The Language of Romeo

I teach English at our local high school. I hope Mrs. Finster, my English teacher from days of old, never finds out. She would be the first to testify to my lack of qualifications for the job; but in Israel it is enough that English be your mother tongue and the language they speak in the USA is close enough and so I got the job.

Israeli kids study English the way their American peers learn French and German, as a foreign language, and barely scratch the surface of American literature, let alone the classic works of our British cousins over the sea. There are a few English speakers in the student body and I suggested that we read Shakespeare together after school. Three girls in the 9th grade took me up on my offer and we sit together in the library every Tuesday afternoon. By popular demand we started with Romeo and Juliet.

I think that Shakespeare wrote the play in an international language that only the young and romantic can understand. I help the girls with the Elizabethan English, but it's obvious that the girls are much more fluent than I. I can read Shakespeare, but they understand Romeo and Juliet. They giggle and sigh and pick up on every detail. The guest list for Capulet's masquerade ball refers to Rosaline, Romeo's "ex", as a lady of the house of Capulet.
"Oh…" The girls exchange meaningful glances. Romeo likes the Capulet girls. These territorial nuances are very important in the 9th grade. I wouldn't know. It's been a long time since I was in high school.


Today someone reminded me of something long ago.
She had given me some ribbon, and I returned it with a bow.
Something small that she has treasured, some 30 years or so.
It was romantic; once I knew the language of Romeo.

Perhaps if I would have known how precious something small can be, I would have given more. Given more, remembered more. But back then I was forgetting more and remembering less; and now I teach English and little girls understand the words I used to know.

It's not as if I'm deaf and dumb. I've learned another language. One word and a hand on my hand can mean more than line after line of declarations of undying love. I didn't learn how to speak less and say more over night, and I didn't learn it alone. We learned it together, my Juliet and I. We created it word by word and it's a language that only two can know.

Hands

As life writes our stories, our bodies are the manuscript. It draws wrinkles on our faces along the creases of smiles and frowns and it colors in our skin. Experiences and lifestyle drum the rythym of our gait and shape our posture. Maybe that is why I'm not a telephone person. I need to see someone to really know who I'm talking to. I need to look into their eyes, to read their body language. And I need to see their hands. Hands are one of the things that define us as human beings. Besides the brain, hands are what set us apart from all other animals save the apes. The dexterity and versatility of the human hand has more than compensated for the vulnerable, weak and furless bodies God created us with. They have enabled us to build, throw, write, shoot, and an endless number of feats. Their role in society is second only to speech. A show of hands means consent and opened they reveal intention. Hands communicate, comfort, curse and worship. Hands shaken and hands held have volumes of meaning.

Hands tell a lot about a person. They have been major participants in virtually every enterprize, companions on every adventure and our life experience is carved in their lines, muscle tone and texture. The grip, the calluses, the scars, the skin tone; they bear silent witness of our journey in this world.
Hands can tell a story. I am gathering photos of hands, and I want to use them to paint a picture of their owners. Naturally, I'm biased; I know these people. This isn't science. Maybe it's art.

Maybe that's what hands are. Perhaps they are more than tools that we use to shape our world, as much as an expression of ourselves as our creations.
Maybe they are in and of themselves, works of art.

Hands

When I started this series about hands, it was more out of impulse than intent. I just noticed how interesting hands are sometimes. But what could they tell me, and what could I tell about them, or rather, about their owners?

Surprisingly, quite a bit. Sometimes I the hands were a venue to express what I wanted to say anyway; and then there times when I looked at the hands and they made me think about a side of the human being attached to them that hadn't occured to me before. And then there were hands that didn't give me much to say, but a lot to ask.

Thanks to all of you that "gave me a hand" with this project.

................Mel................................>>.................Brianna..........>>>>>........................................Leroy

Barry and Brenda..................................................Odelia..........................................................Brittany



..............Maayan..............................................................Xiu................................................................Pat



.....the English Staff...............................................Yael..........................................................Netanel

And special thanks to Stephanie that didn't lend a hand, but came up with that hogwash about me being a warrior instead.

(Links to the entries can be made by clicking on the Names.)

Barry and Brenda

These hands are very pale,
They never see the sun.
These hands are very busy,
They have no time for fun.

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..

,

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.These hands have a job;
They have a house to keep.
These hands are always working,
They have no time for sleep.

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These hands work together,
one mind, one flesh, one plate.
To understand the one,
you have to see the mate.

The Ladies on the English Staff

You're not snobs,
just a bit better.
.
A little culture,
a lot of cultivation.
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One has to know more than English
to understand you.
.
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You teach your students a language,
and the rest of us the difference between a woman that speaks English
and a lady.

Netanel

Hands steady,
.....calm.








..........................................................Firm grip, confident.

.....................................Focused.








....................................Boom

Brittany

You're attracted to danger,
dare to be different,
make your mark.

First from the womb,
first from home,
last to conform.

Inquisitive, independent,
and individual.
Like a signature.

Don't try to wash it,
it won't rub off,
it's not a stain.......

It's you.

Brianna

Sugar and spice,
and everything nice;
that's what you are.

Close to home,

in your comfort zone;

that's where you are.

Clean, unblemished,

not wounded or worn,

Is that who you are?

Yael

I've never asked you,
what you request,
what wish you make,
when the sun sets on the week,
and women bless the Shabbat.
.
You are solid, bedrock;
our family's foundation.
.
And on the seventh day,
when even God rested
from all His work that He had done,
creation rests in these two hands.
. .
I don't know what you say
every Friday at sundown.
But for 25 years you have been a blessing.
Because of you, our house is a home,
and Saturday is Shabbat.

Maayan

You're not afraid of new things,

you explore possibilities.

.

You try this, and then that,

sometimes you're off key.

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Then you strike a chord,

and then another.

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And finally it comes together,

and you find harmony.

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You are a melody.

.

Leroy

You climbed the mountain;
To tempt nature,
to test yourself,
to try God?
.
Being strong
doesn't mean you're not vulnerable.
It doesn't mean you're not sensative.
The only flesh that doesn't feel
is dead.

What did you see on the mountain?
And what did you find there?
Was there something up there
that you had never seen before?

Or did you discover something,
not in the heavens,
and not in the depths;
but something close to you,
at your fingertips,
that had been in you all along?

Pat

A sturdy grip,

very sharp,

moving quickly.

Busy, busy, busy.

.

I know these hands,

almost as well as I know my own.

They are the ones that raised me,

and who I am is their handiwork.

.

My first impulse is caution,

it looks like someone is going to get cut.

But you usually know what you are doing.

.

Your way is the best?

I'll grant you that it's good.

But no matter how you slice it,

it's all the same when it comes out of the oven.

Odelia

Who do you think you're foolin'?
Maybe yourself, certainly not me.

Your little friends will see the polish,
but I know that a lady doesn't bite her nails.

They see long fingers, I know how fragile they are.
They see your beautiful complexion, I remember what you went through to get it that way.

You want to show me a woman, but I still see a girl.
And one day soon my job will be finished, and you won't need me to hold your hand.

You will be a woman, a lady with painted nails,
and I will be the one fooling myself, thinking a child is still holding my hand.

Xiu

Nimble and swift, a true athlete.

You catch when many fumble.

You are tough and energetic,

constantly in motion.

You have paid the price, of course,

and you have the bruises to prove it.

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.

.

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I suppose that a rugby ball isn't the first thing I expect to find in a girl's hand, but when you turn it over you show a another side; one that is unmistakenly feminine, tender and deep.

Mel

You are sure and steady. You hold on to things others would have discarded, but maybe that is because you can find potential. You improvise, a sure sign of genius.

It's hard to understand what you are doing, but the funny thing is that most of your inventions work.

Time has been good to you. No doubt in the past you have slipped and hit a finger or two, but the wounds have healed.

So maybe you are different, but that just means you're original. Whatever you may be, you can always be counted on and you're never boring.

Shabbat

... and on the seventh day he rested,

and was refreshed.














Shabbat Shalom

The Watershed

This week I went with our 9th graders to Jerusalem. We came up from the east, coming into the city through the Judean desert.

This is Hebrew University on Mount Scopus, on the city limits of East Jerusalem.

Only two weeks ago we had climbed the hills up to Hadassah Medical Center on the western edge of the city.

We hiked in the shade of forests,

up dry beds of green wadis.

The contrast between east and west in Jerusalem is so striking because the city sits on a watershed.

Clouds come in from the sea and water the forests as they assend the mountains, and then at some point they hit hot air from the desert and dissipate.

My conversion to Judaism was the watershed of my life; what was before vaporized and what came after is a totally different landscape. But it wasn't a spiritual watershed. It was only the logical conclusion of a lifelong struggle with God, against God. Only much later came a time when I stopped and looked around, only to find myself in a spiritual wilderness.

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Becoming a Jew was no doubt the turning point of my my life, but the wind changed and I came to a place where I turned around. That was the watershed of my soul.

Song of Ascent

A song of ascents,

My eyes rise to the hills.










Whence will come my help?

From the Lord, Maker of heaven and earth.


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He will keep your foot from faltering,
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will be your shade on your right hand,

and the sun will not harm you by day.
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. He will protect you from all evil, He will guard your soul.

The Lord will watch your going and coming,
from now and for evermore.

Psalm 121

(Photos from the 9th grade 3 day trek up the hills in the Jerusalem Corridor, May 2008)