It started…with a bang.
………………………………………………..
During my first week of training for my position as a sound stage manager at Chapman University’s Dodge College of Film and Media, I–a disinterested and exhausted student — thought, “Maybe I’ll tell my boss there was a family emergency so I can leave.”

I slip into the jacuzzi tub
As it fills with warm water.
I breathe deeply
My eyes close
As it bubbles around me

The idea of an invisible being leading one and a half million people from slavery to freedom is a great story for kids and for the uneducated and non-scientific societies that existed when the Torah was written.

A two-minute play about Hope during the CoronaVirus pandemic.
[Two Jewish women are sitting on towels at Hilton Head Island Beach, South Carolina.  Enjoying a Shabbat sunset.  SFX of seagulls, ocean, breath of dolphins.]

Covid 19 has brought about an important new relationship in my life; Paper Towels.  I’m writing this because quite frankly, I’m surprised at myself.  I really should be part of a social science study, if they ever have one.

The question has come up multiple times in our lives as to what would be the most important things we would grab if we had to run out of our homes quickly due to a fire or an earthquake.

I write limericks both grown up and kiddish
But never specifically Yiddish!
A non-Jewish friend
Wants to see that all end
I hope that’s not one God forbiddish!

I’m very fortunate, I cannot go out, but I am not going crazy staying in.
I go out every other week for chemo, I also go for blood test. Other than that I don’t go out

She writes how she whipped up his favorite
kind of pancakes, secretly grateful for
him, for his enjoyment of what she provides

OKAY! — I admit it — I’m vain!!!!!
It’s due to my mother’s mantra (may she rest in peace).
Growing up in the 50’s, she would continuously say to me, ‘always look your best when you leave the house — you never know who you’ll run into.’

1. Out of town family and friends can participate too.
2. No need to polish silver.
3. No need to borrow dishes, silverware or extra chairs.

The squirrels are partying under my orange tree eating more citrus than I can possibly pick.  The green onions are taking over my yard bouncing white blossoms in the breeze.  Arrogant arugula ignores the rocks between my manicured beds, spreading, heading for my neighbor’s yard.

When I was about five years old, I asked my mother,  “Why are we here?” Her answer, “To help each other.” That conversation took place in the early 1940s in Canada.  My mother had emigrated from Poland as a very young woman, marrying in Toronto prior to WWII…

Have you seen the show Westworld?  I’ll try not to give anything away.  Westworld is the ultimate theme park – an immersive experience where guests get to spend their vacation in an authentic Western Town.  The town is full of “hosts” – lifelike androids – who live their stories on constant loops, none the wiser that they are not, in fact, human.

1. The Pandemic has put a pause on a frenetic world.
2. I have discovered there is almost NOTHING that can’t be done on-line.
3. I now have a Pandemic Joke file, which I am sending out in lieu of inspirational poetry

My three grown daughters and two stepdaughters have been calling me daily since coronavirus to make sure that I am careful. I am a senior. Yes, I am the target population for the virus, but I consider myself in good health. Before the virus, I played tennis…

Can you fall in love in isolation
Over ice cream pints and soft guitar melodies
Over shared secrets and anxieties

My suitcase lay overstuffed on the living room floor, all dressed up with nowhere to go.  Dancing shoes sat still, thwarted in their annual pilgrimage  to tango’s mecca.  I am a professional dancer and teacher of Argentine tango.

Tonight I drink Baileys instead of wine
Tonight I watch through a screen
without my family