Driving Through Neighborhoods

My town doesn't really have neighborhoods.  There are areas with expensive homes, others with marginal housing and crime.  We have a shell of a downtown.  But homogeneity rules.  At one time Jews lived in one place, Italians in another, African Americans of all incomes largely together.  We have largely dispersed, with enclaves notable primarily for housing prices.  Our major employers have succeeded in creating ethnically diverse payrolls.  We do not even have a dominant university where young adults cluster.

Visiting family in Pittsburgh a few times, taking a tour by bus, and now driving around to get to different places around town, my impression is very different.  My family lives in a once run down area being revitalized, but still with a ways to go. The main street, where I have walked and driven, contains small businesses.  After a meal out, I counted places to eat over each of three blocks we walked returning to the house.  The tally:  5-8-4.  All these places are small, no chain franchises.  Each restaurateur must have a dream of creating something from scratch.  None seemed to be magnet eateries attracting guests citywide.

Pittsburgh has lots of schools.  The closest to where I stay is Duquesne, a Jesuit university which I visited by walking tour.  Not an enormous number of kids out.  I went to the bookstore where I purchased a souvenir mug.  Then I walked past classrooms, their relatively new Osteopathic Medical School and affiliated hospitals, probably some dorms and an athletic complex.  Squeezed in were a city fire station and an aging red brick church of uncertain denomination.

After returning to my hosts, I had an event to attend in Squirrel Hill.  This section remains predominantly Jewish, both by residents and by institutions.  My route took me past three large synagogues, including the Tree of Life Building, where a massacre during worship occurred in 2018.  It had construction fencing around it.  The other two congregations have massive buildings, cramped grounds.  In Squirrel Hill, I drove past two Jewish Day Schools, a Mikvah, two start-up Orthodox synagogues, but no hangouts.  Housing appeared mostly single-family with two-story masonry, many fewer driveways than I would have expected, and some light shopping at its perimeter.  I encountered almost no pedestrians.

My hosts recommended lunch in a section known as Shadyside.  Restaurants and specialty shops without national franchises re-emerged.  Few driveways but a city parking facility nearby, as street parking took me a few blocks to find.  The place we visited for lunch has a specialty cuisine.  At noontime most tables were filled by young adults.  I found the housing more mixed.  Apartment buildings and houses subdivided for tenants seemed to dominate.  The buildings seemed worn but rehabbed.  Few yards.  Essentially no litter.  And no pedestrians until arriving near the two business streets.

Driving to my host's house took us through a few more places.  Carlow University I'd not heard of before but we drove past an impressive campus center.  The University of Pittsburgh is well-known.  They have a spiring tower at its center but hoards of young people in hurried transit at noontime on a Friday.  Big football game there the next day.  A little farther took us past the synagogue we would attend on Sabbath, the current home of Tree of Life.  It had a cathedral appearance.  As a Reform Temple, its members had no reason to walk from home on the Sabbath but those living within easily walking distance occupied mansions.

For Sunday, my hosts wanted to shop for baby clothes at a thrift store.  Getting there from their South Side neighborhood brought us through two tunnels and up hills with tricky driving curves.  The housing seems more spread out, likely a place where members of the United Steelworkers lived.

Downtown I saw only from the car, but tall buildings marked its place.

No doubt, places I did not drive past would house people like my wife and me.  House with two-car garage and driveway.  They must be there, maybe outside the city limits.

Pittsburgh's leaders seem to have thought their future through a little better than most city officials.  I don't even know where the steelworks once stood.  Perhaps even a few still do.  Yet in the absence of a primary industry, I saw elements of commerce, hi-tech, a food industry, medical centers to match others across America.  Places seemed crowded, some quite worn, but with little neglect.  A Jewish enclave remains recognizably Jewish.  A major and secondary universities teem with students.  Big Box stores did not clutter the city landscape.  A city of character attracting people of character.

Sending Gifts

Periodically, over many decades, I've sent gifts by the US Postal Service.  I've had the good fortune of living my adult life primarily with my wife, mostly in proximity to her relatives.  My kinfolk had just the right distance.  Easier for me to get to them when I wanted to than for them to travel to me.  Birthdays and Hanukkah generated gifts.  My wife and I would wrap them, put them in cartons by destinations, and ship them to the recipients by parcel post.  E-commerce existed, but not in its current form.  I could order from Sears or JC Penny's catalog, but never did.  On occasion, I would receive an edible package as a gift, maybe fruit basket or an array of nuts in packages.  I never sent them.  To a large extent, I still shop as I always had.  With the emergence of Amazon and onIine divisions of most retailers, sometimes I will select a birthday gift, filling a form to have the company ship it to the recipient instead of to me.  More often than not, the seller would add a nominal shipping fee.  They usually had another section of their order form where I could slip a brief note to accompany the gift.  When I incurred a shipping surcharge, it seemed nominal.  Not much different than me putting the items into a carton then taking it to the post office, or more recently, independent mailing services.

A much different experience came my way recently.  Visiting family on the other coast, one with cramped housing, I anticipated needing a hotel.  That city's hotels were notoriously expensive.  None stood in reasonable walking distance of where she lived.  With some effort, she found a friend who would be vacationing the week of my visit.  I could stay there all but the final night.  

The owners kept a spotless place.  Its floor space paled next to my spacious suburban home.  While my house has been a depository for enough stuff to one day burden my survivors at the Estate Sale, this lady added only tasteful, selective things to her interior.  Each room had a function with just the things needed to enable that function.  Sparse decorative elements appeared, a few wall hangings, glass items arranged in an orderly way on a few shelves, a few hooks and towels in the sole bathroom.

By allowing me to stay there, I saved a thousand or so dollars that would have otherwise gone to a hotel and transportation daily to the people I was visiting.  On returning home, I knew that I needed to send them a gift.  I also knew that my choice had to be something consumable, probably edible.  I doubt if she wants anyone other than herself choosing anything decorative.

Distance and appreciation have created a brisk market for gifts needing delivery.  I had received a few from a company called Edibles, so I looked there first.  They are known for carved fruits, the perfect short shelf life, tasty edible, marred only by what to do with the vase that contains the arranged fruits.  I thought the price seemed high, but the assortment of gifts allowed me to pick something for about $50.  While the company depends on long-distance delivery, I found it difficult to arrange shipping to the people on the other coast when I ordered it from home.  I reviewed My Cart.  That $50 item had a shipping charge of $20.  I understand that it is perishable, but that still seemed extreme.  Let me look some more.  Harry & David, perhaps the prototype of high mark-up, high quality edibles.  You get a few pears for $50 but they also offered less perishable edibles.  And everything comes elegantly packaged to impress a recipient.  $50 items were few but available.  Shipping $18.  Similar findings at Gift Baskets.  Apparently, as an industry, their standard seems to be to maximize revenues by shipping fees well in excess of ordinary employee handling and global delivery services.  A little like what we now see at restaurants and hotels.  Reservation Fee, Resort Fee.  It used to be the car dealers that would sneak stuff into the car you ordered in the 1970s era, when Americans specified the options they wanted. The Japanese companies understood how The Bump, as it was called, irritated drivers.  They just built the popular options as standard features and included them in the price of the car.  The new standard of selling cars based on respect for purchasers.

Still, I do my share of online purchasing.   I will even buy a little extra sometimes to reach the free shipping price threshold.  I know what Amazon charges to send orders from warehouse to destination.  Maybe Amazon sells chocolates or cheesecakes.  They do.  I picked one.  Same exorbitant delivery fee appeared in My Cart.  And when I tried to divert it to my hosts, Amazon took my card number and sent me an automated message that it would come to me instead of as a gift to them.  I was able to cancel it in less than two minutes. I know that Katz Delicatessen, that Manhattan classic, ships worldwide.  As a native of the Indian subcontinent, pastrami, however classic, may not be suitable for the lady who shared her home.  And they have a cheesecake, but some people are vegan.  Same limitation of chocolate, perhaps, but hardly anyone other than LDS spurns that.  Shipping fee $15.

Walmart better appreciates people like me.  They have edible gifts, though not the perishables or elegant gift packaging of the companies focused on shipping gourmet gifts.  I was able to find something there for what I intended to spend.  Shipping fee, pretty much what I would pay for Amazon or other mainstream e-tailer to send an item that does not reach their free shipping minimum.  It let me send the item to the address where I stayed.  It did not let me include a note of thanks.  A few clicks, and my new friend from India, who I did not meet during my visit, will soon have a token of my gratitude to nosh on, something vegan.

The note of appreciation is important, though.  As soon as I authorized shipping, I asked my wife to harvest one of those blank note cards with envelope that we often receive from non-profits wanting a donation. She found a few.  It's been a while since I've written an old-fashioned, once mandatory, thank you note on a handsome, sturdy card with an artistic picture on the front.  A few sentences of thanks jotted down, and signed.  Into envelope.  Stamp and return address.  Mail carrier picked it up the next day.  I'm not sure if my note or the gift basket will arrive at her home first.  She will be appropriately thanked.

Finishing It

Slow but steady usually prevails.  My Space approaches its finishing touches.  I hauled the vacuum cleaner upstairs, then ran it over the green shag rug that covered the room's hardwood floor since we move in more than forty years ago.  I do not know the last time it had been vacuumed, or was even able to be vacuumed.  I have an area rug, a round one that once occupied my office, a treat to myself for passing Endocrinology Boards.  It had been vacuumed a few months back, the first time since retiring, then again.  I have a placed what I want around the entire perimeter, leaving the entire central floor clear.  With some minor arrangement, I could probably make this into a Man Cave.  Maybe beer dispenser.  Maybe pool table.  Maybe round bistro table with two chairs, but I really want to discourage eating here.  My many diplomas stay packaged.  I want a place to be me, not to display me.  I've made my briefcases all functional.  A few final decorative, really functional decisions remain.  Should I replace the lounge chair?  Maybe move it a little forward.  Replace desk chair?  I have a special place for my swivel of another era, purchased at a DuPont Company Surplus Assets Sale for a few dollars.  It leans back too much.  It's tilt adjustments seem stuck.  I could replace it, but I really like sitting in it at my desk.  Might I be more productive at that desk with a fully functional chair?  The rear windows have curtains also left by our home's previous owner.  I don't dislike them.  They are lined and fit the window well, maybe even custom made.  Those windows need blinds.  When I go on Zoom, the light from the windows distorts the Zoom video of me.  That's the last definite purchase/istallation of My Space.  Then I can declare it done.

WZO Results

It cost $5 to vote.  I looked at the slates, all 22 of them.  Were I willing to pay this poll tax, I'd probably go Modern Orthodox, which had either one or two slates.  I don't know which one it was.  For the most part the 22 options each pitched their particular druthers. Some seemed very parochial or self-serving.  Reform wants to manage Zionist related funds to promote Jewish leniency.  Not unreasonable, as Herzl himself lived a secular life.  They got the most seats, though a reduction from where they were.  The US Conservatives which also pitched their egal brand, if not their bureacratic infrastructure could not find enough Americans dedicated to their banner to pay their $5.  Instead, the majority of seats, and control of funds, will go to Ultra-Orthodox parties.  Don't fund transportation on shabbos should satisfy them.  The In Your Face ZOA that always leaves me feeling manipulated fared poorly.  So did the niches, the environmentalists, the social justice advocates, the New Future that really has no future.

While the WZO Congress directs a lot of funds, the American component of this election really only represents a third of what seems to me organizational bloat.  Lots of seats at the table.  Lots of organizations seeking their self-importance with a chance to bang their shoes on the desks in opposition to the inevitable majorities.

Will Israel or American Judaism look any different because of the election results?  Not my expectation.  Religious schools in Israel are already funded.  For all the global criticism the current government receives, they still have reliable systems in place to promote agriculture, commerce, medical care, and responsible land management.  The WZO controlls a lot of discretionary money but the new majority coalition does not seem to have a lot of extravagant demands directed at themselves.

These elections take place every five years.  Very forgettable four years ago.  I anticipate similar irrelevance by next year.

Holiday Dinners

The Fall Calendar.  Kitchen time for me.  My synagogue decided to sponsor a dinner the evening before Rosh Hashanah.  It's a good thing for them to do.  They get people to come and stay for an evening service whose attendance has dwindled.  My experience with congregational meals usually has me heading home regretting that I subscribed. Many reasons, most traceable to a Dominant Influencer culture that grates on me.  Also exclusion from the kitchen, one of my favorite places to be as a Food Committee gave way to Sisterhood, with its Dominant Influencer. Something I revel in at home, designing the menus, inviting dinner guests, executing the creation of an elegant meal using home kitchen resources.  My favorite place to be, even before I get to the dining table.  Going to a synagogue dinner registers as a form of deprivation.

Three key meals, multiple secondary ones as the Holy Days play out.  RH, Shabbos Sukkot, and since traveling to an event with my new grandson, I can assemble a Shabbos dinner from their nearby Aldi for the Shabbos before YK.

I've made the menu grid for RH and Sukkot.  As I did this, the RH structure with my family traditions popped out at me from the grid.  I make a round challah, two if Shabbos.  I've known how to make a round spiral for many years, but this past year I learned how to make a four-strand interior braid with the overall shape remaining round.  We have apples and honey.  The Sisterhood, those ladies who exclude me from the congregational kitchen irrespective of my skill and interests, sell honey as a fundraiser.  Expensive, but better honey than the stuff that supports my honey cake.  That goes with apples.  I've gotten away from gefilte fish.  We still try to get to services on time.  Too many dinner courses make that difficult.  Instead, I make a chicken soup with discounted chicken parts that can be harvested for other uses.  Add carrots, an onion, maybe a turnip, a stalk or two of celery and commercial kosher chicken broth, some peppercorns, maybe a bay leaf.  Pastina or orzo for serving.  My wife makes a special rice kugel, more sweet than savory.  I usually make chicken as the main course. Some forms cook easily, others with more elegance.  You can never go wrong with boneless, skinless chicken breasts, that blank canvas of an entree that can be seasoned, seared, and baked, poached with herbs, made in an Insta-Pot, or prepared in a variety of sauces.  Carrots are the preferred vegetable, having to do with a play on words in their Yiddish form.  I've made glazed carrots, but sometimes plain boiled has advantages.  Dessert is always Honey Cake.  It has a basic recipe with endless variants.  Since we need to head to services, I do not serve alcohol other than a swallow of Concord Grape Wine with kiddush.  Seltzer or herb tea does the job.

Sukkot meals get eaten in our sukkah as much as weather permits.  We try to have guests shabbos, usually people who do not have their own sukkahs.  We also usually get invited somewhere during the holiday, but I reserve Shabbos for serving as host.  Here the menu gets more creative.  Two braided Challot, one for the guest to take home.  I've learned to make loaf gefilte fish. It is poached in seasoned water while still frozen, then cooled and served as slices with horseradish.  Soup appears in the menu, often Middle Eastern harira, sometimes chicken. Salad of some type, always with a dressing that I made myself.  The main course has fewer restrictions. Chicken Cacciatore goes well.  So does a half-turkey breast or a whole roasted chicken.  Maybe Bastilla, an elegant chicken pie assembled with a phyllo crust.  Roast meat gets a kugel of some type.  Vegetable on sale.  Dessert is usually a pareve cake.  Apple, nut torte, baklava.  And wine.  Serving in a cramped sukkah with small square table requires its own planning.

While many American Jews center their religious life around the Holy Days, sometimes the only opportunity to leverage reluctant worshipers to fork over hefty annual dues that keep their congregations functional the rest of the year, the luster for me had long since worn off.  In college, I reconnected with friends I'd not seen that summer.  Services usually needed some juggling with school work.  Each year had a twist or two.  Adult suburbia has became excessively programmed. Large crowds.  People of entitlement, either to the same aliyah they've had forever, choirs that mean more to the singers than the listeners, gatekeepers at the door, an influx before Yizkor with a mass exit on completion, an increasingly politicized Bond Appeal.  A programmed Event.  I come as a spectator for the most part.  It is those hours of sifting through online menus, reading possibilities from my cookbooks, extending guest invitations, building a home sukkah from a kit, and challenging my skill in the kitchen that makes the season special.  It's worth my best effort.

Working for 15 Minutes

 
Two-Minute Rule. A staple of productivity.  If a small task can be done in two minutes or slightly more, just do it. Despite my assorted annoyances with my current low-end smartwatch, it has an easily accessible two-minute countdown timer.  In that time, I can wash all four of the coffee mugs that fit on the outer holders of my dish rack.  If I want to wash utensils, I can do about two place settings before my wrist buzzes.  Watering my aerogarden takes less time than that, even if I have to fill up the two-liter harvested juice jug with fresh water.  Refreshing the potted herbs outside my front door takes a little longer.

Indeed, I can time most any task.  Not how long it takes to do, but how long I am willing to work on it.  My semi-annual projects for this cycle include things that have a lot of steps.  Slow and steady wins the ketchup race, the commercial from my childhood taught me.  Repurposing my adult son's bedroom will take many hours.  Boxes everywhere.  Paper dating back to grade school. Crammed dresser and nightstand drawers.  A desk that he rarely used but was my pride to provide it for him.  Electronics long gone obsolete.  That gets fifteen minutes per session on my timer.  I shoot for two sessions per week, but if only fifteen minutes at a time, I could do more without feeling overwhelmed.  And with the ability to sort things that he may treasure, his awards, birthday cards, special clothing.  Fifteen minutes of sorting or washing or discarding at a time gets it done over about three months.

My own bedroom gets only ten minutes at a time, two or three sessions a week.  I've already been able to vacuum my half.  Surfaces have started to appear functional, sorting just a few sections at a time while discarding very little.

My Space only gets six minutes at a time.  Not that I am unwilling to allocate more of my attention, but after six minutes something stymies additional progress.  But I can see more than an end point.  I recently recaptured my beloved Lands End Canvas Attaché, an indulgence purchase early in my career.  The Eddie Bauer cloth attache sits next to my desk chair.  It holds recreational items, mostly art.  And next to that I store a leather briefcase, purchased for $60 with the intent of looking upscale professional.  It's rarely been toted anywhere.  The cloth ones with neck straps captured the market due to better utility.  The leather one with its dual handles lets me see what I once aspired to have.  Six minutes at a time will bring My Space to what I had envisioned as what I would really do with a personalized part of my house, right down to my display of collegiate coffee mugs from the many campuses I've visited.  My many diplomas sit wrapped and in storage.  My Space has no reason to morph into a monument to myself.

My projects also include expressing myself in various ways as I move into the years of limited anticipated longevity.  Can I write a 90K word book?  If I set my timer for 90 minutes and write 750 words, it will add up.  

Other goals, or really systems to reach those goals, do not adapt as easily to a timer.  My treadmill sessions have a count-up timer, 30 minutes.  I set the intensity.  Stretching has a program of 8 minutes spread over 16 half-minute exercises.  I plan to host three dinners to challenge my creativity, social skills, and kitchen expertise.  Pulling this off requires steps, some like stove or oven times dictated by recipes.  I guess I could surf or read cookbooks for soup or dessert options using a timer, but this type of task I tend to work until the step has been completed.  I like going on day trips, having done one of the three intended for this cycle.  The timer does not aid in completing this.  Rather, I pick a day, destination, starting time, and return time, then do it as a unified effort.  Once every November, I deal with my IRA.  This includes allocation to charities working with my financial advisor, then a few weeks later, depositing the rest of my mandatory withdrawal in my checking account or a different investment account.  The timer doesn't properly segment everything.

But a third of the way through this semi-annual cycle, I've done rather well, even on my manuscript.  The short bursts seem productive, not at all stressful. Visible progress appears.  It makes for a good system to bring difficult initiatives to completion, something that has chronically challenged me.