speak to him, one can only imagine the disbelief of the Goldberg-Polin family, and the agony of letting Hersh go.

If there is any solace to be taken, it was in Rachel’s own cry during her eulogy that Hersh, you are finally, finally, finally free.  Goodbye, sweet boy.  I’m sorry we won’t ever get a chance to meet.  But you live on in my thoughts.  And I planted a bush, deep in the earth of my yard, watered by 1,000 tears, to ensure your memory takes root and grows. Because in the face of unspeakable darkness, a plant will find the light. Even when those left behind cannot.

To the Goldberg-Polins, the Yerushalmis, the Daninos, the Lobanovs, the Gats, and the Sarusis, may all their memories be blessings.

Our friend - I’ll call him Bobby - refuses to take the Covid vaccine but insisted on coming to our house for a dinner party despite our strong hints that he skip it.  I even sent Bobby a note, specifically telling him not to come, but he said he couldn’t read it…something about having a worm in his brain that hampers all cognitive function.  So he just showed up, without a gift I might add, ate dinner, and then rudely pushed back his chair announcing his departure, saying he needed to attend to a rotting baby bear in his car trunk.  He left, but not before French-kissing my caterer, an act he ascribed to feeling rambunctious, and we haven’t heard from him since.  Until now. He just asked us to contribute to his Presidential campaign. As if!! Abby, must we support a man who would have us believe he has brain-eating worms, who defends unwanted sexual aggression, has a fondness for roadkill bear meat, and now has the delusion that he should be the next President of the United States?

Signed, HaveYouSeenMyBicycle

Dear HaveYouSeenMyBicycle,

Sounds like Bobby has a lot of delusions. Plus bear carcass maggots in his trunk.  That’s a bad combination. My suggestion, stay clear. And definitely do not vote for him.

Signed, Abby

Dear Abby,

I am “Bobby” and I must respond to my friend’s letter to you to clarify what happened.   I care about animals which is why I scooped up a dead baby bear from a highway, posed for photos with it, and then drove it to Manhattan where everyone knows that dead baby bears are kind of a thing. My original plan, Abby, was not to dump the bear, but to skin it and store its meat in my refrigerator, next to the special foil hats that I have my famous wife make for me now that I’ve ended her acting career, but I had to dash to that dinner party, limiting my skinning and disemboweling time. We’ve all been there, right? Plus, I may have forgotten to mention that I have a worm that’s been eating my brain for the last decade, so my executive functioning skills are crap. I took great care with the little guy — I called him Joe, after one of my 10 siblings who no longer speak to me — and dumped him in Central Park, staging it to look like an everyday, New York City bear-versus-bicycle accident - even going as far as leaving a smashed-up bicycle next to the bear to finesse the scenario. I was pretty proud of that detail, although not so proud that I fessed up when all of New York City went ape sh*t thinking that baby bears were carousing in Central Park.  I was just waiting for the hubbub to die down, restraint being something I am working on with my life coach, Roseanne Barr. Thank you for hearing me out Abby and I hope I have your vote when I run for President of Uruguay.

Signed, RFK

PS United States, not Uruguay. Ugh, that darned worm!

Dear RFK,

Big Cheryl Hines fan!  Is she okay?  We’re all concerned.

Signed, Abby

But what about the other hostages?  The Israeli hostages taken from their beds or from a peaceful music festival by savage terrorists over 300 days ago.  The innocents whose faces were ubiquitous on street poles and billboards, who still cry out for release via social media posts from their desperate families, eight Americans among them.  What about them?  The impulse to go in and rescue them, just as Noa Argamani and three other hostages had been breathtakingly-rescued from Hamas captivity, is visceral and fierce, yet the IDF has been hamstrung in their ability to reach into the tunnels of Gaza by a global choir of non-military experts who presume to have a say in what weaponry will be used, by moronic college students who can’t identify which river or which sea, and by those who deny Israel the right to go and get its own people, as would be the divine right of any other country. Israel has maintained the highest standard of avoiding collateral damage, distributing flyers and communiqués before any insurgency to forewarn civilians; providing necessary aid that has been systematically stolen by Hamas; and coming to the negotiating table in good faith, willing to lay down its weapons for its hostages’ return, only to be thwarted again and again by Hamas.  And still the hostages remain; all sick, some disfigured, all terrified, close to death…and dare I say, losing hope.

I stand with Israelis who care not only about the remaining hostages, but about the plight and the rights of the Palestinian people.  There are innocents who are caught up in this war and are very much victims. But because Hamas started this war, Israel can and must defend its land and people.  As one commander told us when we met with him, “This cannot be a country where people are ripped from their beds while sleeping and stolen away.”  Though that seems patently obvious, that’s what occurred and that is what must be rectified, for the future peace and healing of Israel… and for 115 other reasons. No country would abide such an atrocity. 

And yet I continue to hear only of the injustice or inequity of the battle between Israel and Hamas.  I hear only of the food shortages and the collateral damage done to Palestinian citizens; the word genocide is passed around like so many green camping tents on college campuses - despite that the only genocide committed was that of Hamas upon the Israelis – and reading the news without knowing real facts I would believe the inflated death tolls reported by Hamas (disguised as the Health Ministry) and think that Israel was callously bombing only schools and hospitals, except for knowing that those are the very places where Hamas, in utter disdain for its people, keeps its arsenals of weaponry.

Its been 301 days.  I’ve watched the mothers of hostages we met wither and gray during this time. New footage of the young women taken is alarming and speaks to the sexual violence they face.  Are these young women now impregnated by their rapists?  Could the red-haired babies be alive?  I’m tortured by these questions and also ashamed by how complacency has set in, worried, too, that the fervency once brought to this crisis seems to be dwindling.

Let us rise up again.  We must continue to advocate for the hostages return.  President Biden, I applaud you for doing right by the Russian hostages.  Please do the same for the American and other hostages still alive in Gaza.  You know better than anyone that diplomacy is messy and sometimes there is a terrible calculus that must be reached when the mission is as crucial as bringing innocent people home.  But they are in grave danger, graver by each day, and we need them to be rescued. 

I know if it was my loved one being held, I’d feel the same. I’m betting you would, too.

It has been reported that after the successful rescue operation, Israeli officers spoke to their commanders by radio, saying that “the diamonds are in our hands.”  I could not love that sentence more.  The diamonds are in our hands.

So often as I walk around New York City wearing my “Bring Them Home” dog tags, friends, sometimes strangers, will tell me that the hostages are all dead, or that they’ll never be returned.  That my hope is folly.  I tell them the same thing always, that I choose to believe otherwise.  I say that confidently, because I learned from the wisest, understandably broken, most resilient woman in Israel, that “hope is mandatory.”  That woman is Rachel Goldberg Polin whose son Hersh remains in captivity, a diamond yet to be returned, but who WILL be returned.

Please, may the remaining 120 diamonds still held hostage be brought home alive to safety. I say a prayer for them and I mourn for the brave Israeli police officer killed in the rescue, as well as for innocent Palestinians whose lives were lost.  And if the fact that I would say a prayer for Palestinians surprises you, then you don’t understand the value Jewish people place on life, all life. 

That respect for life is the essence of why this conflict is so difficult. Hamas and many Palestinians – though not all – believe in an ideology that values the killing of Jews.  Period.  Full stop.  Children are taught at an early age the best method to slit the throats of Jews.  Early math schoolbooks use severed Jew heads as a means to count.  They are taught to hate Jews, and to not fear death because it is a path to martyrdom, a literal ticket to Paradise.  This is not my interpretation of Islam, this is their interpretation of Islam.  Those lessons have been deviously successful in creating the jihadist barbarians who murdered innocent people sleeping in their beds, who set them on fire, beheaded them, raped them, mutilated them, who burned babies and recorded it all with their own GoPros, while exalting yelling “Allahu Akbar!” on calls home to share their joy with their families.  I saw it all firsthand in the selectively shown Hamas video. [Sidebar: Hey Israel, worst PR job ever by withholding that video.  It should have been shown everywhere to everyone, on October 8.  Just sayin’.]

And as brutal and disturbing as all the violence in the video was, the glee on the murderers’ faces haunts me equally.  They shouted in rapture, not once about land, or about longstanding oppression.  They shouted joyfully because they came to kill Jews, and that is what they did.  And don’t be stupid  -- I’m talking to you, Ivy League jihadists – the Jews are the first target, it’ll be America and Western society next. 

So when you think about what the IDF is fighting for on a day like today when four innocent souls are brought home, remember that this is not an oppressor-oppressed struggle.  This is not a colonist-colonized struggle.  This has nothing to do with apartheid because Israel is not an apartheid state. This is a struggle of good against evil.  And today, good prevailed. 

Am Yisrael Chai.

My friend who was with me in Israel when we met Hersh’s mother, Rachel Goldberg-Polin, texted me this morning one word: “OMG!”  And there was Hersh.  Not the tan, smiley Hersh we have seen in family photos, not the Hersh whose image sat at a place of honor Monday night at my family’s Seder table.  A different Hersh.  This Hersh looked sickly and pale.  His left arm ends at the wrist in an uneven stump.  He looked gaunt.  He looked scared. But mostly, thank G-d, he looked alive.  ALIVE!!

This video heightens the urgency of bringing the hostages home immediately, meaning now is the time to advocate for their return like never before.  It is up to the key players at the negotiation table -- Israel, Egypt, Qatar, the U.S., and Hamas -- to make the dream of 133 returned hostages a reality.  Rachel has been consistent in reminding the world that the group of 133 are a diverse group that includes eight Muslim Arabs, two Black African Christians, eight Thais; they are from Mexico and Nepal and are Catholic and Hindu. There are five Americans, including Hersh.  Act on behalf of all these people.  But please, act now.

It is a miracle that Hersh has survived but we cannot forget that he is still dangerously at risk and severely emotionally traumatized. As are the young women who are believed to be pregnant, raped by their captors.  As are the elderly, whose more fragile health must be terribly compromised by lack of food, water, sunlight… and G-d knows what other brutalities. 

So let’s turn up the heat.  Use the letter attached below or write your own letter and send to the key negotiators from the US, Israel, Qatar and Egypt below.  Please, act NOW!

 Dear Sir,

I am writing to you today as a parent, humanitarian and deeply concerned fellow human being.  Today I saw Hersh Goldberg-Polin in a Hamas proof-of-life video.  While it was edifying to see this young man alive, it was a stark and urgent reminder of the danger the 133 hostages remain in after over 200 days of captivity.  The 133 are a diverse group comprised of many Israelis, but there are also eight Muslim Arabs, two Black African Christians, Thais, Mexicans and Nepalese, Catholics and Hindus. There are five Americans.  What unites them all is their proximity to death after 200+ days in the dire conditions detailed in Hersh’s video message. 

Please.  I implore you to use your crucial voice at the hostage negotiations table and bring these innocent people home to their countries and end the suffering of all those in the region affected by this war.  The world looks to you. Be brave. Bring them home now.

Thank you,

US

President Joe Biden

       Call and leave a message. 202-456-1111

       Email https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

Senator Chuck Schumer

       https://www.schumer.senate.gov/contact/message-chuck

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken

       https://www.state.gov/department-email-updates/

       @SecBlinken

National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan

       @JakeSullivan46

       202-456-1414

       https://www.whitehouse.gov/nsc

Qatar

Qatari Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani

       pru@mbt.gov.qa

Israel

Mossad Chief David Barnea

       ict@idc.ac.il

Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar

       ict@idc.ac.il

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant

       @yoavgallant

       yoavg@knesset.gov.il

PM Benjamin Netanyahu

       PM_ENG2@pmo.gov.il

Egypt

Egyptian Major General Abbas Kamel

       feedback@sis.gov.eg

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi

       feedback@sis.gov.eg

What we do know is that these actions have re-energized vitriolic protests from pro-Palestinian groups nationwide, many of the signs reading “From the River to the Sea,” a call for the eradication of Israel and its people. Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib declined to condemn protesters’ chants of “Death to America” and in New York City, Columbia University students have built an on-campus encampment that serves as ground zero for the vilest anti-Semitism this city, if not this country, has seen in decades.  Their actions have morphed from their First Amendment right to protest the war in Gaza and the fate of innocent Palestinians, to unadulterated, full-throated Jew hate.  So much so that Jewish students have been advised to leave campus.

Why is it that this generation cannot hold two thoughts in their heads?  It is possible to have concern for the innocent Palestinians - a concern I share – AND understand that Israel has a right to defend itself against an unprovoked massacre of its civilians.  That Hamas shows the same amount of humanity toward its own people as they did for Israelis on October 7 is the primary reason that there have been so many civilian deaths, injuries and denied access to aid.  Which is why Hamas must be eradicated.

That said, I, like many Zionists, disagree with many of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s policies and actions.  That doesn’t affect my belief in a Jewish state.  See?  Two thoughts at once.  The fact that students at an Ivy League school like Columbia, reflexively default to an oppressed/oppressor Marxist paradigm, is not just sorrowfully disappointing but makes me shiver at what this next generation brings to bear when it comes to understanding geopolitics.  Gone is discourse, gone is critical thinking, gone is nuance.  Frankly, gone is learning…from history, from oppositional views and from anyone who doesn’t reinforce personal viewpoints. Dispiriting and frightening, I fear for the world if these are the tenets of our best and brightest.

Meanwhile, campus silence regarding the hostages is resounding.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t losing hope in the hostages’ survival.  According to The Wall Street Journal, during the most recent hostage negotiations, Hamas terror chief Yahya Sinwar told negotiators that they could not locate 40 live hostages, the first phase of a proposed deal.  It’s hard to read that and not lose hope.

But now cannot be the time to lose hope.  I’m putting that in writing not just to compel you, but also to convince myself. 

Now more than ever, we must be extraordinary in our capacity to hope. There is an old Jewish adage that if two cars meet at an intersection; one a wedding party and one a funeral party, the wedding party is to proceed first, because joy must always precede grief.  Light before darkness.  Hope before despair.  Jewish people well know that there is time enough for grief, so they grab joy by the collar and hold on tight for as long as possible.  Which means, even in the face of evidence to the contrary, hope cannot be extinguished.  Hope allows us to visualize safe returns.  Homecomings.  Resolution.  Peace. Eden. Arbel. Matan. Schlomi.

Tonight is the time to remember and pray for the 133 souls still imprisoned in Gaza.  Romi. Guy. Tal. Sagui. 133 human beings who need your help, my help, the help of their countrymen and women, their leaders, and frankly whatever help is out there.  Sasha. Keith. Eli. Loitu. When was the last letter you wrote to President Biden, to Prime Minister Netanyahu?  [Their emails and are at the end of this blog.]

When was the last time you lit a candle, prayed for them, donated to the Hostage Forum that supports the hostage families?  [The links to the Hostage Forum is at the end of this blog.] 

Say their names tonight.  Noa. Omar. Hersh. Liri. Set a place for them at your table. Ohad. Chanan. Judy. Ilan. Before being taken hostage, these young people and hundreds of others were dancing in a beautiful clearing, awaiting the sunrise, and reveling in the freedom of being young.  What a contrast to where they are now.  Think of Oded, an 83-year-old grandfather and great-grandfather, who hasn’t seen the sun in six months.  Think of Dolev and Arbel, siblings taken from the kibbutz where they lived alongside their brother, whose shoulders fold into his body as he weeps retelling the story of their capture. 

133 names.  Yorgam. Omri. Avera. Alexander. Naama.  A collection of young and old, male and female, brothers and sisters, daughters and sons, mothers, fathers, grandparents.  A diverse group comprised of more than just Israelis. There are eight Muslim Arabs, two Black African Christians, eight Thais. They are from Mexico and Nepal, Catholic and Hindu. There are five Americans.  What unites them is that all of them are in horrific danger and all could benefit from our immediate collective action.  So please, when you’re through reading this, do one thing.  Write, text, call, email, donate…and then do it again. 

Imagine them coming home.  Or. Bar. Ofer. Inbar. Gad. David. I’m not giving up on them.  And I’m not giving up on those Columbia students who call for my death.  They are being held hostage, too, to a deadly, misguided ideology.  So tonight, I’ll pray for them, too.  Because I can hold two thoughts in my head at the same time. Actually, I can hold 133.

Am Yisrael Chai.

Prime Minister Netanyahu’s email

 PM_ENG2@PMO.GOV.IL

President Biden’s email

https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/  

Hostages & Missing Families Forum

https://stories.bringthemhomenow.net

That dire news came on the heels of the US decision to abstain from the UN resolution demanding a ceasefire, and Senator Chuck Schumer’s call for new elections in Israel, making it a hard week – to put it mildly – for Israel and Israel’s supporters. Immediately following Schumer’s speech and the abstention vote, yet another hostage negotiation broke down, owing to an emboldened Hamas who, like the rest of the world, doesn’t have to look too hard to see the cracks in the supposedly unshakable US-Israel bond. 

All this, while the hostage families grapple with holding onto hope while stuck in a groundhog day of endless trauma as the minutes/hours/days tick by and negotiations lead nowhere.  Unbelievably, a phone call yesterday between Biden and Netanyahu did not even mention the hostages. 134 hostages, eight of them American, have now been held by Hamas for 182 days.  Rachel Goldberg-Polin, the mother of Hersh, 23, whose left arm was blown off by a Hamas grenade before being taken hostage, attaches a piece of masking tape to her shirt daily, bearing the number of days the hostages have been held.  Yesterday, Rachel took to Instagram to report she has run through a whole roll of masking tape.  That detail made me weep as it puts into high relief how long this nightmare has gone on. 182 days is Fall and Winter and now Spring. Nearly 6 months, the time it takes a newborn to become a baby that babbles and smiles.  Almost half a year.  4,368 hours.  A full roll of masking tape.

If only there was something that could be done to return the hostages and put this tragedy to an end.

Well, there is.

Hamas must return the hostages.  If Hamas lays down their weapons and returns the hostages, the war ends. The only legitimate ceasefire is a Hamas ceasefire, for it is Hamas that brought war to Israel’s door on October 7, murdering, raping, beheading and capturing innocent Israelis. And so it is Hamas who can and must end the war.

Hamas is responsible for the loss of innocent Gazans because Hamas is using them as human shields, hiding in their homes and hospitals.  It is Hamas who is thwarting humanitarian relief, making off with the food and medicine for their own use.  It is Hamas that has promised to perpetuate October 7 over and over, making it necessary for Israel to check the aid supply chain for weapons that would allow Hamas to be successful in another murderous massacre.

Getting back the hostages must be first and foremost.  Why has this essential demand been diminished?  I am speaking to you, Prime Minister Netanyahu.  Your goals in this war have strayed from what should be the absolute and primary imperative: bringing the hostages home now.  How do you sleep at night knowing that on your watch, your people were taken from their beds, or while out dancing, and if not slaughtered, were taken into captivity by the same people who gleefully put a baby in an oven?  You need no reminders from me that Israel is in a bad neighborhood, making it even more treacherous to allow innocent civilians to be taken at will and held interminably. Not getting them back, I fear, means not only will Israel and the national psyche not recover, but it will happen again. 

Make Hamas give them back. 134 human beings.  19 women, all of whom are believed to be pregnant, meaning all of them raped.  The hostages have life-threatening illnesses, missing limbs; they are old, and extremely young. They are underfed or unfed; beaten and tortured. They are barely alive or already dead, their bodies being held by Hamas as bargaining chips.  They are all traumatized.  They are all we should focus on.  They are our people. And they need to come home.

Step up and engage in the links at the end of this blog.  Call your congressional representative.  Do whatever you can.  Rachel is out of tape and we should all be out of patience.  Do something.

Am Yisrael Chai

Write PM Netanyahu and urge him to have wider mandates when negotiating for the hostages in Cairo this week. Urge him to put the hostages first and bring them home now. The Prime Minister’s email is below.

PM_ENG2@PMO.GOV.IL

https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/   Email President Biden and tell him his support for Israel must be unwavering and that the focus must be on bringing home the hostages, 8 Americans among them.

 https://tr.ee/l-1X-jdXDd   Text President Biden and tell him his support for Israel must be unwavering and that the focus must be on bringing home the hostages, 8 Americans among them.

You didn’t know Itay, nor did I, but in a way, he is so familiar.  With a wide easy smile that made his cheeks puff up, he looked younger than his years, and was likely irresistible to Jewish grandmothers.  With a father from Brooklyn, Itay had US and Israeli citizenship and visited New York often.  Coney Island was a favorite, as was basketball and Playstation.  Itay was 19 years old.

Originally from South Africa, Daniel Perez moved to Israel at 13.  The son of a prominent rabbi, he rose to be an Army Platoon Commander and was credited with saving many lives during battle, including that of his brother.  A funeral for Daniel was recently held in Jerusalem, the coffin empty but for his blood, retrieved from the battle site.  Daniel was 22 years old.

Please say their names.  Pray for their families.

Last week, Itay’s parents went to the White House and gave President Biden a menorah, as a reminder that light will always dispel the darkness and evil will not win.  After 167 days, the prospect of light prevailing over darkness must seem elusive to the still-waiting hostage families.  But it is to that light they cling, if only because there is no other option.  And if you know anything about Israelis, you know they always pivot towards the light.

Light over darkness has been a central theme to Shelly Shem Tov’s life for the last 167 days.  Shelly is mother to 21-year-old Omer who was taken hostage from the Nova Festival.  On October 7 Shelly and her family watched in horror as Omer’s phone location was tracked deep into Gaza. Then, nothing. The next morning, Shelly taped the light in Omer’s bedroom to the ON position so his room would always be lit. Every sunrise, Shelly goes into Omer’s room, touches his belongings, and speaks to him while looking out his window.  She has left the room as he left it, which she described as a mess, because she believes in her heart that he will come home, hug his parents and siblings, and finally, clean it up. 

Shelly knows about Omer’s first 54 days in captivity because he was with a friend who was returned in an early hostage deal.  Speaking in a voice laden with grief, Shelly shares what she knows.  She knows they were beaten, deprived of food, kept in darkness and told to speak only in whispers. Complicating those harsh conditions, Omer suffers from asthma and celiac disease, and is without an inhaler or medication.  Shelly was told by the friend that he and Omer spoke in hushed tones about what they would do when they got home. Telling this story, Shelly twisted in her chair uncomfortably; the pain Omer endures is hers. Tall and strikingly beautiful, Shelly is nevertheless anguish personified.  Her speaking cadence is halting, as if she may not make it to the end of the sentence.  But she does.  Every time, over and over.  Because though it is wrenching physically and mentally to share Omer’s story, Shelly does what she can to keep the light in the ON position illuminating the urgent need to bring Omer and all the hostages home. 

Bring them home.  Please.  Bring them home now.

Shelly was one of the parents who, within 24 hours of the attack that stole her son from her family, formed the Hostages and Missing Persons Forum, a hub for family members and loved ones of hostages offering holistic, medical and emotional support.  An entirely volunteer organization, the group includes experts in security, law, media and diplomacy.  Just across the street from Hostage Square, where a Shabbat table is still set for those in captivity, the Forum is a vital resource for the families like Shelly’s who, 167 days later, are still looking for the light.

Bring them home.  Please.  Bring them home now.

If you would like to support the Hostages and Missing Persons Forum https://stories.bringthemhomenow.net/about  please follow the links below.

donate@bringthemhomenow.net

https://lp.bringthemhomenow.net/petition

This is heartbreaking.

Last week I went to another planet.  The inhabitants of this planet were like us, except that they were incredibly broken.  And yet, in a way that made no sense, they were also incredibly strong.  This, despite everyone on this planet missing something: a limb, a child, a spouse, a parent, a feeling of safety.  Still, these inhabitants bravely took time to explain to visitors, strangers really, how they came to be so broken and yet so strong.  They did this even though they were there only in the physical sense. Mentally, they were a few miles away, across a bloody border, where their loved ones were being held captive.  They spoke while an internal hourglass behind their eyes poured out time; 2 hours, 2 weeks, 2 months, 3 months, 4 months…157 days.

Bring them home.  Please.  Bring them home now.

The planet was Israel; the inhabitants, Israelis.  And while Israel is indeed on this planet, forgive the metaphor.  It’s just that I’ve never met people on Earth who, in the face of such devastation, operate with such optimism, determination, strength and compassion.  And above all else, humanity. 

These are people who, in the aftermath of October 7, provided medical treatment to terrorists who raped their daughters until their pelvises broke.  They are the people who send Israeli doctors and nurses, at Israeli cost, to tend to the monsters who slaughtered their babies, set fire to parents and grandparents, and too much more savagery to list.  On October 7 the risk factors of being murdered or kidnapped, were being asleep in your bed or dancing.

Bring them home.  Please.  Bring them home now.

One of the young people dancing was 23-year-old American-Israeli music festival lover, Hersh Goldberg-Polin.  Hersh was at the Nova Music Festival where he and other attendees, after fleeing from armed terrorists swarming the festival site, huddled in a saferoom dodging Hamas-propelled grenades. Ultimately, one grenade inside the saferoom detonated, blowing off Hersh’s left arm and taking the life of his best friend, Aner Shapira. The last image his parents have of Hersh is him being loaded into a flatbed truck, a bone dangling where his arm should be.

Bring them home.  Please.  Bring them home now.

We met Hersh’s mother, Rachel Goldberg-Polin, in a small building near Jerusalem.  If you don’t get a chance to meet Rachel – and I hope you do – please follow her on Instagram at bring.hersh.home. You will see what we saw, a slight woman who speaks softly about every mother’s worst nightmare, a nightmare that is her reality.  Rachel sat at a conference table, a piece of tape with the number of days Hersh has been missing pressed to her sweater, hands clasped, back straight, face weary with desperation.  She shared sweet stories, even made us laugh, and conveyed her devout optimism about Hersh coming home.  Hearing her lay out the reasons he must be alive with matter-of-fact determination was wholly convincing. If for no other reason, then because any child borne of this incredible woman, a woman who has existed since October 7 without sleep or relief, surviving only on a diet of worry and prayer, who boasts the grit of one million mothers and who has cried one million tears… any child of hers, being even half as formidable, well, you’d believe Hersh is coming home, too. 

Rachel described herself as being stuck in an ambiguous trauma. Someone run over by a truck can begin healing when pulled from beneath the wheels, but for Rachel, and all the hostage families, they remain underneath that truck.  157 days later.  Can you imagine what it must be like to ruminate every sleepless night knowing your child — your twinkly-eyed, loving son — who, missing an arm, is being held while in dire need of medical treatment?  I can’t.  I bet you can’t.  And Rachel can’t.  The internal hourglass pours out time behind her eyes.  And time is running out.

Bring them home.  Please.  Bring them home now.

No one reading this should be complacent.  Help bring the hostages home now.  Help the families living under that truck.  Help them because sleeping or dancing shouldn’t result in beheadings, mass shooting, and torture.  Or just help because allowing such barbarism to exist there, gives license for barbarism to exist everywhere.

When you travel to Israel, it takes a while after landing home to acclimate. There are so many other important stories we heard and people we met.  My aim is to share more stories soon.  In the interim, if you want to get involved in helping bring Israeli hostages home, please follow the links at the end of this blog or go to bring.hersh.home on Instagram and click the “how to Help” button.

Am Yisrael Chai

https://docs.google.com/document/d/10HYCE0HDGlPGun24cVGfd9YtgqxcPXeV9kyPIBXzfks/edit?pli=1

https://linktr.ee/bringhershhome

https://oneminaday.com

https://www.jgive.com/new/en/ils/donation-targets/110669/about?fbclid=IwAR0ZJ-0Kr32U-Ml7wYZ7M1zmaGIxeOMR3JZU5kaMI0Oe6LT8TXGaifdyT4U

Regarding other people, Leah brought up our mutual friend, Janice.

“You know something?” said Leah. “That Janice has a heart of gold.”

“I agree! Janice has a heart of gold. A heart of GOLD.” 

After our walk, the heart of gold comment stuck with me.  What a beautiful thing to be described that way.  Lucky Janice, to have such a reputation.  And though I was ecstatic for her, I found myself wondering: Would anyone describe ME as having a heart of gold?  And by that, I mean someone other than me.

I decided to do some field research. I went first to Leah. 

“You know how you described Janice as having a heart of gold? Well, I was wondering: Is that how you would also describe me?”

“You?” Leah’s eyes appeared to grow bigger than I had ever seen them.  Was it incredulity? Or did she have a blepharoplasty that went unmentioned during one of our plastic surgery talks?

“Yes, Leah, me. Would you describe me as having a heart of gold?”

Looking at me intently with her big (new?) eyes, “I would describe you differently,” said Leah.

Brightening, and with a dash of smug anticipation, I asked, “Oh? How?”

“I would describe you as tall.”

“Tall?”

“Yes, I would describe you as tall.” It was disappointing that Leah didn’t see my heart of gold as she had seen Janice’s. Worse, despite my own certainty in boasting a heart of gold, I found myself wishing Leah would be run over by one of the speeding boardwalk cyclists.  And that’s a hard feeling to have about a friend.  Even one who is an idiot.

I’ll spare you the rest of my field research but in summary, I asked ten friends if they would describe me as having a heart of gold and I got nine “No ways” and one friend who couldn’t stop laughing.  A shame really, because that friend really looked forward to the pickleball games that I have now completely cut her out of.  Who’s laughing now, Erica?

I began to reflect as to why my heart of gold status wasn’t being seen by others.  I took a hard look at my life, my 4.0 Uber score, and decided I needed to do more to show the world all the love in my heart.

To that end, I helped a woman who didn’t realize she was standing directly in front of the elevator cab’s buttons by shrieking, “EXCUSE ME!” in her ear to help her get out of the way and escape the vitriol of other understandably annoyed elevator occupants. Had there been any.

Similarly, I saved a man who had misjudged his ability to get across the street before the traffic light turned green by leaning on my horn as hard as I could, to warn him of my impending pedal to the metal.  He turned around immediately, astonished and alive, if not rattled to the core, perhaps because of his advanced age. And maybe because of his wheelchair.   Yet, he successfully wheeled himself right back to safety. Happy to help, sir!  It’s me old heart of gold you can thank!

You see, I believe I possess a heart like Oprah’s, who, after making her fortune, gave a million dollars to her best friend, Gayle.  I would 100% do exactly the same thing for my best friend, Julie.  Oprah couldn’t love Gayle half as much as I love Julie, and nothing would make me happier than sharing my wealth with Julie, if only Julie was not an absolute moron when it comes to money and financial decisions. I mean, I’m scared to think what would have become of Julie without me to set her straight, and really, if there’s any money to be changed hands, maybe it’s Julie who should pay ME.  Too bad I couldn’t help her out with the decision to marry her loser of a husband, but still, Julie, you are forever my Gayle. Just without the money. Or the trips.  Or the guest house in Montecito.

But back to my heart of gold status, have I mentioned how much I love nature and babies and animals?  Perhaps I didn’t - because I don’t – but that alone shouldn’t disqualify me, should it?  It just feels as if I’m fighting back the tide trying to convince the world of the solid gold content of my heart. Is it my fault that I am hard-wired to be less like homespun, heart-of-gold Jennifer Garner; and more like don’t-make-me-take my-earrings off Jennifer Lopez?  But let me ask you: which of those gals would you rather spend a night out at the clubs with?  Just saying. 

Alas.  This heart of gold thing may not be my thing.  But if you’re looking for someone who is loyal, really fun and truly kind, then I suggest you call Erica.  She has a lot of time on her hands now that she’s kicked out of pickleball.

This ain’t that.

Our great city isn’t at her welcoming best.  The weather is bleak, the mood bleaker.  New York City is overrun with rats, vape shops, gridlock and now, a terrible influx of epic proportions, worse than even e-Bikes.  Here they are again. The dreaded, holiday tourists.    

You know ‘em, you hate ‘em, you know how to spot ‘em.  Who else carries a selfie stick?  And why, may I ask? Did someone in your gun club request footage of you walking along Avenue of the Americas, as you so annoyingly call it?  And by “walking” what I really mean, is slowly sauntering, six abreast, making sudden and frequent stops.  I know I should be grateful for your patronage of our city, but instead, I just hate you.

Furthermore, and I ask this question delicately, why are you all fat?  Surely we New Yorkers haven’t scarfed up all of the nation’s Ozempic supply.  What is happening in the flyover states to make you not just overweight, but seemingly fine and dandy with being so overweight?  Are New Yorkers the only people with a weight shaming skill-set baked right in?  Do you not feel our disdainful gaze wondering why you’re not counting your steps or ordering a salad – dressing on the side – even when dining at Serendipity? Surely there must be a Jerry Springer reunion you have to slim down for, no?

Now, back to your slow pace on our sidewalks. I could say I’m thinking of the health benefits of a fast walk when I implore you to move it along, but truly it’s only because I actually live here and have places to go.  I mean, this face can’t Botox itself.  So please, I beg and beseech you: WALK FASTER.  That is my hot breath of impatience you feel upon your neck rolls, desperate to break through the scrum of bad coats, worse purses, and curiously, throngs of Nespresso shopping bags.

Moreover, to those of you who come to this city dressed in what you mood-boarded as quintessential New York garb, we sigh.  So you saw “Rent” in high school (the movie, not the show) and surmised that black, ripped fishnets and Doc Martens were all the rage.  They’re not. You look ridiculous.  And fat.  This is not the 1990s.  There is no more Tunnel, or Palladium or even Canastel’s.  The Michael Todd Room is closed, the Limelight is a mall and Barney’s…don’t even get me started.  I’m sad to say you missed out on the best of New York and seeing you trying to resurrect the past with your Madonna-for-Halloween outfit is maddening, especially when you’re carrying a Madame Tussaud’s shopping bag.

So stop trying to blend in.  It’s annoying.  We can smell that Rockettes ticket in your pocket.  Just do you: See the Rockefeller Christmas tree, go to the Times Square M&M store, take a photo with a perverted Sesame Street character (don’t say I didn’t warn you) and photograph a squirrel. What is it with you people and squirrels????  Those amusements are there just for you and all I’m asking, is please, while you make your way there, WALK FASTER!. 

And not to be presumptuous, but I imagine you saw Sarah Jessica Parker and Mikhail Baryshnikov ride in a horse-drawn carriage through snowy Central Park which is why it’s on your New York City to-do list, like seeing the “Friends” building and buying a fake Louis Vuitton bag from a sidewalk vendor.  [Omg, please don’t tell me you thought it was real.]  But back to that carriage ride, yes, it was so romantic and iconic and yes, you have dreamt of being swaddled next to a loved one in a cozy blanket provided by the driver.  I just have three words for you: that blanket is filthy.  [I know that’s four words but we New Yorkers talk fast.]  So make whatever decision about that carriage ride you wish, but do so knowing full-well that that blanket, as Taylor Swift herself might say, has never, ever, ever, been washed.

Lastly, regarding that sense of danger you feel while slow-walking the streets, that feeling of anxiety you chalk up to not being familiar with New York? Well, let me tell you, that feeling is on the money, honey, because New York is a hellscape right now. It doesn’t just feel scary; it IS scary. The only difference is that you decided to go into the belly of the beast for your holiday and we New Yorkers left for Miami. Mostly for the sun. But also because you just were walking way too f*cking slow. 

I look different, don’t I?  I’d go as far as saying that I’ve utterly transformed myself.  After decades of being weighed down by dissatisfaction with my appearance, I finally said, “No more.”  And now, as you can see, I’ve shed my old looks and…well, here I am. The new me!  Such a metamorphosis, am I right?

You’re wondering how I pulled this off.  How could I make such a dramatic change so quickly??  How is it possible to utterly transform oneself? 

In short, you’re wondering how in the world did I go from having a full head of thick frizzy brunette hair to having the long flaxen blond, stick-straight locks of a Barbie doll? 

Hiking.

I’ve been hiking.

I know it sounds crazy, even unbelievable, especially for my fellow hikers, but I guess I just stepped it up a lot more than you.  I just really committed myself and the more I hiked, the blonder, straighter and more lustrous my hair became.  I am now able to wear the kinds of hair accessories once off-limits to my bushy dark pouf.  I wear these hair accoutrements all the time when I’m hiking.  And if I didn’t mention it already, I am really into hiking.

Going from a brunette frizzbomb to blond bombshell has afforded me a whole new audience of people awestruck by my appearance.  And that is why my social media content has been edited to feed the appetites of my newfound fanbase.  My hair is now the mainstay of my content to the exclusion of almost everything else...I mean I could wish happy birthday to my kid and bore you all to tears or I could take photos at the gym with my hair up and then more with my hair down.  All these years posting on social media, I have never received so many clicks and likes and reposts.  I mean, who am I… Adele?  Please.  It’s still just humble old me…although a me who looks a lot more like Margot Robbie than I used to.  And though there are more than a fair share of angry comments questioning the source of my transformation, I just stand in my truth and tell them what I’m telling you.

It's hiking.

Only hiking.

I would tell you more about my hiking journey but really it’s easier if we all just act like I was always blond and always an elite hiker, despite living on the island of Manhattan and having a full time driver.  Plus, this conversation gets me agitated and I’ve got to get going.  To hike. I’m thoroughly committed to hiking, as I may have mentioned, plus I’ve heard that if I miss a hike, my blond hair may fall out and I’m at risk for stroke and anal leakage.  So la-di-da.  Off I go.  To hike.  Just to hike.