Working girl

I have been thinking a lot about finding a job lately. I knew this stay-at-home mom gig would be temporary from the beginning. My husband teases me about sitting around watching soap operas and eating bonbons while he's slaving away at the library. There's a grain of truth to his jibes. I don't watch soap operas. In fact, I watch just one hour of television a week. I'm embarrassed to admit that I'm a Lost addict, and every Wednesday night at 9 pm I move my husband's pants off of the television in our room to enjoy my guilty pleasure. And I'm not eating bonbons, on a regular basis, anyway; but I suspect I'm snacking quite a bit more now that I'm not working. And exercising less.

It's clearly time to get rid of the bathroom scale.

The biggest surprise of staying at home is that I'm far less productive than I was when I had a full time job. The apartment isn't as neat, and, thanks to a wide choice of kosher restaurants here, I'm not spending nearly as much time in the kitchen as I used to. So, what am I doing with all of this time? Beats me.

But my husband's ribbing contains only a small grain of truth. A side-by-side comparison of our typical Sundays clearly demonstrates the fallacy of my husband's torments. Consider the following:

Last Sunday morning I took my son to his piano lesson. I came home and sorted and started the laundry, prepared the children's lunch, and got the girls dressed. I took my older daughter to a birthday party and took the other two shopping for Spring clothes. I took the two kids to a playground until it was time to pick up the big sister. I took the kids home, made sure my son finished his homework and practiced his piano, and did some more laundry. I made supper and baked and decorated cupcakes for the baby's second birthday. I fed the kids supper, bathed all three of them, and put them to bed.

My husband took care of the girls in the morning, rotated the laundry a couple of times, and studied.

Bonbons? Hmph.

It's really not fair to make these comparisons right before Passover. I went to four stores today, and I'm only two-thirds of the way done with my shopping. I also cleaned out the inside of the oven and broiler, on top of my usual household duties. Tomorrow I have to finish cleaning the kitchen, I have to take the car in to get it cleaned out. I have to clean out the car seats and strollers, and I have to buy sheets of linoleum to cover my counters with. With luck, I'll be ready to start cooking on Friday for the Monday and Tuesday night seders.

If I sound like I'm on a caffeine buzz, it's just the adrenaline. So far we have eight law students coming to our first seder. Three more are tentative. My husband was just elected president of the Jewish Law Student Association, and his first executive function is to make sure everyone has a place to go for Passover. He's doing a great job.

And I couldn't be happier. Really! I am totally in touch with my inner Martha Stewart. I have been researching recipes on line. I found several delectable looking Sephardic recipes on the New York Times on line, some fabulous looking Italian recipes in the Chicago Tribune, and I've spent hours on All Recipes exploring perfect roasts, chickens, and soups.

And anyway, Passover isn't Passover unless your home is full of family, friends, and strangers coming together to share a 3000 year tradition. We all do essentially the same things, just a little different. I'm really looking forward to incorporating the new with the old. And seeing the looks on our guest's face when we continue my Abuela's startling and loud family custom, is worth all the time spent in the kitchen.

But, of course, the best part for me is seeing my kids participate in the services more and more each year. My diva has been practicing all of the songs and prayers she's been learning in her nursery school since Purim wound down a month ago. Her four questions, the Ma Nishtana, has been getting bolder and louder. Her ten plagues song is as adorable as any song about the horrors brought down upon a Godless nation can be! She came home with a bag full of Passover-themed projects: a seder plate, a bag for the Afikomen, a Hagaddah.

And my Son is a budding Torah scholar. His Hebrew reading is flawless, and his knowledge is broader and deeper than a seven year old's has a right to be. I look forward to his commentary and the tough questions he is sure to pose.

And if my baby manages to stay awake and not pull the tablecloth with all of the food on it off the table, well, I'll be every bit as proud of her, too!

No, I'm not sitting at home with my feet up, watching daytime television, and snacking on candies all day, but the pleasure I receive from being able to enjoy my kids (when they're not driving me batty), prepare elaborate meals, and occasionally steal a few hours to blog or play on-line Sudoku, is almost as good.

Then again, adult companionship, the welcome challenges of the work environment, and a regular paycheck, aren't too shabby, either.

Speed racer

My son has joined the cub scouts. My husband and I thought it would be a good way for him to make new friends. As an added benefit, it has provided him an opportunity to spend more time with his dad. They've both benefited. My son hangs out with kids his age, gets to work on cool projects with his dad, and has a boyish activity all his own. My husband has an excuse to work with power tools. Last Sunday was the culmination of one such project: the Pinewood Box Car Derby. When my son joined "the Wolf Pack", he received a small, hard plastic case with a block of wood and instructions. In a nutshell, he was to design and build a car to race against his troop. My son designed a fierce looking race car, my husband sawed the block of wood into shape, and my son sanded it down. Together they painted it fire engine red, and trimmed it with bright yellow lightening bolts. With the wheels hammered on, and the little Lego man taped into place, they were ready to go. My husband was tempted to call his Eagle Scout brother-in-law for advice, but real men don't need no stinkin' advice!

That afternoon, the men came home victorious! My son had placed second in his very first Pinewood Derby Race, behind a...submarine. And he had qualified for the district competition. That day, they spent a lot of time discussing the improvements they would make to their creation, and comparing it to the others there: The submarine, the skinny one, the block of wood with the crayon designs and wheels. The giggled and smiled as they told me about the cool race tracks and the funny cars. It was beautiful seeing them so relaxed and happy. They don't get the chance to spend time together so often with my husband's law school schedule. It's great that they've made the time.

My son has been quite a bit more relaxed lately. He seems to be enjoying himself more at school, in general. I've seen it in the way he breezes through his assignments without too much complaining, and the way he makes time for his little sisters. Best of all, he's no longer complaining about the other boys in class. He's either managed to work things out, or he's at peace with the whole elementary school dynamic. He is sweeter, more thoughtful, and more affectionate than at any other time since we moved here.

I am especially loving watching him playing with his sisters, and reading to the baby. It's hard to believe that he's almost in third grade. It sounds so old! Last weekend he passed yet another small milestone, and lost another tooth. Another one is wiggling. I'm not sure how he's going to eat with all of these teeth coming out. I may have to feed him mushy foods through a straw! At the very least, I'm enjoying teasing him about it.

Today is the first day we've all been free from the sniffles, coughs, and sneezes of winter for months. My husband and I spent all day yesterday cleaning up the apartment. My dearest Skokie Sistah took the diva for an afternoon playdate, and brought her back with a yummylicious dinner for us. Thank goodness, because my son was nervously eyeing the ingredients I had laid out.

Today I was called in to substitute teach for the physical education teacher at my son's school. I was stuck with 7th and 8th grade boys classes. I was reminded of why I disliked teaching young kids after suffering the abuses of squirrely pubescent boys. Yech! Never again! Give me my kvetchy college kids any day! I wish to take this moment to salute all teachers out there. You deserve a decent paycheck and a medal of honor for all that you do! Putting up with 13 year old boys, and actually managing to get something stuffed into those crusty brains of theirs is nothing short of miraculous!

My husband's Spring Break is ending, and the kid's Passover break is right around the corner. We're moving into Passover preparation hyper-drive now. We got the rest of the apartment cleaned, and now we're eyeing the kitchen with a mix of fear and determination. I picked up 8 boxes of aluminum and plastic kitchen wares from "the disposable kitchen". For a week, we're transforming this place into an environmental disaster zone, but there's no room for real dishes or pots or pans for Passover. We had to sell just about everything when we moved from San Antonio. The one consolation is that at least I won't be wasting precious water washing everything.

In the meantime, the last batch of challah dough is in the bread machine, before it gets cleaned out and packed away. We're down to the bare-bones in our pantry. I'll be whipping up a lovely pasta-rice-kasha souffle or something just to get rid of the non-Passover stuff. I'm just about ready to start the consolidating and clearing phase, where I start tossing out or cooking random things in my pantry in order to make room for Passover goods. Some of the most creative and ingenious cooking occurs over the next week. Let's see... a can of pumpkin puree, Israeli olives and pickles, and onion soup mix...ahah! the perfect marinade for...er...my leftover fish sticks! Mmmm.

There's a kid's song that is roughly translated as: Great joy, great joy, Spring has arrived and Passover is coming! No adult in their right mind is singing that right now, but after one taste of my pumpkin and pickle fish sticks, we'll all be dancing and singing for Passover!

Virus vector, redux

This past Shabbat held great promise. My family and I were invited to spend the weekend with one of my Skokie girls. She had a whole Mexican-themed meal planned for Friday night, and I had prepared a big pan of vegetable enchiladas with a tomatillo salsa to bring along. Saturday night we were planning a couple's game night with the other Skokie girls and their husbands. Pictionary, Scrabble, Bunco, it didn't matter, we were just thrilled at the prospect of a fun weekend with other real, live, honest-to-goodness grown-ups.

This was an especially anticipated weekend for my husband. After three all-nighters in a row, his big legal writing project was completed and ready to be turned in. It was also his chance to spend time with the Skokie Girls, my friends who had begun to take on mythical proportions. Day after day, I have come home with stories, anecdotes, and funny tales of Jewish Moms Gone Wild. My husband just shakes his head in wonder and disbelief at the thought of women in long skirts and head coverings singing "Love Shack". "I'm not sure I want to meet them, I'm a little scared!" He said, half-joking.

It will be good for you, hanging out with adults for once. I retorted.

Friday morning I received a call from my friend as I sat in my dentist's waiting room. "You're not going to believe this. My daughter has strep. She's on antibiotics, so she's probably going to be okay. You're still welcome to come." So said the epidemiologist. We left it up in the air, and I went in to get my teeth cleaned.

I had a bad feeling, both literally and figuratively. The literal bad feeling was an aching in my body, a tickling in my throat, and sinus pressure. I was certain it was allergies, so I took my Allegra, and some Advil, and pressed ahead. The figurative malaise was over the fate of my weekend plans.

I had as lovely a visit with my dentist as one can. Like me, he is a second generation Cuban Jew, a Juban. We shared stories of our mother's childhoods, and departures from their Havana homes. Actually, he shared. I drooled in my examination seat, grunting as expressively, and spitting as ladylike, as possible.

At nursery school pick-up, as I chatted with my Skokie Sistah confiding that I wasn't feeling so great, our kids emerged from the schoolhouse. "Your daughter isn't looking so well." My friend noted. "Our girls are always hugging and kissing on each other. You two should get tested for strep."

And like that, our Shabbat plans went down the drain.

Testing for strep in the Chicago Jewish community is a unique experience. Apparently, it is a big enough a problem that "strep testing" centers exist throughout the community in people's homes. Strep testers are lay people trained with swabs and testing kits to keep the infection in check. My daughter and I rushed into the main office of the organization hours before the Shabbat candle lighting, and got our throats swabbed. We waited patiently while the woman in a dark suit and vinyl gloves mixed drops of solution into a vial with our saliva samples.

"Mazal tov." She said dryly, "You're positive." She wrote up our test results, and faxed them into our doctor's offices. She had the phone and fax numbers to the doctors and the pharmacy memorized. In fifteen minutes we had our diagnoses, our doctors were informed, and our prescriptions were called in. "Refuah shlema, feel better soon." She said as she rushed out the door to prepare her Shabbat dinner. If only all of our doctor's visits were so quick and efficient.

I got home and informed my husband who ran out to pick up our prescriptions. I called my dentist to guiltily confess that I inadvertently exposed him to a nasty infection, and I settled in with a cup of tea. It was going to be yet another Shabbat at home. Luckily, we had a nice pan full of enchiladas, and I whipped up a pot of pinto beans, rice, and tortillas for the kids. The giant frosted cookies with sprinkles I picked up for them didn't completely assuage the letdown, but they didn't hurt, either.

So there we were again on Saturday, in completely familiar territory: laying about sick and miserable for another Shabbat, waiting for the antibiotics to kick in. Isn't there a country western song about that somewhere?

Seconds after Shabbat ended, I got a call from Skokie.

"How are you?!!"

Hack, hack, cough, cough. Better, I think, sniffle, sniffle.

"You're not going to believe it, but I got it, too!"

As they say: we plan, God laughs.

But not all of our plans were quashed. My husband and I put the kids to bed, and took out the scrabble board and had our own couple's game night. We haven't played in years, which is too bad. My husband and I used to love playing scrabble together. On one of our first dates we played in a tea house in Boulder, Colorado. I suspect that he was so charmed with my creative wordplay that he decided to marry me right then and there.

It was quite reasonable to think that if cows were bovine, that BOVA could, in all likelihood, be a perfectly legitimate word. And maybe I spent too much time in a graduate school computer lab, but I could have sworn ANOVA was a word, and not merely an acronym. And VINT? Well what else would a vintner do?

We did pretty well for being as rusty as we were. I am not too humble to admit that I smoked my smarty-pants law school student 374 to 289. And as always, I learned something new. Did you know that "CROUP" was spelled with a U? Did you know that UBEND isn't a word? (HA! Tell that to a plumber!). QI is not found in the scrabble dictionary (tsk, tsk), but LI is. An AI is a three-toed sloth, and GAR is to cause or compel. We thought it was a fish.

Today is more or less back to normal. My husband took our son to cub scouts for his pinewood car derby. My son painted his race car fire-engine red with bright yellow lightening bolts while his father was on the internet trying to figure out ways to legally rig the car. I'm home practicing my daughter's tap and ballet routines with her, reading to the mini-marauder, and coughing up a lung. It's the most exercise I've gotten in weeks. Don't discount the caloric expenditure of a good, deep, bone-wracking cough! If I don't dislodge connective tissue, I'm sure I'm building up some muscle somewhere.

It's not how I planned to get a workout, but these things are rarely entirely in our control.

March madness

March Madness isn't only about Basketball (go Horns!). The whole month has an aura of lunacy about it. Purim caps off the month's nuttiness with drinking, eating, dressing up, and a big, noisy ruckus. This year, Purim was followed by Pi day (3.14), a little known, but geekily fun celebration of the most famous mathematical calculation. The day after is the historical Ides of March (beware!), notable for the famous assassination of Caesar. My niece's birthday (not a national holiday...yet) comes right after, followed by my favorite March indulgence, St. Patrick's day, which I celebrate, not as an orthodox Jew, but as a woman with a useless degree in Irish History. And bundled up in there somewhere, is a special celebration all our own, our anniversary.

March goes out, not like a lamb, but like a neurotic OCD psych patient, in the ultimate expression of insanity: Passover preparations.

All of this revelry and self-flagellation occurs against the multiple personalities of Chicago weather - 70 degrees one day, 30 the next.

I love all of these celebrations. I love the baking and costume shopping and playful pageantry of Purim. And as much as I complain about it, there is something cathartic about Passover cleaning and cooking. The spiritual metaphors are cliched, but only because they're true. The process of cleaning out the nooks and crannies of my kitchen, separating the good from the bad, the clean from the unclean, the unleavened from the big and fluffy, are all part of a journey figuring out what's important in life. What can we get by without for a week? It takes real spiritual fortitude to learn the lesson of freedom amidst the servitude of Passover preparations.

And like most important journeys, the first step is the hardest. I will spend weeks just thinking about, fretting over, and organizing my cleaning. I talk about it with my husband, stress about it in the shower, and ponder purchases as I rush past the Passover section of the grocery store.

My son finally asked me when we were going to start cleaning. I told him that I had to make a plan of attack.

"Attack?" He asked, puzzled. "What do we need a plan of attack for?"

I'm sure my eyes flashed as I responded, perhaps a bit too enthusiastically: For the war on...chametz! I know it sounds over-the-top, but I'm telling you, it's getting ugly out there. People are swarming the grocery stores already, grabbing the essentials before they disappear. I haven't even figured out what my essentials are, other than matzah. I was in the grocery store today, and I commented to a wild-eyed woman that I hadn't even begun to think about Passover. She looked at me with a mix of disgust and pity.

"Passover's right around the corner!"

But if I'm too caught up on matzah and charoset, I might miss the opportunity to celebrate the rotundity of the fourteenth of March. I might forget to pay homage to my favorite Irish authors, James Joyce, J.M. Synge, W.B Yeats, Sean O'Casey, and Flann O'Brien over a nice cuppa Irish tea and biscuits.

I know, I know, I'm being a complete hypocrite. Just a month ago I was haughtily proclaiming that Orthodox Jews don't "do saints", when the truth is that I do "do saints"; at least one fifth century saint who was kidnapped by Irish bandits from his home in Roman Britain, only to return to convert the pagan island. If that wasn't a big enough deal, he is also credited for ridding Ireland of snakes, inventing the shamrock, and discovering U2.

I don't "wear the green" or march in parades. I don't even drink beer. But in my own small way, I acknowledge the day the whole world celebrates a small country I once called a home away from home. A country that is both bitterly anti-Israel, and fiercely proud of its Jewish Heritage.

James Joyce once joked that the Irish never persecuted the Jews, they just didn't let them in. Yet, years ago I was treated to a half hour long discourse on the history of Jews in Ireland by an Irish cab-driver! I learned about the two Jewish Lord Mayors of Dublin, the Irish President of Israel and his father, the first Chief rabbi of Israel. And I got a quick lesson on Jewish representation in Ireland's Parliament, the Dail.

So much for Joyce's quip.

Raising a cup of tea to my spirited adventures of long ago is about as close to excitement as I get these days. March has become more maddening than madness. I'm happy for the opportunity to take my focus off of the P-word. These minor celebrations are a small but welcome respite.

So I'll go ahead and eat round foods on Pi day. I'll raise a toast to Eire on St. Paddy's. I probably won't wear a toga on the Ides of March, but I may get my husband to feed me grapes while I'm reclining on the couch!

And for our anniversary, well, we'll think of something.

Let the madness begin!

Spring song

I'm afraid to say anything. I don't want to invite the evil eye, the ayin ha ra'ah, but (ptui, ptui, ptui), it looks like Spring is finally here. And now that I've actually expressed this thought, I have guaranteed a late season blizzard.

We awoke on Saturday to brilliant sunlight, and melted snow. Before I even set foot outside, I could feel the change of seasons in my skin. Almost imperceptibly, my muscles and bones unclenched, and my whole body shuddered and sighed in relief. For the first time in weeks, we all awoke healthy and happy. I hustled my husband and kids into their Shabbat clothes, fed them the bread pudding I baked as a desperate measure to rid my home of leftover challah, and set out to synagogue, for the first time in weeks. Maybe months. In honor of this glorious day, I suggested we hike the three miles up to the Sephardic synagogue, and to my giddy surprise, my husband agreed.

I love going to the Sephardic Synagogue. It's a small, older congregation, but the men remind me of my Cuban uncles. The way they dress, their formal, quiet demeanor, their decades old elegance transport me to a familiar, but distant, time and place. And when they recite prayers in Ladino, the ancient, dying language of Spanish exile, it reaches deep into my heart. I have a strong spiritual connection here.

My children like it, too, which puzzles me. There are no other children at the Sephardic synagogue, apart from the rabbi's grandsons, who are fortunately my son's age. We don't come often enough for the boys to have developed a fast bond, but they get along well enough. My children have far more peers, friends, and acquaintances at our usual synagogue, so it's not the social scene to which they are drawn.

I suspect it has to do with the rabbi. After services I went to greet him. He smiled warmly and told me that my children were very sweet. "They came right over to wish me a Shabbat Shalom!" He informed me, clearly impressed. Frankly, I was impressed, too. I didn't realize my children knew the proper protocol and honor to bestow upon a rabbi. But they got it. When my husband was called up to the Torah, the three kids ran up to the bima, the pulpit, and stood by their daddy's side. The rabbi smiled at them, and shook my son's hand. And like a good Sephardic wife, I stood up and beamed, like my abuela and her mother before her would have.

Even my husband likes to go to the Sephardic synagogue every once in a while. It's a nice change of pace, but more importantly, we are always given a warm reception. It's a small congregation, and there is a heartbreaking dearth of young married couples and children, but it's what a synagogue should be, an extension of family.

Buoyed by the sunlight and warmth, and energized by the six mile walk the previous day, I decided to press my luck with the children on Sunday. After my son's piano lesson and a quick lunch, I strapped the baby into her stroller, brought out my son's scooter, and led my brood out towards the walking path and sculpture gardens. We picked up some sugar and fat laden snacks at the kosher Dunkin Donuts and began the second long walk of the weekend. My legs and lungs couldn't get enough fresh air and exercise.

My children are pretty sheltered. They do not watch a lot of television, nor do they see a lot of movies. It's not that I am fundamentally opposed to all television or movies, but I am extremely picky about what I deem appropriate; and I do take very seriously the American Academy of Pediatrics policy that: "Until more research is done about the effects of TV on very young children, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) does not recommend television for children age 2 or younger."
(http://www.med.umich.edu/1libr/yourchild/tv.htm)

In other words, I'm a hardcore mom, and my kids live in a cave.

This fact really hit home that Sunday afternoon when we walked down the sculpture gardens, munching on our donuts, to the mall to find new shoes for my daughter. "Where are we going?" My son asked. To the mall. I responded, breezily.

"What's a mall?" He asked, with the naivete of a boy raised in a secluded jungle. I nearly snorted the contents of my frozen latte through my nose

I herded my small brood into the bustling mall, and their eyes popped open as big as saucers. I could see the sensory overload in their dropped jaws. Um. This is a mall. I lamely explained, in utter shock. My children listened with fascination as I told them about the many days I spent just hanging out in malls as a young girl. "What did you do at the malls?" The word sounded foreign in their mouths.

Um...er... I stammered. You know, I just sorta hung out... Walked around... Looked at stuff... With friends.

It was useless. They had no reference point. They asked an endless stream of questions about everything they saw - video screens blaring advertisements, shoe stores, toy stores, department stores, food courts - until we ran into our cousin and her boyfriend. I was relieved for the distraction. This line of questioning was turning out to be more fatiguing than the walk. We left the mall, and as promised, headed to a park.

The baby was sound asleep in her stroller and my son was starting to fade by the time we got to the busy playground full of families enjoying the fabulous warm day. It was getting close to dinner time. I called my husband and made arrangements to meet him at the pizza place down the street. My poor kids had hit a wall. They were exhausted from all of the walking and scootering, and they were hungry. I loaded them all onto the stroller, and pushed them, like Sisyphus rolling the boulder up the mountain, to the pizza place.

Every muscle in my back and legs was protesting almost as loudly as my tired kvetchy kids. My husband showed up dazed from too many hours at the library, and we collapsed in our booth, the five of us, looking like the weekend warriors that we were. It was ludicrous to think we could shake off the sedentary cobwebs of a long, drawn out winter in one short weekend. Or, in my husband's case, make up a weeks worth of work in one day.

We staggered home and collapsed.

My son awoke the next day with a fever. He lay in my bed sucking on Popsicles and drifting in and out of sleep. I vacillated between feeling guilt that I wore the poor kid and his immune system out, and enjoying our quiet time together.

As the weather turns fair, we are emerging from our winter cocoons like ravenous butterflies, flitting about for nectar. We are hungry for the warmth and brightness of the sun that stood so aloof for so long, teasing us with it's light, but denying us the relief our chilled bodies needed. I'm anxious to soak myself and my children in the vitamin D drenched rays of the sun, and to clear some space for my husband to study.

Winter took a toll on us. Our psyches felt the heavy weight of sweaters, coats, and hats. Our bodies were racked for weeks with winter ailments: flu, stomach virus, sinus infection. Even our spirits flagged, hunkered in at home for Shabbat after Shabbat, and even Purim.

It is ironic that with release of the Spring warmth from our cold captivity coincides with Passover and final exams. The timing is like the yin and the yang of freedom and responsibility, tears of sowing, laughter of reaping. But like my son's sudden fever, the return of cooler weather is just around the corner, waiting to remind me that life is never predictable, never stagnant, never so reliable. We get tastes of joy only to be snapped back down to struggle again.

I really enjoyed the time I spent walking with my family. Even my son's litany of complaints on the way to synagogue ("I wish we could drive!", "Are we there yet?", "I need a break!"), couldn't dampen my mood. But the temperatures are going to be dropping again this weekend, and I'm really going to have to get us ready for Passover soon.

But it can wait a day or two.

I'm enjoying the brief respite while I can. Tonight I called my Skokie girls: It's your yetzer ha ra'ah! Put down that scrubbing brush and spray cleaner - it's ladies' night at the pizza place! Women-only karaoke - you know you want to!

Three of us sat at the back of the restaurant, ignoring the timid ballads and off-key melodies of orthodox girls eager to express themselves, and sang our way through the song list. When we finally got up to sing the B52's Love Shack, we belted it out, more chutzpah than skill. And it felt great - like a perfect Spring day.

Dark days

I am sitting in a dark apartment. The only light on is the blue glow coming from my computer screen. I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I'm sitting in obscurity because if the lights were on, I'd see the toys, clothes, and books scattered all over the living room floor. If my home were illuminated, I would have to face the black beans and rice sprinkled on my kitchen floor, or the stack of folded laundry needing to be repatriated to its drawers. If I turn on a light, I have to face my failures as a stay-at-home mom. That would be far more painful than the eye strain.

To worsen matters, Purim is over, and as any Jew knows, that can mean only one thing: Passover cleaning. The real reason we drink on Purim has little to do with any commandments regarding good and evil. No one wants face the task at hand with a clear head.

To the uninitiated, Passover is the commemoration of the Redemption of the Israelites after centuries of slavery in Egypt. The celebration lasts eight days, during which, Jews refrain from eating leavened foods, and perform the ritual feast of the "seder", which incorporates symbolic foods into a retelling of the story of the Exodus of the people of Israel. It is a festive meal, often lasting late into the evening, or wee hours of morning, as families read, eat, sing, and pray together.

If only it were so beautiful, meaningful, and simple. The behind-the-scenes insanity that goes into pulling off a Passover celebration that appears to be beautiful, meaningful, and simple, is nothing short of social psychosis. I have heard Passover cleaning described as "Spring Cleaning on steroids". Rabbis, for decades, have admonished Jewish women to relax. "Remember," they have advised, generation after generation, "dust is not chametz".

Chametz is not a word you hear everyday. In fact, in Jewish communities it is essentially forbidden to utter it until after Purim. The very sound of the word turns relatively calm, stable, and put-together women into ashen paranoiacs, stuttering, shaking, and looking rather unsettled. Chametz is a Hebrew word that means leavened food, or food that contains leavening. Leavening can include yeast, baking powder, or any other substance that causes foods to ferment and rise. Breads, muffins, cookies, and cakes are obvious examples. Others are more surprising, for example, children's molding clay.

Hey, who hasn't taken a nibble as a kid?

Cleaning for Passover doesn't just mean ridding your kitchen of the offending items. If you have children, it means trying to imagine how many nooks and crannies a child can reach and hide the uneaten half of their peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I know of women who turn out all pockets, search under mattresses, in books, behind books, in drawers, and under sofas, armed to the teeth with vacuum cleaner attachments. I know one woman who starts with her upstairs months before Passover is an inkling, and seals off the bedrooms as No Chametz Zones, before any other reasonable human being is even ready to utter the dreaded word.

But that's just the start. Getting rid of the chametz is only half the battle. Many women follow that up with professional carpet, drapery, and sofa cleaning. Once the rest of the house is cleaned, it's time to take on the kitchen. After snapping on the heavy-duty rubber gloves, the typical orthodox Jewish woman attacks her kitchen with a viciousness usually reserved for pedophiles and anti-Semites. Every surface is scrubbed, from floor to ceiling. All dishes, pots, pans, and cookware deemed non-suitable for Passover use are boxed up or sealed away in a designated chametz cupboard. Surfaces that can be used uncovered get a dousing in boiling water. All other surfaces are covered, often in ingenious ways: heavy duty aluminum foil, heavy duty plastic sheets, or my personal favorite, sheets of linoleum. These coverings are taped down with industrial strength tape.

And we're just getting warmed up.

Ovens are thoroughly cleaned, and then put on self-cleaning mode. If your oven isn't self-cleaning, it is blow-torched. The contents of the refrigerator and freezer are removed, and the insides of the appliances are scrubbed clean. Some women go as far as cleaning under and behind the refrigerators and ovens. I once caught my parents removing the oven door to clean out the gunk in the hinges, and they're not that observant! People do not act in rational ways during Passover.

The growing trend of people sealing off their homes and going on Kosher-for-Passover vacations is not surprising. I suspect if polled, most women would gladly abandon ship and let someone else sweat the details. Lest you think this is evidence of some horrible patriarchal society where women are some helpless victims, let me clear up this little misunderstanding. Women are not the victims, but the victimizers. In Israel, one of the great Rabbis, hoping to ease the pressure, reminded women that Passover was a time to celebrate freedom, not to commit themselves to servitude. Did the women rise up and cheer this Rabbi as their modern day Moses, liberating them from their hated tasks?

The poor, well-meaning man was taken to task by the very women who cursed and cried every year when faced with their annual Mission Impossible.

One of the songs we sing each year is roughly translated as: "We were slaves to the Pharoah in Egypt." Children throughout Israel have altered the words to sing, "We were slaves to Mom in the kitchen." Before anyone harshly judges Jewish men as the perpetrators of this cruel labor, consider the fate of many a pitiable husband who has been conscripted into his wife's Passover army, moving heavy furniture and appliances, scrubbing oven racks with steal wool and caustic cleaners, and treading lightly as his sweet, gentle wife is transformed into a raving lunatic armed with a spray bottle and scrubby sponge.

So here I sit, on the verge of a panic attack, with the lights off, in a complete state of denial. My husband is still recovering from his succession of illnesses, and Spring Break is days away. He is reasonably expecting to make up this lost week of reading and assignments, and in my heart I really want to believe that I will let him go to the library each day of his break to work undisturbed. But Passover is weeks away. And the terror is beginning to descend over me.

It's best to keep the lights off for now.

Virus vector

Welcome to the virus vector. My husband was the first to introduce the microbes into our home. He brought a lovely selection of flu, stomach virus, and sinus infection home with him from law school, and earned himself a paid vacation to bed for a week. Somehow, the rest of us managed to stay more or less healthy, except for the nagging coughs and running noses. Dutifully, I shipped my children off to school and stayed home to tend to my ailing hubby. All was well, until I tried to give him a saline nasal irrigation treatment. Not knowing what I was doing, I had him lie down while I squeezed half a bottle of nasal saline solution up each nostril. It was supposed to clear up his infection, according to our old pediatrician, NPR, and my sister. I just managed to force all of the goo gunking up his sinuses directly into his ears. The salt burned him from his throat to his nose, up into his ears. For hours, he snorted, snuffed, and sneered at me. "Next time, " he muttered, "figure out what you're doing first!"

On Wednesday, my little princess came down with a stomach virus. She turned a lackluster shade of green and proceeded to throw up everywhere. My husband ran her to the doctor the next morning. By Friday, all three of my children had the bug, and I was washing my 9th load of laundry in two days. Having been through this before with my son, I knew the urgency of getting my kids to eat. Soup broths, ramen noodles, tea, Vitamin Water, and ginger ale were meticulously fed at 15 minute intervals, a teaspoon at a time to each child. For Shabbat dinner I added kosher jello to the repast, just for some variety. On Saturday morning I was scrubbing the bright red gunk out of my son's carpet. We all stayed home coughing, moaning, wheezing, and sniffling in unison. I held on as best I could, praying we'd all be well enough to enjoy the Purim festivities.

By Saturday night, everyone was feeling noticeably better, but we thought it best to keep our crud to ourselves. We dressed up the kids, and my husband did a valiant job reading the Megilla for the first time, trope and all. It was an impressive feat, almost as impressive as our kids staying up and alert for the whole thing.

After the reading, I put the whole lot of them to bed and stayed up to make more hamentaschen. I was inspired to make backwards hamentaschen - chocolate cookie dough, with white chocolate chips in the middle. I had never seen it done, and thought I was breaking new Purim pastry territory. A Purim pioneer! I rolled out the dough, melted the chips with a little margarine to soften them, and then overcooked the heck out of them. They were quite crispy by the time I had finished the last batch at 11:30 pm.

And, as it turns out, quite unoriginal. One of the first Mishloach Manot baskets we received had a baggy of them.

And to make matters worse, mine were horrible. They made me so sick, I couldn't sleep, writhing, and moaning in nauseous agony. I grabbed one of the ubiquitous trash buckets by the bed and waited and prayed. Nothing came out and I finally fell asleep, but by the morning, I realized that it wasn't the cookie, which the ballerina princess, feeling much better declared "the best!" The bugs had finally caught up with the Mommy. I woke up, my stomach feeling no better than it had before, and now the rest of my body was aching.

Our first Purim in Chicago has not gone as planned. We're quite a sight. We all look pretty scary without the masks. Roles have been reversed. My husband made up the Purim baskets, cleaned the kitchen, fed the kids, dressed them in their costumes, and took them out to deliver the baskets of homemade hamentaschen ranging from fair to middlin' to gag! Ack! Gaaah! This has not been a banner year. But that's Purim! "Ve nahafoch hu", everything topsy turvy. The main caregiver (me!) is being comforted and cared for by her family, cookies that are meant to be sweet are nasty. And a celebration meant to be public, joyous, and rowdy, is quiet and subdued.

In a way, I suppose that's appropriate.

My husband took the kids out to deliver the baskets, and then they're going to the synagogue to hear the Megilla again. Our friends have been dropping by baskets all day. Beautiful, creative, funny, and smart treats to fulfill one of the commandments for the day. I'm a little embarrassed by our weak offerings this year, but if we manage not to infect everyone, we've done a good mitzvah, indeed.

Happy Purim!

Purim is this weekend. I always dismissed it as a lightweight in the panoply of Jewish holidays. It was, to me, one of those: "They tried to kill us. We defeated them. Let's eat!" holidays that are so often the subject of Jewish humor. How deep can a holiday about dressing up in costumes, getting rowdy during the reading of the Scroll of Esther, and drinking and eating really be? You don't even get a free pass out of work for Purim - and you call this a holiday?

There were always hints to the serious messages underlying the festivities of Purim. The preceding day is traditionally a fast day. This year, the fast falls a few days early because of Shabbat. There were other hints, too. Giving gifts to the poor, giving gifts of food, and the peculiar obligation to hear the reading of the entire scroll of Esther, not once, but twice.

Several interesting themes provide the subtext for the holiday of Purim. Starting with the name, "Purim" or lots, as in casting lots. The lots in question were the lots the wicked Haman drew to determine the day the Jews of Persia would be massacred.

One of the major themes of Purim is the concept of randomness versus predetermination. It is said that Haman, the villain of the story was doomed from the beginning because he believed everything in life is random, a chance occurrence, the luck of the lottery.

For those of you who do not remember the story, Purim commemorates events that occurred during the Babylonian exile of the Jews, 2,300 years ago. The Persian King Achashverosh threw a series of lavish parties, some say to celebrate the humiliation of the Jews after the destruction of the holy temple in Jerusalem. His queen Vashti, the story tells us, refused to appear naked at one of the banquets, and was executed for her impertinence. The king sought out all of the beautiful women of the kingdom in order to select his new queen, and chose a woman named Esther who kept hidden her Jewish identity.

At this time Haman, the king's grand vizier, was insulted by Esther's uncle Mordechai (some sources say he was her husband), who refused to bow down to him. He collectively punished the Jewish people by passing a decree declaring all Jews were to be put to death on the 15th day of the month of Adar.

Queen Esther took a great risk revealing her true identity to the king, and exposed Haman's plot to murder her and her people. But the risk paid off. The king ordered Haman and his sons to be hanged, and the Jewish people were saved.

The scroll of Esther is a remarkably complex document, despite the relative simplicity of the story. There are many layers of meaning between the lines. It is interesting, for example, that the name of God never appears in the entire scroll, yet it is clear that God's hand is in everything that occurs in the tale. That Esther should be chosen as the new queen, or that Mordechai should happen to understand the language that was spoken by the two men planning the assassination of the king are two examples of coincidences that are not quite random.

We also see this pattern of divine intervention in the themes of opposites, a topsy-turvy world. Haman wished to bring shame to Mordechai by making the Jewish leader bow down at his feet. Instead, Haman was required to lead Mordechai through the city of Shushan on a horse. Haman wished to kill all of the Jews, but was hanged himself, on the very gallows he built for Mordechai. The more Haman tried to bring and end to the Jews of Persia, the more he sealed his own fate.

Finally, Purim teaches us a great deal about our purpose in life. Mordechai asked Esther to speak with the king to halt the genocidal decree, but Esther hesitated. Intruding on the king, unbidden, could have dire consequences. Mordechai said to her that the Jewish people would be fine, their salvation would come from elsewhere, but she and her family would be lost. Why else, he reasoned, would God have brought you to this place at this time, if not for this one purpose?

In other words, this zany holiday of dressing up, drinking, and making a loud racket with noisemakers, is really about the meaning of life. Things happen for a reason, even when we can't understand the reasons, and each of us has a role in life, a way to contribute to humanity. Finally, the greatest lesson hidden in the Scroll of Esther, is that even when it's not readily apparent, God is always present in our lives.

The kids should be bursting with excitement about the upcoming holiday, but my poor ballerina is home sick with a stomach virus. She's been sitting in my bed, watching television with the saddest expression on her face, all day. It breaks my heart. She can't eat, and she can barely drink. She and her still sick daddy make a fine pair, indeed. I just hope she's up to donning her beautiful blue princess costume and enjoying the festivities by Saturday night.

Big brother is excited about his costume. He's going to be a knight in shining armor. I couldn't imagine a more appropriate costume for him. Yesterday I commented how he was eating everything I sent him for lunch. He looked at me rather sheepishly, and finally admitted, "I don't always eat it myself. Sometimes my friends don't bring enough snacks, so I share with them. Two friends came to me the other day and asked me if I had any extras. I only had one extra, so I gave it to the one who was my better friend, but I felt bad about it. The next time they came to me I decided to do eenie-meenie-miny-mo, because it was more fair, but it turns out I had two snacks! So, I let the other kid pick first."

I wanted to hug and kiss my little boy right then and there. Not only was he honest, fessing up to his mom that he was sharing his lunches at school, but he was kind, generous, sweet, and fair-minded about it, too! He was truly a knight in shining armor to his fortunate friends. I stuck an extra snack in his lunchbox this morning.

Like the story of Purim, I wonder what the hidden message is here. My son comes home some days so sad, complaining that no one wants to be his friend, yet he clearly has a reputation for kindness and generosity among his peers. What's going on here? Is this the normal behavior for seven and eight year olds, or is he exaggerating when he tells me no one likes him? How could they not?

On Purim we wear masks, metaphors for the many faces we show the world, hiding close to our hearts who we truly are. Which is the mask and which is the real boy? I like to think the sad, down-hearted, friendless boy is hiding a sweet, generous, friend to all. Perhaps the real story is his expectation that everyone would make such sacrifices for their friends. That all kids would gladly give up their string cheeses and fruit leathers for a fellow second-grader in need.

The baby doesn't have a clue what's coming. We'll dress her up and set her loose. There isn't a better day in the Jewish calendar for wild kids: the noisemakers, the hamentaschen, the crazy costumes. I just hope we're all well enough to attend.

My husband, in the meantime has missed a week of school trying to recover from his miserable flu. It has been wonderful having him home, even if he's spent most of it coughing and sleeping. But the illness is only the beginning. I can already sense the stress he's feeling having to catch up in his classes, his reading assignments, and finding a summer job. I suspect I'll being flying solo this Purim, as my husband fulfills his minimum obligations, and ducks out to study.

But of course, there's a reason for everything. Somewhere in the great scheme of this universe, we are exactly where we're supposed to be, hopefully doing what we're supposed to be doing for the betterment of humanity. Layers of meaning are entwined in the extra loads of laundry I'm doing, the hamentaschen I'm baking, and all of the hard work my husband is doing. And God's hand is in everything we do, the meaning obscured from the eyes of an exhausted law school widow.