Paris, here I come!

             In my four years at Alliance Française, a French-language high school in Tel-Aviv, we all became Francophiles. We belted out French songs, staged school plays in French—and cursed in French. A romantic teenager with three language at my disposal and a flare for writing, I penned poetry in French.

            The summer after our junior year, a selected group of students was sent to France on a month-long mission, which included almost three weeks in Paris. That memorable first trip turned up decades later as the seed of inspiration for my novel JERUSALEM MAIDEN.

            Somewhere along the journey into French language and culture, a dream sprouted: one day I would spend a semester at the famous Sorbonne university in Paris, where I would study Civilisation Française.

            Life, though, had its own agenda, and the dream never materialized. And while in the decades that followed I visited Paris numerous times, I put behind not only that youthful fantasy, but also the language I had once loved. In my twenties, I moved to New York, made English my daily language—and soon the language of my career, first in business, and then in the literary world. When my American husband and I traveled through France, I acted in restaurants and stores as an American tourist that did not even speak French. The Francophile part of my life was erased.

            And then, in 2005, while penning a novel set in Jerusalem, my protagonist surprised me and took off to Paris. Only after I packed my bags and chased her there did I realize that unbeknown to me, the author, her move had been motivated by my very first school trip in the 1960s. It was then that I had imagined my grandmother—the inspiration for JERUSALEM MAIDEN—as an artist there during the avant-garde era.

            What did I know about Paris at that historical time? In the two weeks prior to leaving home to follow my protagonist, I trained my oral muscles and grey cells with verb conjugations and nuanced pronunciation. My husband was amused when I walked around the house mouthing forgotten words and phrases. 

            In Paris, for the first time in decades, I spoke the language as I became a flaneuse, a wanderer, now exploring the city though the eyes of my protagonist in 1924, at a time when most houses had no running water, few had electricity or gas lines, and sanitation services were provided by the slop wagon into which residents emptied their chamber pots. I sat at dusty libraries and leafed through tomes of history—in French.

            In 2010, when JERUSALEM MAIDEN was preparing for publication by HarperCollins, I set out on another project, investigating the history of a painting that had been in my family. I grew up with this museum-size canvas and was so attached to it that after my sister inherited it I commissioned an artist to copy it. Now I contacted long lost cousins, a brother and a sister whom I had met only once forty years earlier, and whose grandparents had originally purchased this painting. Raised in Germany, the brother and sister—now with their respective spouses—lived in different parts of France. The first phone conversation with the sister turned into an almost two-hours long chat. A week later I spoke with her brother, and after forty delightful minutes, he put his French-speaking wife on the phone. Like the others, she was warm and delighted at the renewed contact.

            Three months later, my husband and I piggy-backed a trip to Europe with a get-together in Paris with these cousins. The three couples spent fabulous four days, where we bonded beautifully. Since both my cousins’ spouses spoke no English, I chatted in French from morning to night. My husband, who spoke only English showed the best of his bonhomie self. Although my grammar was far from perfect, it was clear that it was intuitively ingrained, as only someone who had once been fluent in the language could have mastered.

            A year ago, in the spring of 2012, Ron and I visited each of the cousins in their respective hometown, where again I spoke only French. Soon, I was flooded with memories of my high school years when the language and its cultural nuances had meant so much to me.

            This past Fall, at a conversation with a young man who was on remission from cancer, he brought up the question of a bucket list. “What would you do if you had only one year to live?” he asked.

            After some thought, I replied, “I’ll eat chocolate.”

            He burst out laughing. “That’s it? You’ve done and seen everything? I haven’t even been to California!”

            Later, I reflected on my pathetically short wish list. Had I really accomplished everything I could ever dream of? Or did I not dare dream outside the obvious, beyond what was available to me?

            My old desire to spend a semester in the Sorbonne popped in my head. At this time in my life, nothing held me back from making it happen: I had the financial means, my children were emancipated adults, my husband a busy independent man. Besides being French-challenged, he had always enjoyed Paris for just a few days at a time. On the other hand, he always supported my interests. With his unending encouragement, I had blossomed.

The first problem I encountered was that the student body at the Sorbonne that had once been so appealing, hadn't changed: they were still twenty year olds. And a semester was too long to tear myself from my life.  

I approached my husband with the request of a birthday gift of only one month in which I would tailor my own language and culture program. Sure enough, a quick Google search brought up language immersion classes for business executives, presumably in their 40s rather than in their 20s. I discovered groups of expat writers that conducted French conversations, and I signed up for lectures about art and theater along with architectural walks. I would take my exercise and dance classes in French and would even play Mah-Jongg in French.

There was a moment—turned into hours--in which I panicked.

In today’s world of Internet, I could view photographs of each furnished apartment from every possible angel. It would be my home for the month, a place to cocoon alone. But that’s when reality hit me. I had never been alone! Even in the solitude of writing, Ron had always been in the background. After thirty-five years together, I was accustomed to his ever-present care and friendship. Since he struggled with the same separation anxiety, I had to keep my bravado. I forged on with my plan--or my bucket list would once again be reduced to only one thing: chocolate….

I will be leaving for Paris in 8 days. Stay tuned.

 # # #

Novelist Talia Carner lives in New York. Her latest novel, JERUSALEM MAIDEN (HarperCollins, 2011) deals with the struggle between freedom and faith. (www.TaliaCarner.com)      

Public Thoughts To be Read At The Passover Table

Passover 2013

By Talia Carner            
             

            This Passover, as we celebrate our ancestors’ freedom from slavery, we reconnect through our most important holiday with our centuries-long traditions. It is incumbent upon us to contemplate the broader concept of freedom and what it means to us as individuals, as members of our immediate communities, and as members of the community of Jews across the globe.             
            Throughout history, Passover has also been the time of increased blood libels and pogroms against Jews. While Jews celebrated freedom, they were being reminded that they were hated to the point of being killed by the dozens, thousands, and millions. As a new wave of anti-Semitism is sweeping over the globe, landing right in Manhattan's UN building, its Jew-hate festival has metastasized into leading universities, mainstream media, and civic organizations. The tale of the Haggadah we read at the Seder stands to remind us that hate comes knocking on our door first with words, then with economic and academic boycotts, then with biased UN resolutions, and, as in the past, it may end with guns, bombs and incinerators.            
            Passover also marks the Spring in our ancient agrarian society, a beginning of a cycle of life, with the blooming of trees and the planting of vegetables and flowers. The fresh start of spring also stands to remind us that our friends and fellow Jews are watching with angst the rise in anti-Semitism in countries from Venezuela to Spain. And while these past sixty-five years Israelis—civilians and soldiers—have helped every Jew everywhere walk tall and proud, their existential threat from Iran is real.     
            “Every Jew should consider himself as if he was freed from slavery,” says the Haggadah we’ll read tonight, retelling the story of Exodus. In today’s climate we should add that “Every Jew should consider himself as if he’s just escaped a terrorist bomb.” There but for the grace of God and twist of history, we would not have been spared the wrath and bombs of a Palestinians or extreme Muslim murderers taking shelter in our sacred freedom on these shores. Let’s give our prayers and charity to the over 6,000 injured Israelis forever coping with embedded nails, burned faces, or missing limbs. And as we do that, let us search within ourselves whether we have done all we could for them and for the Israeli soldiers who take the first bullet for us.
            The tradition of Passover also calls us to invite to the Seder table any Jew who does not have one. Let’s invite—at least in our thoughts—all our Jewish brethren in countries that do not offer the freedom and protection that the USA guarantees us. For them, we can raise our collective voice with indignation and outrage and use our collective power to fight tyranny and fanaticism that calls for our—and their—demise.

Therefore, as we move into the Spring, let us bless all the good things the world has given us. This Passover we are not alone at the Seder table. Neither should any Jew be.

Amen.

# # #

 

Novelist Talia Carner lives in New York. Her latest novel, JERUSALEM MAIDEN (HarperCollins, 2011) deals with the struggle between freedom and faith. (www.TaliaCarner.com)          

The Scandal In Our Own Backyard

 (This article was adapted from a previously published one.)

      
     

o       “There is something bad happening to our children in family courts today that is causing them more harm than drugs, more harm than crime and even more harm than child molestation,” said Judge Watson L. White from Cobb County, Georgia, Superior Court.

       In researching for my book, Puppet Child, I discovered that “something bad” to be the judges, especially when it comes to adjudicating allegations of child sexual abuse.

       In Clarke v. Cowles in California, eight-year-old Loren (not her real name) told her caseworker and later her psychological evaluator, “Daddy licks his fingers before he puts them in my vagina.” The first report was suppressed by the judge, the latter was never presented at the trial. The father was awarded full custody while the mother received supervised visitations on the unproven assumption that she had brainwashed her daughter. Years later, after the girl wrote repeatedly to her caseworker about molestation, a judge refused to hear the evidence because the question of sexual abuse had been decided five years before.

       Loren is only one child out of thousands being handed to their abusers. According to The American Judges Foundation, in 70 percent of cases in which abusive men ask for custody, they succeed in gaining full or joint custody. This national scandal is made possible by the secrecy within the Family Court System and by public disbelief in the scope of the problem. The very system designed to safeguard helpless children has become a national disgrace as injustice has reached epidemic proportions. 

       Whatever you have ever known about democracy becomes irrelevant at the gate to family court. There, one person is judge, jury and executioner. Paradoxically, in most states, a family court judge is the one professional in the courtroom who is not required to be trained in domestic violence and child abuse. As a result, wrapped in their own mix of prejudices, religious beliefs, or misguided assumptions, all too many judges are ignorant about the dynamics of family abuse, ignorant about the nature of child molestation, and ignorant about the ways in which an abuser manipulates the courtroom as the arena where he can hand a woman the final blow by taking her children away.
       Although studies such as the one by the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts Research in Denver—an organization which mothers’ groups claim is biased against women—shows that at least two thirds of sexual abuse allegations made by a child were proven to be substantiated (the one third unsubstantiated are not necessarily false.) Yet a study by the California Protective Parents Association found that 91 percent of fathers identified by their children as sexual predators received full or partial unsupervised custody—while in 54 percent of these same cases the non-abusing mother was placed on supervised visitations.

       How is that possible? Here are some of the more glaring errors the courts perpetuate:

       * Viewing children as property. When the crime of sexual abuse is committed upon a child who lives next door, the perpetrator is subject to harsh jail punishment. The same abuse committed upon one's own child is likely to result in a father getting sole custody. Behind this unfair ruling is the lingering feudal tradition that regards children as the property of their fathers.

       * Mistaking controlling men for loving fathers. Used to getting their way and given to expressions of anger, controlling men fight hard in the court they regard as a boxing ring. Having seen too many men walk away from their children, judges often mistake for love a father’s unwillingness to let go of the child who has become both a sexual object and a weapon against a mother trying to get away from her husband’s control.

      * Favoring the Parental Alienation Syndrome theory. PAS maintains that a child has been brainwashed to give false testimony. Not listed in the American Psychiatric Association manual, PAS is refuted and considered bogus theory by nationally recognized academic and clinical institutions—and by a 1999 Congressional act (VAWA). In fact, the lone advocate who coined the term, Richard Gardner, has also written that “pedophilia is natural.” Nevertheless, increasingly, legions of children are removed from their mothers’ care under the PAS theory.  

     *  Tolerance of child sexual abuse. A Tennessee judge granted visitation rights to Ralph Gonnella two weeks after he had been arrested for taking sexually explicit photographs of his seven-year-old son. In California, Manuel Saavedra, a convicted sex offender who had pleaded guilty to lewd conduct with a child was awarded custody of his two daughters.  All across America, convicted pedophiles—a crime known for its high rate of recidivism —are given access to their children.

*  Refusing to stigmatize a man as a pedophile. A 1996 report by The American Psychological Association states, “women seldom make false reports of child abuse or battering.” Yet in case after case, when a father is found to be sexually abusive, judges suppress evidence. While many judges, many of whom are fathers, do not truly believe that sexual abuse exists, they also do not wish to venture into the criminal arena of pedophilia due to overlapping jurisdiction between civil and criminal courts.

 * Not following the law. In demanding burden of proof of sexual molestation that supercedes the required “preponderance of evidence” and instead seeking the criminal definition of “beyond a reasonable doubt,” judges often demand dates, times or witnesses that are impossible for a child to provide. Interestingly, the same judges demand no proof when speculating that at the roots of the sexual abuse complaint is the mother’s coaching the child.

 * Misogyny. In Virginia, Kathy Wade was told by the judge handing Kathy’s two-year-old daughter to the sexually abusive father, “This is what you get when you don’t have a lawyer.” In Florida, Judge Paul Marko told Marianne Price: "The singles' bars are full of guys… you go and find one.” In Michigan, Judge Gregory Pittman ordered a couple shackled together after the woman complained that her former husband had violated the order of protection. Routinely, American women are denied the right to due process, are subject to ex parte hearings, and are victims of perjury or illegal out-of-state jurisdictions.

Through it all, children are at a disadvantage because they are dependent upon mothers with no or poor legal representation and who are short on financial resources to wage protracted legal battles and appeals. (Professionals in the field report increasing support for men from well-financed fathers’ groups.) Moreover, men, poised and collected and surrounded by a legal team, “look good” in court when compared with frightened, distraught mothers, whom judges often view as hysterical, paranoid and vindictive. Yet all across the nation, behind every case in which a woman’s constitutional rights are being ignored in family court there are children needing protection. Instead, they receive a life sentence without parole.

Public disbelief guards the system from exposure. There are child services, therapists, and legal guardians who commit atrocious mistakes. But ultimately, the untrained judges are the ones responsible for saving the children. While I met compassionate family court judges, the shocking overall picture of injustice indicates that they are in the minority. Until the public grasps the scope of the scandal in our own backyard and holds judges accountable for the grand scale in which children are being removed from the custody of good mothers to be placed with pedophiles, we are facing a national shame of catastrophic proportions. 

###
    

Novelist Talia Carner published her first novel, PUPPET CHILD in 2002, and became an advocate for children caught in the nightmarish legal system. Since then, she's published CHINA DOLL and JERUSALEM MAIDEN. For more resources, please check  www.TaliaCarner.com

Trials of a Super-Taster

        
            I sit with friends in a plushy alcove at a restaurant. A halogen light beams into the center flower over a white tablecloth. I place my order, smiling at the waiter. “No lemon, no black pepper or chili, not even as garnish,” I say. “But please tell the chef to use all other flavors.” That should cover all my bases. I love the taste of cilantro, sage, cinnamon or rosemary that together with textures—from crunchy to smooth—create a concert of my senses. I admire the chef who orchestrates ingredients to perform a melody of sensual pleasures. But fresh lemon wrecks my mouth. Upon touch, small blisters pop up on my tongue and gums. They dissipate within the hour, but not before they ruin my meal. Black pepper and hot spices blow off the top of my skull, or at least that is how it feels from the inside.
            “She’s allergic,” my husband adds.   
            When my food arrives, though, three slices of lemon flank the fish. A network of black dots covers the macadamia crust of my 3”-size piece of fish that is listed at $35. My battle-worn mouth contracts reflexively.
            “That’s only garnish,” the waiter explains when I remind him of my food sensitivities.
            Why is it that I am the one to apologize when I must send the dish back?
           
            The rest of my dinner companions are half way through their food when mine reappears, this time as a dish deserving the “Best of Hospital” honor. That sprig of rosemary that had so proudly hailed from the top of the previous serving is no more. Ditto for the patches of sauce that had lain artistically on the rim of the original plate. The chef is angry with me, I can tell. The fish lies lumpy, as unappetizing as the lampshade over the pale halo that now filters through the fish’s translucent tissues. Last weekend at another restaurant it was the lamb chop’s second coming that must have been laundered in the washing machine, and with my favorite mint jelly MIA.
            These past few years, Northeast chefs have adopted the culinary spice repertoire of the Southwest. And while my dinner companions range from those who bask in the hot burning sensation to those who admit they’d rather taste the original ingredients, unmasked by jalapeño, I do not have the luxury of tolerating piquant or acidic foods.
            More frequently now, I’ve I become the eccentric complainer at the dinner table. In more restaurants, over more frequently spiced-up dishes, I must publicly detail to the waiter yet again my food allergies. More often, I must seem to my dinner companions as a spoiled brat—or a bitch. But topping it is the chef’s resentment when required to redo my order. I am starving, but the chef lets me know that my audacity deserves no more than IV drip sustenance.
            In my youth, my days passed in relative tranquility until Saturday. Then, my encounter with my grandmother’s salad became my family’s undoing. Sunday through Friday, my mother’s salad traveled from my plate to my stomach uneventfully. But come Saturday, at my grandmother’s, I would refuse to bite into the lettuce. At the sight of her own mother’s quivering lips, my mother would leap over the rituals of warning, begging or coaxing and would revoke my radio privileges for the week.
            The thought of missing Wednesday night with its Top Ten sent me into a fit that was instantaneously met with banishment to the other room. From there I could hear words spoken aloud, predicting my future spinsterhood. Who would ever marry a girl this difficult, stubborn and capricious? I sat alone, wallowing in misery. Because of a few leaves of lettuce I would be relegated to a lifelong of knitting sweaters for all my future nieces and nephews.
            The mystery of my problem was unveiled in the early 90s, well into my  adulthood. A Yale researcher identified the likes of me as “Super-tasters.” With that diagnosis, years of private frustrations and public family feuds came to a halt. Aha! The innocent lemon my grandmother used in her dressing was responsible for my family’s weekly crisis. I sent copies of the report to everyone who had witnessed meal fiascoes in which I had starred. A super-taster, the article explained, had a tongue in which the taste buds were clustered in far greater numbers than in the rest of the population’s, causing the owner of that special tongue to feel flavors at up to four times the rate of “non-tasters” at the opposite end of the bell curve. Most people were otherwise clustered in the center bubble.
            Voila. Now I could also reveal to my hostesses why I didn’t finish that piece of chocolate cake (I tasted her Equal), why I sneaked to the kitchen for a stainless steel soup spoon (I tasted the silver polish,) why I passed on those green peas everyone adored (I tasted the original tin can.) Finally there was an explanation to why I sprinkled sugar on my tongue at the political fund-raising dinner (sugar molecules diffuse jalapeno’s.)
            So now I know, but what good does it do me? Waiters still don’t listen, and when they do, chefs ignore their instructions. While the word “allergy” increasingly sets a three-fire alarm in more restaurants, the chef and staff take it too far. The interpret “black pepper” as “any green or red pepper,” “Chili” as any spice. On the other hand, when I recently ordered the forever-safe chicken soup—without bothering to add a warning—it put my mouth on fire. Whoever guessed that chicken soup had become a Mexican feast?
            Three out of five times I send my dish back to the kitchen, and an irascible chef punishes my impudence with his blandest versions of food, letting me know that if I don’t like his recipe, I’d better dine elsewhere. While I managed to beat the prediction of spinsterhood, thirty years later I still come across no less capricious than in the scenes at my grandmother’s home.
            What’s there to do? I order tea with a scrumptious dessert to fill my empty stomach, to soothe the blisters on both my mouth—and my ego.
            ###
             
            Novelist Talia Carner lives in New York. Her novel, JERUSALEM MAIDEN, (HarperCollins 2011)  depicts the struggle of an Orthodox Jewish woman in the early 1900s against her society’s religious dictates. Check www.TaliaCarner.com .
           
           

         

Baby Production Unlimited?

A crack baby

[Note: I wrote this essay a decade ago. My views have not changed. In these pre-election days, I cannot identify with either party’s views—which is why I am a registered Independent.]

            Recently, a lawyer from Illinois wrote in The New York Times about a woman who gave birth to 13 children, six of whom where born with cocaine in their systems, three with syphilis, and four were HIV positive. At least one of the children was beaten to death by the mother’s boyfriend. Others were physically abused and tortured.
            Promptly ruling out sterilization of the mother, the lawyer argued for the need to protect the unborn—two views I do not share. 
            Yet, I curiously found myself siding with him in his outrage that this woman—ill equipped to deal with life, her body, her emotions, and her addictions—is permitted to produce children as long as her body is capable of beginning the process of pregnancy and continues with little awareness on her part until a baby is born.
            Liberals in our society see any imposed meddling in the process of pregnancy a challenge to the woman’s civil rights. Blocking her ovary-production after two, three—or even six—children is unacceptable to them. What I find interesting here is that a conservative man such as the lawyer who wrote the piece joined the liberals in the same conclusion, albeit reaching it from a different angle.
            I believe that these children should not be permitted to be born. By allowing them to come into the world, we as a society midwife them into unimaginable misery. Passively, we stand powerless as more babies are dropped into our arms and become our responsibility via the myriad services they require from us. Helpless, we face staggering costs that devour our resources and trump other priorities. We assume the cost of lifelong medical care, foster care, and special education—all of which fail to raise the needle on their happiness meter.
            If this mother’s children reach maturity—which they often do due to medical care that is denied children of more functional families—they are likely to engage in violence and crime, often against us. We raise them in our midst only to endanger our own safety. We must engage more law enforcement personnel, prisons, security systems, legal defense and social workers. We pay for rehabilitation programs (for the criminals—not the victims) that are most likely to fail.
            While we are busy taking care of this mother’s children, she will continue to send more sick babies our way. She does not mean to do it. It happens to her. It happens to her body. She is ravished by illness. She has no way to control her destiny because her mind is fuzzy in a confused soup of drugs.
            Why not take a stand and say “No more!” Why not sterilize her?
            As a feminist who supports a woman’s right to her body and to choose abortion if she and her doctor agree, as a person disgusted by the notion that any citizen—including a bartender—is allowed to tell a pregnant woman that she may not drink alcohol, my boundaries are clear: Society ends where my skin begins.
            But what about the reverse situation? What about a case when a woman’s body abuses and exploits society? Where do I draw the line between the right of a woman to her body and my right to protect and defend myself and my resources against the consequences of her irresponsible actions?
            Where does liberalism start and conservatism begin?
            There are times we must cross the line, times when we must be allowed to stop the process of pregnancy before it begins. We are not placing a chastity belt on the woman--she can still have sex. We are not tying her down and removing a kidney to be donated to one who needs it. Irreversible sterilization needs not be the first step. We can start with enforcing birth control such as the five-year Norplant II (or its newest version.) It will give the mother a chance to clean her body from drugs, to get her act together, and to show responsibility toward the children she has already borne. Sterilization may be the answer if the first program fails.
            “Three Strikes” has been the buzz word for repeat offenders. We can stand up to other kinds of offenders and in the process save thousands of children the misery of being born.

            # # #

Author Talia Carner’s latest novel, JERUSALEM MAIDEN, (HarperCollins, 2011) is set at the end of the Ottoman Empire rule of the Holy Land. www.TaliaCarner.com

Tragedies

Rather than write my own blog, I give the space to a brave Israeli who expresses both his outrage and courage in the face of the recent terrorist attack on Israeli tourists in Bulgaria, an attack that killed seven Israelis and wounded 36 others.  

By Ami Baram*: 

Dear Friends,
             Can you imagine getting onto a plane , flying to a beautiful country where the people are nice and friendly , thinking that you are on your way to a relaxing vacation , go through security , which has become the norm around the globe, throwing out your water bottle that you forgot in your bag before passing security and trying to drink the last drops of it at the last second and eventually feeling safe.
            You arrive at your destination in one of Europe’s promising and growing countries , you are with friends that have been with you since childhood, school and army and have seen tragedy all your lives , together. You are with your loved ones, the ones you want to spend the rest of your lives with , holding each other , watching your children grow and have families of their own.
            Then it happens.
            Reality sets in.
            A deviate of mankind, with the guidance of evil itself, feels he has to end the lives of all of those people , who were picked because of who they are , and from where they come. He feels he has to do something , because he believes that he will be stopping so called injustices , which he truly believes Israel commits on a daily basis or he just believes he is on a true mission to end Israel????
            By killing and mutilating Israeli citizens on vacation he surely will bring down the entire Israeli Nation, he believes.!!
            He believes that it will produce fear in our hearts , that we will not wander the world , looking for time off from the troubles within Israel, that we will fear getting onto a plane , visiting cities around the world, because they , the deviates , will be waiting for us and when possible kill us.
            Well , I have one message to his mentors, since he is no longer alive.
            You do not scare us, we can endure pain and sorrow forever. We, with our friends (‘we’) who are on the right side of mankind will persevere. We will look you in the eye and hold you accountable for the atrocities that you have caused , and are planning to cause. We will be there when you show up , armed and ready to fight and defeat you. We will also not wait for you to come to us , we will learn of your plans and stop you before you even make your first move.
            True, you will succeed in some of your acts of terror, and we will lose loved ones as we have in the past, but for those loved ones , we will hunt you down and it will be you who will have fear in your hearts , it will be you who will fear to step out of your home , knowing that at any given time , your end will come.
            I wish that all of us would be able to wander the world freely, with no worries, being able to get on a plane with no need for security, to go to a movie and not be worried that someone will start shooting at us, just to be.
            But reality is different, and we all need to acknowledge that these times are difficult ones, which will bring us together because only together can we defeat the deviates who try to harm us and our families.
            I received a call from a father of a young girl player who will be traveling soon for tournaments and he was concerned about the security after the terrorist attack in Bulgaria. I thought to myself , before answering how do I calm his nerves, what do I say that will relieve him of this fear for his daughters life.
            I asked him, if there was an attack in Israel how many days would you keep your daughter at home. He bravely said , I wouldn't! He realized why I asked that question and said , she will be going , I just want to know that we are aware of the dangers, and I said we are. End of conversation.
            My friends, you all hang in there, trust yourselves, believe in yourselves and remember we are in this together , so we are stronger than any bomb , shooter or evil that comes our way.
            Your friend
            Ami
           
* Chicago-born, Israeli attorney, Ami Baram, is a son of Holocaust survivors. A Major [Ret.] in the Israeli Police Force and a star athlete, Ami represented Israel at international sports competitions as a champion Javelin thrower and now holds key positions in both domestic and international sports and security leadership.  

The Sole of a Shopper

       
           This week I shopped for three “must-have”s: a car, a computer, and a pair of sneakers.
            Researching a new car was simple. Searching various websites by the simple selection of number of doors and the color gave me a preliminary list. Adding the budget—and out popped a few cars. I weeded out those that failed to meet my Number One request that the passenger seat is endowed with every single adjustment as the driver’s. This is a deal breaker for me, since when my husband drives me around, I am relegated to the passenger seat. But it’s my car, where it is one place where I can choose not to be considered a second-class citizen.
            Only two cars matched my specification. At the first showroom, I sniffed the inside of the car for that delicious leather aroma, took out the car for a spin, signed a few papers, and became the official owner.
            Finding a notebook computer was a more demanding task, requiring me to refresh my terminology of as RAM and Megahertz, and understand what the number of pixels on my screen meant. I got the hang of it as I perused through several catalogues and sorted the models that matched my budget. Then I called online companies and got my deal—sight unseen, a free case included. The computer arrived in a box the next afternoon.
            Buying sneakers, though, demoted me to the class of dimwits. “Do you cross-train?” the salesman standing in front of a wall of sneakers asked me, and in the same breath produced a shoe whose top was crisscrossed by a straining pink mesh that reminded me of my late grandmother’s corset. 
            Cross-train. I mulled over the new term until I remembered someone at the gym where I take Pilates (barefoot) mentioning a cross-training machine. “No,” I shook my head. “But I’m size eight, medium.” Surely he’d appreciate an easy-to-fit customer.
            Unimpressed by my helpfulness, he pulled down another pair. “Do you need the sneakers for jogging? Walking on the treadmill?” He pointed at an air-bubble, like that in a plumb-ruler, set in the back of the heel.
            I thought of my nature walks—in the woods, by rivulets and on rocky inclines. How would I keep the air bubble centered? And if I did, how would I see it? “I just need sneakers.” I pointed to a white-and-blue pair that looked benign enough. “What about these?”
            “Do you do aerobics or jazz?”
                        “Yes, I dance.”
                        He drew my attention to the fact that the sole of the sneaker was broader than the top part, which would add balance if I did aerobics.
                        “But I won’t be able to pivot in a jazz routine.”
                        For that, he showed me a split-bottom, where the heel and toe parts were not connected. I could see all the large stones getting caught in the space should I walked on the graveled walkway, let alone in nature.
            He turned to a Lucite display, where, like a trophy, stood a sneaker whose 2-inch bottom seemed to have been made from stalagmites and stalactites meeting halfway, leaving miniature caves. “Shock absorbers,” he said.
            The caves seemed like a perfect refuge for small cockroaches or little snakes. “Too much sneaker,” I said.
            He turned away from the display in obvious dismissal of that option for me; I was undeserving of that special marvel of human engineering.
            Trying to save face I offered, “I have a high arch.”
            His eyes searched the ceiling and his brows crinkled as he considered that new obstacle. Then his gaze traveled back to the selection on the wall, and he pulled down a sneaker. He flexed it lengthwise and widthwise, explaining the technology involved in designing an arch support. I was grateful that at the car showroom no one had suggested I crawl underneath the axel for an engineering lesson.
            The salesman compared this Eighth-Wonder of shoe engineered against a more cushioned shoe, which would provide a better spring.
            If I were jumping hoops, that is. In my compassion toward the salesman, I scoured my brain to give him something to work with. “I’m planning to ride a bike.” Well, I used to, and they say I’d never forget.
            He handed me a single shoe with Day-Glo strips at the back and sides. Like a chef waiting to hear praise of his Banana Flambée, he watched me with eager eyes. Not knowing what to do with the shoe balanced in my hand—sniffing it as I did in the car seemed awkward—I weighed it in my palm. “It’s heavy,” I said.
            He pointed at the strips. “Reflectors. Good for riding after dusk.”
            “I need a pair that would be nothing special, you know, for everything.”
            It was no use. I would have to throw my own lot with good faith. I yanked a shoe off the wall. It had no mesh, or bubbles, or caves, or glow-in-the-dark features. The heel did not extend out. The gentle-looking sole would allow some toe-pointing. The stitching was a bit fancy, and purple-and-yellow combination was not my favorite color scheme, but this simple Neanderthal model, from times before shoe technology had become a university degree, seemed right. “What about these? How much?”
            “A hundred and twenty dollars.”
                       
            I left the store sneakerless. At least I have a car and a computer.
           
            ###
           
              Author Talia Carner's next novel, JERUSALEM MAIDEN, (HarperCollins, 2011.) Please check my website at www.TaliaCarner.comhttp://www.TaliaCarner.com