I have a friend named Sara Benincasa who I have known for almost a decade, since our days tromping around Europe as part of Emerson College’s Kasteel Well program. Even then I knew Sara was not only a delight, but she was dangerously smart and laugh-until-you-lose-consciousness funny. So it was no surprise to me that, nine years down the road, she would be doing her brilliant stand-up all over the country, appearing in magazines and rounding up a bevy of famous, funny folk as her friends. Well, today I got an email from my lovely friend telling me that she wrote about none other than YOURS TRULY on her blog! I am truly honored and way excited. Does this mean I’m actually legit? If you’d like to read Sara’s two cents about Reezie, check out http://sarabenincasa.wordpress.com/. Check out the rest of her site to see some of her outrageous standup and short videos (her Sarah Palin stuff is too good).

Dad is leaving this afternoon (sniff…) but I’m not as devastated as I was when Shira left because I’ll be seeing him again, Gd willing, in about two weeks. I have to admit that I have been a sorry excuse for a hostess. Sick, tired and childcare-less, home is where I’ve been parked for most of this week, save for our archaeology expedition and the occasional trip to the park and the grocery. Dad has been content to go out on his own when the mood strikes (yesterday he spent the day at Kever Rachel, Maarat Hamachpelah and Kever Rut, all burial places of our foremothers), or hang out here with me and watch Rodney Dangerfield on YouTube. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to escape what I am calling the Curse of 43 Ramat HaGolan; if you stay in this apartment for more than 48 hours, you are going to get sick. You all know about me and Yonah; Shira left here with a lovely case of Conjunctivitis and now poor Dad has a stomach flu. At least I know it’s not just me.

Having Dad around for the past week has made for a nice distraction but as soon as he leaves it’s down to business. I have 15 days to pack up this place, sell anything we’re not taking with us (basically everything except the clothes we came with) and get ready for life back in the States. This may sound exhausting, but I am actually getting a charge out of actually DOING something. As my husband says, “She’s the type of girl who says she’s going to do something, she does it”. So let’s roll.

Over the past year or so I have been educating myself about natural living, organic farming and the complete disaster area that has become the food industry in the United States. Some favorites are “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” by Barbara Kingsolver, “In Defense of Food” by Michael Pollan, and now I have a new favorite, thanks to my brother and future sister-in-law. For my birthday, they sent me an amazing book called “Eating Animals” by Jonathan Safran Foer. I (forgive the pun) gobbled it up in about 24 hours. The book is an expose about factory farming, which is the standard system of raising animals for slaughter in the United States. While I don’t want to give everything away, some of the highlights of factory farming include: packing thousands of animals into small compartments and depriving them of fresh air and sunlight for their entire lives, letting them live in their own excrement, genetically manipulating them so they’ll grow faster (to the point where their legs can’t hold them up and they are unable to procreate on their own), feeding them antibiotics (which also affects our resistance and immune systems) and physical abuse. 99% of meat sold in the US, including kosher meat, is raised this way.

After reading this fantastic/horrifying book I am ready to pack it in, buy my own farm and live off the land for the rest of my life. However, that’s probably not going to happen today. So in the meantime, I’ll have to start slowly. First order of business: whether or not to go vegetarian. It’s an idea I’ve been toying with for a while. I haven’t been able to eat much meat during this pregnancy anyway because my system is so sensitive, but now I find that when I do eat meat, it just doesn’t feel right. While I was having cholent (beef stew) at lunch on Shabbat, for example, all I could think about was the poor living conditions the cow I was eating may have had, and all the hormones and antibiotics that had been pumped into its system and was now making its way into mine and my unborn child’s. Now, I know what you’re thinking, and unfortunately, Israel is not exempt from the factory farming craze. According to CHAI (The Concern for Helping Animals in Israel), the Israeli PETA, “Agricultural trends in Israel closely parallel those in the rest of the world”. The U.S., or more specifically, the conglomerates who control 80% of the world’s food supply, set the standard for everyone. That said, I have a choice of whether or not I want to support them, which quite frankly, I don’t.

So what would it mean if I gave up meat? Well, during the week I eat vegetarian anyway (right now, tofu for lunch and dinner are all my body can handle). I eat tons of fruits and veggies, a good amount of dairy (though that will also need consideration at some future point) and whole grains, preferably organic. My son is not a meat eater; he just doesn’t like it. And my husband will eat whatever I put in front of him. The challenge is that while I have these change-the-world, progressive leanings, I am also an Orthodox Jew. And for Orthodox Jews, a beautiful chicken or beef dish is the crowning glory of every Shabbat and Holiday table. What would my guests do if they came for a meal that was lovely, nutritious, plant-based and completely flesh-free? Would they throw down their napkins and storm out? Would they smile politely while vowing to themselves never to come back? Is it possible to be a vegetarian and still be a good Jewish mother? I guess there’s only one way to find out.

Dad just left. Yes, I cried.