notes

One day I will have that printed out with gigantic letters and hang over my desk in my office: “Giving the finger to what others think will earn you a calm and happy life”.

Some remodeling was being done at my friends’ place. The workers, as usual, were Arabs. During a break, the host struck up a conversation with one of them — the usual stuff, how’s life, how’s the family. It turned out the man had three wives and ten children.
“Isn’t that hard?” the host asked.
“Many children — that’s a wonderful thing,” the worker replied.
“But why?”
“Think about it. You walk through the village alone — you’re afraid of everyone, anyone can push you around. But if you have ten children? Then everyone’s afraid of you. Ten children is a very good thing.”
Remarkable, really: the final conclusion — that one should have many children — is identical in both the Jewish and the Arab worldview. But the reasoning behind it…​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Ashkenazi folk wisdom holds that at least once a year, every Ashkenazi Jew should know what it feels like to be Moroccan. It brings us together.

Today at work, I had a conversation about the difference between my children and myself when it comes to ceremony. The moment I find myself at any official event, I switch — instantly, automatically, and irreversibly — into a more sarcastic mode. I start looking for anything false, unnatural, emotionally overblown, or simply dishonest. And I reliably find plenty.
My children, on the other hand, don’t quite understand their father’s sardonic manner. Worse, it often annoys them.
My own case seems clear enough: it’s inherited from Soviet realities, where there were too many ceremonies, too much manufactured pathos, and too many lies. But Israel is hardly short on ceremony either — or on fake pathos, for that matter. So what explains the difference between my kids and me?
A colleague offered an explanation. In the Soviet Union, participation was not optional. Absence could be dangerous. In Israel, you can take part or simply not show up — no one is keeping score.
It’s a logical explanation, at least as a first approximation. I’ll go with it for now and remain open to better answers.

This will do for a beginning.