Yesterday began with pale yellow sun here in southeastern Michigan, and fresh air above freezing. My older children had slept at my parents’ house, so Shaya and I packed into hats and gloves and coats and headed outside for a walk.

Up and down the suburban streets I pushed the jogger stroller and listened to the constant chatter of my happy little boy.

Later, after spooning pistachio ice cream into his mouth and playing with straws, he insisted on stomping on snow. I watched my little one, under then-gray skies, skip and hop and jump atop a patch of snow I hadn’t even noticed, too busy as I was walking to the car, point A to point B.

That’s the beauty of children: they notice the details. What’s more, it is so important to them to stop and touch, feel, smell, experience those very same details that I would have missed, so intent am I on checking things off the list. 

Of course, his shoes were wet and so were the bottoms of his black corduroys. No matter. When he asked me to join him, a smile simply broke across my face from the sheer joy of being in that moment with someone I love.

After, he settled into his car seat satisfied and happy.

The other day, I visited a dairy farm, eager to learn how one of the last vestiges of how the-way-things-used-to-be continues on in a global economy.

It was beautiful - open skies, a perimeter of trees hugging the land, soft innocent cows eager for the touch of a hand. My eldest son, Asher, was with me, and we stomped along the muddy-hay, watching and listening and learning how our milk is processed.

It never occurred to me that in order for my family to drink milk, a baby cow must lose his mother.

The farmer looked incredulous at my lack of awareness. “You want your milk…” she said, when I balked at her claim that the baby cows are never with their mothers.

I didn’t plan to be such a deliberate mother. But when I got into breastfeeding and started learning about holistic approaches to health and nurturing, well, I just got swept up in the storm of it all.

But I saw it, plain and simple. My babies were happiest when right beside me. When they could smell me, hear the beat of my heart, be soothed by my very familiar voice, they were content.

I know humans are more highly evolved than any other animal, but I can’t help but wonder if all babies need that reassurance before they can go out into the world…

Alas. I’m not going to stop drinking milk - wouldn’t even make a dent in the system.

But as I slept last night wedged between a snoring daughter and a tossing, flailing toddler son, I was reassured that all is in order as it should be. Ducks in a row. Pieces of a puzzle.

I am so sick of hearing about the government potentially pouring billions of dollars into the economy to bail out flailing companies and banks. Because the companies swirling in dark pools are entirely to blame for the mess they’re in right now.

Whose bright idea was it to give mortgages to people who can’t afford to make the minimum payments? Who came up with the notion of preying on elderly citizens whose homes had been paid off just to give them cash in hand? And why hasn’t someone at some point stepped up to the plate on health care for all?

I know many of you don’t like Sarah Palin, but the best thing she has said in recent months was during the VP debate - and that is, that we are ALL to blame for the predicament we’re in.

How many of us are guilty of buying things for which we did not have cash on hand? How many of us are squirreling away money every month? How many Americans live within their means with money left to spare?

The numbers are low, if they exist at all.

Because we are smack in the middle of a please-me-now society where the bar rises higher each day and people can’t imagine life without a 52-inch TV.

My parents taught me to work for what I have and to take care of myself. That was one reason my marriage failed - my ex didn’t receive the same hard-earned lesson.

Starting in ninth grade, I worked part-time jobs - Dunkin’ Donuts, Fitnesse, Lois Gross Dry Cleaners and Kerby’s Koney Island. Yep, I wore burgundy polyester with the best of them.

I haven’t always been great about saving, though. I get the retail therapy itch just like everyone else.

And still. I can see my parents’ old bedroom from 25 years ago, when Northwest Airlines first issued its WorldPerks Visa card. It was the first time my parents used a credit card and to make sure they didn’t spend more than they had, my mother wrote a check to Visa for every purchase made on that card. In her top dresser drawer she kept a small white envelope stuffed full with checks that she’d send off when the statement came due.

At my daughter’s fifth birthday party, my ex pulled my aside and whispered, “Who’s paying for this party? You or your parents?”

I squinted my eyes in disbelief. “I pay for my children,” I said.

I’m 37 years old. I’ve chosen to build a certain life for myself and I have the sole responsibility of ensuring all the bills are paid.

Why should the government bail out stupid companies and greedy CEOs? Couldn’t we all use a little help to get through tough times?

It’s time Americans started dealing with the consequences of their decisions. All of us. And fast.

At the beginning of the day and before they go to sleep, my children peer up at the kitchen counter to see if the Passionfruit have wrinkled. Ripe when wrinkled, I tell them, and they scrutinize the purple-green orbs to see if any progress has been made since their last check-in.

Ripeness takes time, you know. Bought on Wednesday, I don’t expect these fruit to be perfect for eating before Sunday. They are patient, my kids, but eager. New flavors, the promise of sweet and tangy together.

The other day, we peeled and cut a cactus pear. Its vibrant magenta flesh beckoned, promising something divine, but their noses wrinkled, their mouths puckered. The seeds were too hard, Asher said.

My father has a wonderful philosophy on life’s hardships. Dad never holds a grudge. Something happens, he addresses it, he gets mad if he has to, then he forgets it all and moves on to the next moment. A very real way to live.

Last night, golden sparkles twinkled from the ceiling of the Detroit Institute of Arts. At least half a dozen attractive men with aloof expressions wore velvet or corduroy blazers over jeans and black shoes. I haven’t read Details or GQ lately and the oldest man I live with is 6 1/2 so I wasn’t aware of this trend.

There were so many stories I wanted to hear but didn’t get the chance for I don’t approach strangers readily. I’m single again, and yet I don’t feel that desperation propelling me toward a man I’d like to kiss even if he isn’t standing beside a woman in spiky heels or wearing a ring on his left hand.

So many chances each day - to become annoyed with the indiscretions of the others and stupidity swirling around me or take it within my careful stride and look only at the clear blue sky, unbroken by clouds, and the minty air?

I danced this morning with my lovely daughter at a mock wedding. She wore fluffy layers of pink and blue, her blond hair in a ponytail and her face all in smiles. She grabbed my hand and pulled me in concentric circles, her black patent fancy shoes bopping in frequent jumps.

The memory of my fingers against her round cheeks - soft, the living essence of real love.

It was just on the drive home that I felt that constricting in my stomach from an abrupt phone call and an averted gaze. Some people let nothing go, even in 17 years.

So there will be yoga later and quiet work by candlelight with wine at hand. I am planning my business and realize what a job that is in itself. And there is work to do.

Still. Two days lay ahead unplanned and open. I can be anything. Like the little girl I remember being, looking backward on my grandparents’ lawn in spring. The back pocket of my white jeans embroidered in all the familiar colors.

My golden hair in shiny waves, not crinkled into curls like it is today. I was happy then, and carefree, my smile open and gulping sweet, sweet air.

Once, I wanted to be the first female Jewish president of the USA. I don’t want that any longer. The best I can strive for is the belief in my eventual and continued success and an approximation of greatness under current definitions.

To sleep well.

To taste the flavor in every bite.

To listen steadfastly to those I care about.

To progress with every step.

It’s a good day. It’s a good day. 

When she saw the glass-enclosed lights dangling from the ceiling and the full yellow orchids in glass tunnels, she smiled. It was a beautiful hotel, just as she had expected.

The bar was filled with velvet couches and plush chairs and the menu was just as she had hoped: innovative and snappy, with pages upon pages of creative drinks.

Maybe a drink would calm her nerves. The mid-day sun shone white in the cold. He smiled when he saw her. She smiled back, but wasn’t sure if it was driven by anxiety or joy.

Through the lunch, she listened to her voice jabbering forward and felt his breath rise and fall. He was familiar like a favorite teddy bear but not essentially like a lover.

The tea-soaked salmon tasted fishy. The tuna was over-cooked. Even the dessert was banal - caramelized fruit with vanilla ice cream. The hotel could purport world-class decor but it was driven by the provincial sensibility of her city, which was fine for an urban market or bread bakery but not for a downtown hotel.

In the aftermath, as she whisked him to the airport in time for the last flight of the day, she knew that she was fulfilling Rilke’s famous quote: “For one human being to love another, that is the most difficult of all our tasks, the ultimate, the last test of proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation.”

She could care about him deeply and have fond memories of hope - but he was not the right man for her.

Her time was precious; soon her kids would come back. And as she drove away from the curb, his back turned to rush into the frenetic terminal, she knew she would prefer infinitely her own pillowtop bed to an austere hotel room with a played-out fantasy and a person from her past.

And then she understood: the bathroom at the restored hotel, all early 20th century tile with a grotto shower and sleek sink but then the garbage can - a black plastic Bed Bath special in the far corner, hard to find and ultimately unsophisticated. It had been a metaphor, a message, a sign that only she could read.

The evening fell a cloak before her and she went about her life, speaking on behalf of clients and smiling before strangers. She declined a drink with a nice man to carry home penne with eggplant and tomatoes.

That night, as her head hit the pillow, she had no regrets and no trouble falling asleep.

“…study its form and structure, you discover its deliberate and fundamental artificiality - it is the language of people who are interested in ‘the maintenance of difference, the conscious preservation of the self and thus of strangeness.’”
– The New Yorker, p. 39, Nov. 10, 2008 issue

An article about Sidney Weinberg, the late leader of Goldman Sachs who came up from Brooklyn poverty to lead the financial world; looks at how outsiders profit by staying outside the main, by their very different qualities and sensibilities, by staying different instead of trying to blend.

Most of the time, I cling to the familiar and the quiet: staying at home on a weekend night with a blanket around my legs and a movie on the flat-screen TV. But when pressed to go out into the world - whether it’s to work the crowds at Hiller’s Family Day or to laugh so hard my eyes hardly open at John Heffron’s Comedy Castle show or to stroll along the fragrant wood chips of Tappan Middle School’s student garden and dine on just-picked chard and spicy mustard greens - I am ever happy that I went.

When I was growing up a secular Jew in the suburbs of Detroit, the ideal was to blend with the mainstream. To remain Jewish, but to cheer the high school team on at Friday night’s football game.

It was our family’s tradition to invite Gentile friends to the Passover Seder. The notion that we could accomplish anything in America, rise to uncharted heights, be just like anyone else, drove everything we did. And when I celebrated Christmas with John’s family in New Jersey, I ate salty summer sausage and sharp gouda cheese without thought. 

The one thing we didn’t realize was it was nearly impossible to get to the perceived top AND remain staunchly, observantly Jewish.

I’ve lived on both sides now and no longer believe it is possible to be everything at once. Like the time in my early 20s I realized I couldn’t be a CEO, first female President AND super-mom.

I see it now, too. I am running a company. A family. A self. When my kids are off school for in-service or conferences, it’s awfully hard to conduct a power-meeting. Or when the baby insists on attention, I can’t focus on planning a client’s event.

But plenty of children grow up close to their parents even when they endured latch-key after-hours or sunrise-to-dusk day care. And plenty of women attain the silver seat. Do enough observant Jews establish themselves on Wall Street or in retail?

I’m not criticizing my tradition, mind you. I love being Jewish, love the way my lit candles flicker on Friday night and the fact that my children look forward to Shabbat with a passion I never had for ritual when I was young.

I just can’t sustain the lock-the-doors, stop-all-business approach that orthodoxy dictates. Right now my balance of one-week-on, one-week-off is perfect enough for me. Because you know a candlelight yoga afternoon is just as rejuvenating as a cholent-induced nap.

Every day does not have to resemble the one before it. Every morning, I awake when my body has had enough rest and I rejoice in the new chance I’ve been given at life.

The series of moments takes me through the day to come. Driven by a sense of wonderment and awe, I remember all the fantastic times of my life until then, kept in a little velvet pouch inside me as a personal locus stone.

I permit myself to dream, too, of moments-to-come, but only briefly. For I am ever aware of the fact that what I hold in my hand is this moment only, this right-now, and if I waste it with worry or dread or regret, it, too, will disappear like the night.

And so today…I march into the dreary gray of almost-winter skies, and receive my children back at 11 a.m. with punch and vigor. Hugs abound. We meet my parents for brunch, then Asher and Eliana ice skate. We buy new stories at the Jewish book fair and groceries for a week’s worth of meals to sustain us.

Then return home as the sun sets to sup on soup and salad and crusty bread, turn the water on hot to bask in the settling-down, and finally clamber under blankets all together, with books, with unspoken reverence, for the moments we are absolutely, engulfingly together.

In the morning, I swirled white-whole-wheat flour in the Cuisinart with yeast, warm water, salt, olive oil and rosemary. Pressed the button, Shaya standing on a chair beside me, bouncing on his sock-toed feet as the noise overtook the kitchen.

I waited for the moment of clarity, when the ingredients came together into dough, clumpy enough to clean the inside of the bowl. Lid off, I pulled the tacky clump and plopped it into a bowl to sit the day and grow.

That night, the kids and I gathered around the counter. Each of us pressed our fingertips into the dough, stretching it round on the baking stones, then smearing pizza sauce and sprinkling cheese and chopped olives onto our own creations.

It baked up puffy and crisp, cheese an orange bubbling sea.

Every chop a moment, every slice a sort of manna. From disparate ingredients to a whole something, we created a simple meal: pizza, salad, sweet corn cobs and green beans to dip in hummus.

All things good from the earth and bounty. Flavors and scents, sensory touches all around, until at last, the sun had set into the darkness that started the day and we were all tired in the upper rooms.

I laid in bed beside each child for a quiet time of connection. A few words, sloppy hugs and close-to-the-ear kisses. Those moments precious and fleeting.

Every night, Eliana creeps into bed beside me, no words spoken, just a desire for closeness. Last Sunday night, back from Boston, the house silent in their absence, I missed the presence of another warm body.

And then Monday came and they returned home to me, and I to them.

Tonight, different ingredients into completeness. Tonight, all of us around the table, different words, same goal. Tonight, another chance for love.

It was dark as we walked from the sushi restaurant to the quiet and shuttered Jewish main street. Even the observant had finished evening services that Friday night and gone home to warm soup, red wine and fresh loaves.

I hadn’t lit candles. I hadn’t said a single blessing. I hadn’t ushered in the distinction from one day to another.

Still, it was a special day of sorts. In Boston visiting my law-school-student cousin Kyle, the weekend had been long-in-coming and a veritable vacation: no laptop lugged along, no packed itinerary to fulfill.

It was a weekend of exploration and reconnection, of simulated sibling-esque connection. We hiked through the city’s Emerald Necklace until we faced a view so resplendent in Puritanical church spears and russet-hued trees fading toward winter.

Even in early November, the market square was full of produce. I paid one dollar to snack on a quart of sweet strawberries, while Kyle pulled ruby seeds from the heart of a pomegranate.

And then, once back in my formal routine, I caught echoes of the news.

The day before this historic presidential election, the first non-white candidate’s grandmother died. Tears threatened to spill from my eyes as I drove the children to school.

“That’s so sad,” I choked out. “That’s just so sad.”

And since I believe that we die at the perfect time and live as long as we have a job left to do on this planet, I pondered the meaning of this timing.

Did Obama need his mother-figure only to see him get this far? Does it mean somehow there will be an upset and he will lose, so God spared her the sight of seeing his defeat? Or does it mean something else entirely?

Regardless of how each of us votes today, we are all infinitely and spiritually connected. Whichever way the coin toss lands, whichever story we start to tell tomorrow, we are one nation of infinite minds.

I know she is watching from beyond the clouds, supremely proud, completely at rest.