Senioritis
Remember when you were graduating from high school? You had already been accepted to college, nothing but a catastrophic flame-out would disrupt your life, and you lived in a more-or-less consequence free environment. The subpar grade on the Spanish quiz didn't matter so much. Attendance became essentially a non-issue. Everyone looked forward to Senior Ditch Day as a kind of semiofficial sanction for an existing behavior. Actually, come to think of it, my high school didn't sanction ditch day, but threatened to suspend people who did ditch. Of course, my AP Lit teacher (still among the best teachers I have ever had) told us the day before, "I understand that tomorrow is Senior Ditch Day. All absences will be unexcused. You are required to come to class. On an unrelated topic, tomorrow is going to be a reading day. Everyone come in with a book. I am going to be sitting right here, at my desk, reading my book. Just come in quietly, sit at your desks, and start reading. I love my book, so I don't like to stop reading. I won't look up from my book. I want you to be so quiet when you come in--so as not to disturb me--that I don't even hear you. I hope this is clear to everyone."

But, obviously, I digress. I'm on Passover Break right now; Elana and I just got back from a trip up to the north with her grandparents, and are in Ashdod for the first seder. I have been pretty sick the past couple of days--a nasty cold--but I'm now feeling pretty much entirely better. And, to the point of the entry here, I managed to write seven pages of my monster paper today, completing yet another section (which makes 5 completed sections, and 8 to go) and bringing the page count to 53, already the second-longest academic composition I have ever scribed, with the number 110 hovering in my head as my wished-for but likely too modest limit. It's been really, really hard to get myself to do my work since getting accepted to UPenn. Once that next step is in sight, it's pretty hard to stay focused on this one. I think I have managed to convince myself that all the work I do now will help me for next year, since my studies will essentially continue. But the senioritis kicked in pretty heavily, and what can I say? The sinusitis I had this week didn't help.

Elana's grandmother gave me a magical antibiotic that essentially cured me overnight. Perhaps it restored my will to work, as well. I can't say for sure. But I hope I can keep it going. Because with this paper, the others I have to write, and my language work, quite frankly seven pages a day is about the pace I need to maintain if I don't want to be emailing my finished papers from America this summer.
- posted by @ 3:34 PM

 
Quickly Now, Step Lively
It's been quite a week. Obviously after finding out our big news, we took some time to celebrate and then, more or less, got to work. We now know when we are going to be leaving and where we are going to be going and all of that good stuff, so we can now start planning our move out/return to the Western Hemisphere/move in to Philadelphia. We will have about a month and a half to do it in, but we have help, so I'm sure we'll be fine.

Meanwhile, I've been working very hard on the paper I have to write for Professor Sharon and the tutorial I took with him last semester, which is looking more like a thesis every day (42 pages and counting, and not even half done, but writing itself fairly quickly). I have four other papers to write this semester: one a 20 pager which I've already outlined, collected sources for, and started writing; one a 10-12 pager which I haven't really even thought about (but based on my current rate, it should take me about a week at most), one 5 page reaction paper to a movie, and another 10-12 page take home final exam (which I obviously have not seen yet). Add all of this in addition to Arabic translations, self-motivated German study, the hassles of a move, the desire to travel, family in town, eating and sleeping, and in the end you get a very busy lion (with little time to blog). But, as anyone who knew me when I was young will tell you, I do my best when I am overloaded. I guess that's a good thing, since I intend to be overloaded quite a bit in the coming years.

The political situation here is obviously very tense, with terms like "civil war" being tossed about in relation to the disengagement plan. I have not the time to analyze right now; I tell myself that I have plenty to write without going into a topic like that, which will send me down a wayward path of pseudo-productivity, when the real thing is quite clearly called for. On this note, however, let me just say that I think that most of the Gush Qatif settlers are starting to talk the government about moving en masse to a coastal area between Ashdod and Ashqelon for substantial compensation, most of those who are not talking are saying they won't use violence, and those who remain--who intend to use violence--are a small number. A few thugs with guns firing on the police does not make a civil war, but rather a rough day on the South Side. It's still a frightening image, one which I sincerely hope will not come to pass. But I do not believe that the disengagement plan is, as some doomsayers have prophesied, the beginnings of a split of the Jewish people from which it will never recover. I happen to be among the optimists who believe that it is the beginnings of peace, or at least an improved security situation for the whole country. One must not forget the human tragedy of hard-working people being evicted from their homes by the very government that encouraged them to move there in the first place. But I feel that the alternative is 50 more years of War, and that is something I don't know if Israel can survive. I will write more about this when I have progressed with my papers, and we shall see what will be.
- posted by @ 8:09 AM

 
The Penn is Mightier than the Sword
At 6:45 PM, Israel time, our future for the next five years was set.

I have been accepted to the Ph.D. program in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at the University of Pennsylvania. I am ecstatically happy.

So, here we are. Elana has officially accepted her position at PAFA. I am going to be at Penn, a mere 2.5 miles to the west. I'm amazed that we've been granted such providence, yet again. First we both found what we wanted in Jerusalem, halfway around the world; now, it is Philadelphia that calls to us each and to us both. This is a big moment. Not only do we know where, but we know what: that is, what we are going to be doing with our lives, with the time that we have on this earth.

Well...at least in part. Life is full of surprises and challenges and leaps that are not career-related. But it's sure nice to have an idea of what the launch pad looks like.
- posted by @ 7:00 PM

 
Elana's Show
Elana had her opening in Tel Aviv two nights ago. Her drawings were placed in the most prominent position in the room, and in my objective opinion as well as my subjective, were the best things there.

I'm going to let the pictures speak for themselves.























- posted by @ 11:23 AM