In a phone survey last year, the caller asked for my ethnicity. I pointed out that I believed he was asking about race, unless he wanted to know whether I am Irish or Italian. He got it. Do you see the difference?

In the 1960’s and 1970’s, black was the “correct” term to use. And most of us agreed that it was certainly better than the N perjorative. (When I was a little girl, they were just “colored.”) A few people pointed out that, before colored, the N word had evolved from Negro (Spanish for black), which had been adopted to avoid calling black people black. We do this sort of pussyfooting all the time.

Your race is your physical being. It is in your DNA, maybe in your blood type; and it may or may not be visible in the way your look. Your ethnicity is how you are brought up, what language you speak and how you speak it, your religion or lack of it, and the way you live. If a black or yellow or brown child is brought up in a white community and never taught that his race is part of who he is, his ethnicity will be entirely different from his race.

Personally, I am suspicious of hyphenated descriptions, as if people are tiptoeing around what they mean to say. And very often, an adjective like Afro-American is inaccurate. I watched a television investigation of an unidentified skeleton — “female, age in the mid-twenties, Afro-American.” Various specialists managed to put together some pictures of what she might have looked like. Someone recognized her and, indeed, the authorities captured her murderer. However, it turned out she was not “Afro-American”; she was Tanzanian.

President Obama, on the other hand, is truly Afro-American. His mother was an American and his father was an African. Moreover, he learned about the backgrounds of both. I specifically identify myself as white, an American, a New Englander. There is more that may or may not be pertinent to the situation.

I recently saw a headline about a candidate targeting the Latino vote. I saw no mention of whether that meant Mexican, Cuban, or South American. They are lumped together, as if there is no difference in their ethnicity. I think I would be a little offended.

Wouldn’t it be nice if no one thought about a Latino vote, or a black vote, or a women’s vote. (I think they’ve pretty well given up courting the Jewish vote, because that’s contrary to the oil interests. It’s just as well; we all know that, in a room of three Jewish thinkers, there will be at least four opinions.) Why are we so incapable of judging people by their skills, their strengths, their morality?

Oh, that means “character,” doesn’t it? I think I heard that somewhere.

In general, my dad was more of a card player than my mother, but he was not going out to play cards. He would play with us kids, or he would play solitaire. He taught me to play as well.

I particularly remember one night when there
was a PTA meeting. As usual, Mom would go to the meeting, and Dad would stay home with the kids. After we went to bed, Dad played solitaire to keep himself awake until Mom got back. (He knew how to play bridge but never played after he was married. Mom learned how to play only after she moved into the retirement village.)

This was the house on Court Street, where our bedroom was right off the kitchen, where Dad’s cards were laid out on the table. So I could hear everything that went on. They must have thought we were all asleep.

Mom came in — she must have come in the back way, so as not to waken us. She looked at the cards on the table and said, “What’re you doing, Benny, playing with yourself?” And they both laughed heartily.

It was years before I understood what was so funny.

In my ongoing project of looking for space in the Cheesebox, I found a couple of treasures (?) from many years ago. There is a little white woolen cap and a blue saque. (There were two sets, but I have no idea where to look for the white saque and the blue cap.) They were designed to have ties — I used ribbons — threaded through the edge for closures.

I made the white set during my first pregnancy, and I brought both blue and pink ribbons to the hospital. The following year I used the same instructions with smaller needles and finer yarn to knit the blue set. Since the last baby to wear either of them outgrew them before his older sister was three, no one remembers seeing them. I ought to undo them to see if I can copy the instructions — just in case someone has another baby.

Henry Aaron, nicknamed the Hammer, played major league baseball during my era of fandom, usually at the expense of the team I was rooting for. This book was written “with Lonnie Wheeler,” who was unfamiliar to me. I would say Wheeler did a good job. I did not count pages, but I think more than half of the book is Aaron’s own story, from the time he joined the Negro Leagues as a seventeen-year-old who just wanted to play baseball, through twenty-plus years — a whole generation — of organized ball. But you can feel the research that went into the writing, the history of baseball and its ramifications, as well as the effort of obtaining quotes from players, writers, baseball officials, not to mention a lot of people who are basically well-known fans. The portrait of the man emerges.

Aaron is basically a gentleman, who seldom got into physical altercations with racists; but he never was reticent about speaking to individuals who went too far. In the long run, many of those same individuals respected him and even became friends.

It was exciting to read about those players who mentored him during the early fifties. In the off season many black players barnstormed across the country, and the young Henry Aaron got to know Jackie Robinson, Don Newcombe, Roy Campanella, and Willie Mays. By the 1960’s he was the one mentoring the younger players. At the same time, it was disheartening to read how segregated baseball was, even after Robinson’s entry into the major leagues.

Spring training in Florida meant separate, usually inferior, living quarters and eating arrangements for the black players. There were towns where the local statutes prohibited black and white players to play on the same field; they would close the stadium rather than allow the game to take place. (They didn’t even allow a white man and a black man to play checkers against each other.)

I know such situations were not uncommon sixty years ago, but they are completely opposite to the way I grew up. It was like reading The Help all over again. And I repeat, this is a culture I really don’t understand. In our schools in the Northeast, it was natural to want the best players on your team, regardless of their color.

Henry Aaron was not a flashy player, just a very good one. He was the kind of guy who just went out and did his job, for the love of the game. I remember something Sandy Koufax said. “Hank Aaron is the kind of hitter who will always get his hits and runs off me. That’s why I would rather have him the leadoff hitter, instead of pitching to him with men on base.”

Aaron attributes his hitting ability to concentration — learning everything he could about a pitcher and watching each move carefully. (He retired only when he realized his eyesight was deteriorating.)

It was all right with most people when he was just another player, but when he began inching up on Babe Ruth’s home run record, the hate mail began. Aaron ended up making something good out of the telegrams; for every wire sent to him, Western Union contributed a dollar to a children’s scholarship fund. (Telegrams? Western Union? This really is an old book!)

When his playing days were over, Aaron worked in player development and some administrative positions in baseball — not because he wanted to manage a team, but because he felt that black men were still not getting respect they deserved. When Bill White, a former black player, became president of the National League, Aaron felt that part of his work was done. He left baseball to concentrate on his business and charity interests.

Henry Aaron is a good example of how a young man should grow up, no matter how poor his beginnings might be. I am afraid that today’s young men don’t believe that can happen any more. He did have a hammer, hammering out “danger and a warning, and love between his brothers and his sisters…”

I enjoyed the book, remembering what it was like before baseball disappeared.

I shall always admire Henry Aaron, even as I remember that game where the score was Aaron 6, Mets 0. Did he have to rub it in?

That photo was borrowed from an auction site, but I have a pen just like it. It is a Sheaffer’s White Dot fountain pen. Evidently these are prized by collectors. The white dot is the sign of quality; the points were supposed to be guaranteed for life. Mine is at least seventy-five years old, and I know the rubber bladder is deteriorated.

My dad bought that pen for my mother, probably around the time they got married, which was 1938. All through my childhood, that was the pen my mother used — for correspondence, for notes to school, for just about anything that she would not write in pencil. I have to (1) get some fountain pen ink to make sure the point still writes and (2) find out what it will cost to repair.

Ballpoints just can’t compare.

I am more than offended, I feel as if I had been mentally assaulted. Yes, my grandparents were immigrants, and they did not come from some upscale English-speaking enclave. They all spoke English with an accent, which evidently is not acceptable.

However, I have been an American — a natural-born American — longer than most of these debaters. I was educated in public schools, and I was taught to love my country. I learned that our country is not always perfect, but the ideals to which we aspire hold true. It hurts to hear self-aggrandizing orators distort those ideals to suit their own purposes.

From time to time some big news is presented all over the media, and people ask for my opinion. And I usually say, I will wait a few days until the whole story comes out. Journalists no longer believe that it is more important to be accurate than it is to be first.

You may not have been one of the askers this time, but you will read my opinion on the Komen explosion. I too was appalled by the original statement I saw, even though I could imagine some plausible reasons behind the decision, aside from the political ones. (I am not going to argue with the political screamers because I cannot fight stupidity. Neither can you.)

I did think this kind of statement might be a way to encourage other sources to contribute to Planned Parenthood, and indeed their donations increased a great deal on Thursday. I listened to Nancy Brinker’s statement and, while I do not agree with everything she said, I did note that “no current grants were to be removed.”

This morning’s newspaper had a front page article that mentioned that the Connecticut chapter of the Komen organization will not stop funding Planned Parenthood, no matter what the national group decides. I didn’t know they had that kind of autonomy; did you? I am still withholding judgment, because the facts are not yet in.

Being aware that I am not the only one here who has had a “medical scare” recently, I remind all my friends: Take care of yourselves. I value you.

This has been a disjointed week, including meetings scheduled and re-scheduled. Anything I am going to do waits until there is someone else is going that way. The Gentleman is working split shifts, and that affects everyone else as well. Yesterday — I think that was
Wednesday — U.D. and I did some errands.
(We tried to make them shorter by leaving one of us in the car in each place; you feel guilty about extra shopping if someone is waiting for you…) We had some supper, and I felt sleepy. I lay down “for a minute” and slept for about two hours. Just lucky.

At 9:30, according to my caller ID, the nursing home called. We did not get to the phone in time, and the caller did not leave a message. Next it was U.D.’s phone — and again, no message. So U.D. phoned the home (which had also left no message when it called Son’s work number). They told her they were taking my husband to the ER because of low blood oxygen. (I’ve heard that one before.) A little while later, they called again to tell us they were taking him to a closer hospital, on the advice of the EMT in the ambulance. “Do we need to go to the hospital now?” asked U.D. The caller said, she would, if it were her dad.

Got to the ER around quarter past ten; I found out where he was, but they would not let us in. No one was going in and out of the treatment unit at that time; I never did find out why. After half an hour, I asked if they could just tell me how he was, inasmuch as we had not brought him in but had been summoned. So then they let me in — just one visitor.

He was awake, evidently tired, but not so tired that he didn’t know who I was. I looked at the display, and his numbers were back up. A doctor came in and talked with me. She told me what treatments he had been given; they would keep him overnight to be sure there were no side effects. U.D. came in too, and Husband was holding his end of a conversation.

When a student came in to explain that she was going to take a blood sample for arterial gases, I had to warn her. He is a “hard stick” at the best of times, and this would not be one of the better times. She left to get some more experienced help and eventually returned with the doctor. U.D. and I stepped outside, because we knew what was coming. From his yells, I estimate they had to try four times for that sample.

By midnight he was half asleep, and we decided to leave. All we needed was the phone number to call to find out where he had been moved. I did not call my son again; I figured he deserved to sleep a little, since he would have to take the girls to school in the morning.

In the morning I talked to the nurse on Husband’s unit. He seemed cheerful enough, had been cleaned up and fed, was watching “The Sopranos.” But she wouldn’t know more until the doctors did their rounds; try again in an hour. Just before the hour was up, my son phoned because the doctor had called him. She said he wasn’t that bad even when they brought him in; probably the quick treatment had averted another major episode. He is expected to return to the nursing home on Friday.

My son traveled down from Massachusetts today, mainly for the purpose of seeing the old man and finding out if he needs anything. (But he also took the time to work on my computer. Progress!) I truly do not know if we could manage all this without his support.

I was all ready to walk into today’s care meeting and start complaining, but the meeting will be rescheduled. I guess I can’t complain as loud, at least not until I have thanked the staff for responding to this emergency. Déjà vu — all over again. In Yiddish we might say, noch einmal (one more time).

1. How did you cope with your biggest heartache?
   Good question. I’m still trying to decide whether I learned to cope, or if my heartaches just haven’t been that big.

   If I consider losing my father, which was a terrible, terrible thing to me, despite his long illness, I would have to say that I coped by holding on to the good parts.

2. Who was the last person you visited in the hospital?
   My husband; he fell, in October.

3. How many jobs have you held in your life? How many of those were part of your chosen career field?
   Do I count all the long-term temp jobs? Do I count the volunteer jobs that turned into real paying jobs? There are too many to count. My “chosen career field” was usually whatever I was doing. I was always interested in learning what was different about a new job, and I really loved being able to fit my own special skills into the goals of the company.

4. How did you discover Saturday 9?
   I usually pick these up from Bev, who gives credit to Kwizgiver.

5. If you could take the train from anywhere to anywhere, where would “anywhere” be?
   I believe I have mentioned this just recently. I want to travel across America via Amtrak.

6. When was the first time you cooked for someone else?
   I can’t remember when I started learning to prepare some simple meals, maybe around age seven. By the time I was fourteen, my mother was working at Bloomingdale’s, and I was usually expected to start dinner, even if I didn’t prepare the whole thing.

   In college I worked in the dorm kitchen for a year or two. I was not the chef, of course, but I was preparing side dishes for someone else.

7. What is the worst beverage you’ve ever tasted?
   Warm milk. My mother always insisted that we could not have cold milk on a cold morning. She would “just take the chill off.” But she would forget, so that the (warmer than warm) milk she gave me usually had a slimy skin on top. If I was lucky, I would be able to throw it away when she wasn’t looking.

8. Is there anything in life you are “certain” about? Firm in your beliefs? Strong in your convictions?
   I hope you understand that one can be strong in one’s convictions and still open to other possibilities. Nothing is more certain than uncertainty. Once I would have said, how can it be wrong to give people the benefit of a doubt. You know how misguided that turned out to be.

9. Do you know anyone who has as very unusual pet?
   Not currently. Before he was married, my son had an Australian bearded lizard — I think that’s what it was called. He had a snake after that. (He’s allergic to animal fur…)

I will be interested to see how some other people handle this one.

Did you hear this item from Nancy Giles on “CBS Sunday Morning”? Ya know what I love about Nancy Giles? She says what I say, but she usually says it better.

As long as we’re talking about forgiveness, let me explain what I was taught. (I am not spouting some new age dogma; this is what I was taught about Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when I was a kid.) If you have broken one of God’s commandments, if you feel you have sinned against God, you ask His forgiveness. But if you have wronged another human being, you don’t fix it by asking God. You must apologize to the individual you hurt, and (sincerely, I hope) you ask for his/her forgiveness.

So…if you take money unethically, you have both broken a commandment and hurt another person. Aside from prayer, you need to pay back what you took. These “God-fearing,” Bible-thumping orators don’t do a thing for me. I cannot imagine that they believe the things they’re saying.

Monday morning began with my annual eye exam. It was good; the doctor did not bother with expanded tests. His logic is based on two things: (1) I can see, and (2) the nerves in my eye still look normal. As my daughter pointed out (she sees him every January too), it’s almost a social visit. “Let me show you the newest pictures of my granddaughters.”

Tuesday the U.D. and I shopped. She needs “retail therapy.” I just need some things. I replaced a shade for a lamp I like, and I replaced a lamp that I never liked. (My mother bought that lamp for my freshman college room; it may have been convenient for fifty years, but I decided I need furnishings that suit my own tastes.)

Wednesday I started a project that has been staring me in the face for years. Although my “living room” is theoretically 12 by 15 feet, in reality I have a path — narrow enough that a random wiggle can knock things down. I started breaking down empty boxes (“don’t discard them, we might need them”); pulling out books that we might as well donate; finding strange clothing that belongs to no one I know. Maybe I can at least make that path wider.

Thursday was bookmobile day. I had compiled a list of books that I want to read, books that I know are in the larger library system — but I forgot to print it out. “No matter,” says the bookmobile man, “I will give you my email address.” That should work well. Meanwhile, I found an Anne Perry I had not read. How did I miss it? It’s brand new. Good stuff.

I had hoped to do some food shopping Thursday afternoon. A little leisurely shopping was not to be, as the weather turned nasty and we rushed to finish before the rain began to freeze. If I don’t do at least some of the food shopping, I lose control of my regular diet, something I cannot afford to do. And my body tells me.

Food for thought: If your doctor prescribes a medication for your specific condition and the insurance company refuses to cover it because “it has not been specified for that condition,” who is to blame? The doctor, who hopes he is choosing the best treatment for his patient? The patient, who doesn’t have textbook symptoms? The insurance company, whose knowledge only goes as far as what was written when the FDA first approved the medication? Or maybe it should be the support group for that particular condition, whose members obviously have not raised a loud enough uproar about getting the help they need. And, oh yes, who is receiving all that money that the patient has to pay, not only for his prescriptions but for the insurance that is not insuring him? Is there anyone we can trust?

When I had finished both college and business school, with the added experience of having worked in the library for five years or so, I was definitely job-flexible. I
had no trouble getting a job, and I could work for
anyone.

It occurred to me that, while I could not afford to live without working, I could afford to take temp jobs — just about anywhere. Let’s say I settled myself in a big city for maybe six months and used that as a base. I thought about Chicago or St. Louis, maybe New Orleans. I could use my free time to explore the areas around the city, whatever it was. Every large city has attractions both within the city, like museums, or in the outskirts, like parks and zoos and whatever caught my fancy. Obviously, I never followed through.

A similar  plan was based on   having a more conventional full-time job. I would use my vacation time to coincide with wherever the Dodgers were playing. That would include Florida for spring training. Major league baseball, before it was written in capital letters. (I did get to see a game in Dodger Stadium — 1966.)

I never did either of those, nor did I get to Europe or Israel. I met my husband, gave a large amount of my savings to my father to pay for a wedding, and grew new life goals. It is true, life is what happens while you’re making other plans.

I had traveled to both Los Angeles and San Francisco before I got married. Nice places to visit, but I wouldn’t to live in either. After the kids were grown, I got to go a few places with my job. And the Middle Daughter and I got to London but not to the Continent. If I had thought a retired husband would be a good travel companion, I was wrong about that too. The last big trip I took with him was to a wedding in Portland, Oregon. I had a good time, he did not. He is just not that kind of person.

My son took us to Florida; my husband slept most of the time we were there. We took the train to Boston a couple of times; he was glad to see our son and his family but was otherwise not interested. I gave up on ever taking him on the one dream trip I still coveted — traveling cross-country via Amtrak.

Perhaps the most positive result of my caution is that I always encouraged my kids to travel. They took chances I never would have dared. Consequently, they have seen more of the world than I ever imagined. Nothing you ever learn is wasted.

I used to travel alone once, and I think I still could. But there are new constraints all the time. I am almost — but not quite — ready to give up the whole travel idea as something that is not meant to be. Well, not for a year or two, anyway.

Can anyone who has followed the non-labors of Congress over the past three years honestly believe that the President was the cause of the divisiveness and the lack of cooperation between the legislative and the executive branches? Before a bill was presented, even before it was written, there were Republican members declaring there was no way they were going to vote for it. Whatever happened to the concept of working as a team?

Being able to look at the bigger picture is not rocket science, and even a child can understand the concept of cause and effect. I contend that, if your actions are going to cause difficulty to other people and you cannot see a way around that, your attention is not on the society but on yourself. I further contend that, if your actions are more to benefit yourself than to assist the community around you, you have no business holding office.

None of us live in a vacuum. No matter whether you are high-tech or no-tech, no matter how you live, you are somehow connected to other people. If you have gone back to nature and live off the land, you still need products that others provide. If you have locked yourself into your home and get everything you need online, the day will come when your connection fails. Whether you like it or not, you are part of the community of the world.

You might just as well accept that you need to be kind to others. As someone said, where did Thoreau get that axe?

In case you can’t make it out, the Year of the
Dragon means that the election year will “drag on longer than usual.”

A couple of years ago, I commented that when people are campaigning, you really can’t tell how they will perform in office. You’re only finding out how they run a campaign. They do their best to convince us they’re sincere, but are they? Some of them have already proven that they are liars, but what about the rest?

“I want to create jobs,” says one. “I am spending a million dollars to win this election.” What? From my point of view, you are wasting a million dollars to make yourself look good. You have convinced me of nothing, except your inability to spend money wisely. And you expect me to choose you to manage my tax money?

Then on Monday I turned on Brian Williams on “Rock Thirty.” Ted Koppel was doing a piece on the Super PACs, which can request funds from any entity (person or corporation), who can donate anonymously. The Super PACs, in theory, are supposed to report their earnings, but no one makes them do it, so there isn’t much accountability. Then the Super PACs can spend all that money to run any kind of ads they want. No one checks the veracity of their messages. There is never a “this is So-and-So, and I approved this message,” because no one did. Indeed, the candidate can truthfully say he doesn’t know anything about it.

The best part was Stephen Colbert’s explanation about how he founded a PAC, converted it to a Super PAC, and then ceded it to Jon Stewart so that he — Colbert — could run for “president of South Carolina.”

It all sounds so stupid that you wonder who thought it up. I found myself wondering why all the voters are being taken in this way and, even more, why we are letting it happen. As a matter of fact, I did not watch till the bitter end. I was just too disgusted.

Oh, wait, there’s more. I fell asleep on Wednesday night listening to “Nightline,” as they talked about the tax shelters in the Cayman Islands. They also mentioned just who is in the position to take advantage of these shelters. So… are we going to elect these same people to work alongside the Washington insiders who are already benefiting from insider trading, knowing they won’t be held accountable?

Our local newspaper had a call-in question regarding the South Carolina primary. Results were published this morning, predictably vitriolic. I was amazed to see how many rednecks live in Connecticut.

We must be certifiable. We will not, however, be eligible for social security disability funds.

1. Do you live close to where you grew up? Why?
   I grew up about forty miles from here; I was living about seventy-five miles away from here when I met my husband. I chose to move to his area because my work was more flexible than his. (And then, of course, I didn’t work for nine years after we got married.)

2. Have you ever been so angry that you
   almost lost control?
   Yes. Haven’t we all?

3. Are you a fan of a musical act that slightly embarrasses you?
   No. If I like anything, I’m not embarrassed to admit it.

4. Is there a movie that always makes you cry?
   Just one? Of course. I empathize with anyone in tears — and if I already know why they’re crying… Despite the way my mother always laughed at me when I cried, I have decided it is all right to weep if I feel like it.

5. Who is the most famous person that you've met?
   I have encountered versions of this question before. Were they famous before, during, or after the time I met them? How much do I have to have said to them to make them eligible for this question? I will go back to Dr. Eli Goldratt, because I knew him well over several years.

6. Before you leave your home, what must you have?
   My purse. I keep my keys, my ID, my cell phone, and my credit cards in it.

7. What do you miss the most about being a kid?
   Nothing. I spent that time trying to learn to be a grown-up.

8. Tell us about a passion of yours that your readers would not expect.
   What haven’t I talked about already? Music, science, computers, reading, my kids, my granddaughters, politics… It seems to me I gush about anything I really like, just as I complain about what I don’t like.

9. At what age do you think you’d be able to think, “I’ve had a great run”?
   Well, I do think I have had a great run, but I would never say it that way. There is always something to look forward to.

I wrote about the inconvenience of Fosamax® the first year I was journaling. Almost every Saturday I take the pill with eight ounces of water and wait out the half hour. There have been exceptions, of course, and this should have been one of them. But winter does strange things to my brain.

I woke up about six, but I have no intention of getting up in the dark. I heard the newspaper delivery a
few minutes later; it usually comes earlier. Then I
heard the plow… It was a small plow and easily maneuverable; it did not get stuck at the end of the street. Nevertheless, snow does not make me happy. I would wait awhile to go outside.

I got up, took the darned pill, and set the timer. Then I tested my blood sugar. Oops, I should have done that first. It was rather low, and I should eat something, but I can’t eat until the timer goes off. On the other hand, I will not even attempt going through snow to get the paper until I have more available energy. Computer, here I come!

According to the weather station down the block, it is 19° out there. I am definitely not going out.

I still have not gotten to the support people for the external drive, but I did retrieve one important file. I remembered I had attached it to a test email regarding my husband’s “Redetermination of Eligibility.” I was able to download it from the sent mail; even an annoyance can turn into a good thing.

At last, the timer rang. I put on the coffee maker and got myself a spoonful of peanut butter. I still have a small snow shovel in the kitchen, and it looked like only a couple of inches of snow. I put on sneakers and socks (still haven’t found comfortable boots) and got my warm waterproof jacket. Sweatshirt, hoodie, jacket, waterproof gloves — check. Out the door.

There wasn’t much snow on the doorstep, but a lot more on the stairs. I cleared a path down the stairs and stopped when I realized I could just reach the package with the shovel. I made my way carefully up the stairs, had not locked myself out this time, and went in, thankful that I had not made things any worse. The wet shovel and bag of newspaper went into the trash can to drain, while I changed my shoes and went straight for the hot coffee.

Well, I’ve done my part. I got the paper and made the coffee, and I did not inconvenience anyone else with my problems. Let the others go out to brush off their cars and whatever else they deem necessary. It should stop snowing in an hour or so, and it has already warmed up to 21°. Tomorrow will be better, right? Where have I heard that before?

Wednesday’s big news was the death of Dr. Mel. The tributes I have heard are unusual, in that they mention his work but are more about the man. The man whose doctors gave him thirty-three months when they diagnosed multiple myeloma — he threw a party on the thirty-fourth month. (And lasted for sixteen years.) The man who always continued to teach — his colleagues, young and old, have wonderful memories. The man who worked through pain. The humanitarian, who befriended other myeloma patients and raised funds for cancer research. The musician — I thought about the music in his head that he was going to write down, now that he had retired.

People who think they are good enough to campaign for leadership positions should take note.

As I continue to work on the new computer — my daughter would have given it a unique name by now — I have set the AVG search engine as my default. Internet Explorer chooses Bing and allows you to change, but does not include what I want. So this morning I did a test. I chose an unusual phrase out of my own journal and searched for it on AVG search. “Not found.” I tried it on Google, and there it was.

I do like AVG as a security application, but a search engine? Who are they trying to fool?

Last night I heard Eft (the immature newt) railing about the journalists whose stories make it “so difficult to govern.” (Is this the same man who wanted to remove Bill Clinton from office for similar offenses?) While I would never deny that journalists often make mountains out of pimples, it seems wrong to blame them for one’s own mistakes. He’s just mad because he got caught!

It reminds me of a very old story about a psychiatrist administering a Rorschach test to a patient who seemed to see something suggestive in every inkblot. The doctor made a note that perhaps the patient had sexual fantasies — and the patient saw the note. “What do you mean sexual fantasies?” he demanded. “You’re the one with the dirty pictures!”

With a view toward solving some of my own problems, I had considered asking to borrow my daughter’s car today. (Mostly to practice a little, even if I just drove around the neighborhood.) I woke up to snow on the ground. I can wait till another day. Have a good week.

My son bought me a brand new Dell — Millennium Edition — back in 2000. It was the nicest computer I had ever had. It’s the one I was using when I first began writing online. A few months later, it died. The online help from
Dell had been very good, but when I could no
longer get online, the telephone support was very poor. My son finally repaired the computer — despite bad advice from the phone tech — but I really lost my faith in Dell.

Eventually my son replaced my Dell with a Compaq, which ran very well until last year. Since I no longer have a job, my only recourse was my daughter’s laptop, which I appreciate, but it really does not like me. Or maybe it too is ready for replacement. The Compaq was really dead, and I bought a new computer, with my son’s advice as I progressed. This one is a Hewlett Packard. I was not too sure about HP computers, but I do know they make my favorite type of printers.

Last May a professional completed the setup on my new computer and retrieved the files backed up on my external drive. Wonderful! I was back in business. All of my bookkeeping was on that backup, as well as a very important document where I store my passwords. I think I explained all that last May.

Last week I turned on my computer and, instead of the prompt for my password, I had a message that included the phrase “detects imminent hard drive failure.” Fortunately, I had printed out an email that I received when I bought the machine, pointing me to Costco Concierge Service. I spoke to a woman who went through all the possible procedures that might put me past the message. Nothing worked; my seven-month-old hard drive had died.

It didn’t end there. She put me into a conference call with HP, who would send me a new hard drive. I had the choice of installing it myself or requesting an HP tech to put it in for me. The hard drive arrived the next day, after which I got confirmation that a tech would be available on Saturday, if that was okay for me. It was. The fellow came on Saturday morning, installed the hardware and the software for it. When it came down to the last disc, he instructed me what to do when the program was done and went on to his next assignment.

Completing the installation program took several hours. By then, my computer area was too dark for me to work the peripherals, so I began the next morning. I reinstalled my printer. (While the computer was down, I was at least able to use the scanner as a copier.) I went online and initialized my emails. I opened the introductory Microsoft Word and Excel. These are not perfect, but I can improve them with the backed up files from the external drive.

I plugged in the drive; its little light went on, and I felt the slight vibration I usually feel. I found the user manual online and started to retrieve my files. But the computer does not recognize the device. There is customer support online for the device, but I need the password I registered with. I had a different email then, so I can’t receive any password they send me. I didn’t know whether to cry or swear. But…

I knew that Martina at Costco Concierge Service would be phoning me on Tuesday morning to make sure the tech had done his job. Even though I will have to phone WD and explain my predicament, I wanted to be sure I had tried everything else, so that they won’t tell me, “It’s your computer, not our product.”

Martina and I were on the phone for over two hours, updating Windows, updating drivers, and everything else we could think of. I tested the port by plugging in a different device, which opened beautifully. It is not the port; I still cannot see the external drive on my computer.

I will probably start the phone calls with WD later today, but I wanted to complain first. It is Whine About It Wednesday, after all.

The time is the summer of 1945. The war in Europe is over. The place is a patch of land at the eastern end of the Mediterranean, a place that Jews for centuries have called the Land of Israel. In 1945 that land is part of the British protectorate.

The Balfour Declaration of 1917 stated Great Britain’s intention of returning that land to the Jews and creating the homeland about which Jews of the Diaspora pray, “next year in Jerusalem.” Various “White Papers” negated the Balfour Declaration, because in the face of war you want the oil-rich countries — that is, the Arabs — on your side.

After World War II, when the Nazi concentration camps were closed, many Jews wanted to go to Palestine; the Jews who were already there were eager to accept them. The British refused to open the country to anyone without documentation or, at the very least, proof that they had relatives already in the country. (Have you read or seen “Exodus”?) Those people who managed to get through but were caught by the British were sent to displaced persons camps, like “Atlit.”

Despite more humane treatment — they were fed wholesome kosher food, they had clean beds and clothing, and they had classes in Hebrew — the immigrants they still felt as if they were in concentration camps, surrounded by barbed wire and forbidden to leave. We follow four young women who are typical inmates.

The girls come from diverse backgrounds. Some were from observant Jewish homes. (The degree of piety often differs from one family to another.) Some were Zionists, raised to believe that one day they would go to Israel; such young people had spent their summers learning about farming and kibbutzim and studying Hebrew. But their comrades had been killed in the war, and they were alone. A couple of the girls had mixed families and had been brought up not to associate with those “lower classes.” They too had been separated from friends and family and were now alone. We watch them trying to build a new life, a new identity. No one talks about what they went through; they will learn to use what they know to survive in a different way.

We follow them only for a few months, but in that time we follow their thoughts and dreams. We learn what they don’t tell each other. I will not divulge the ending of this beautifully written story. Rather, I will tell you why it spoke to me.

Around the time of this story, I was an American child just beginning religious school. Along with teaching about the Jewish holidays and some Hebrew prayers, we were taught about our people in Palestine. I can remember seeing movies, grainy black and white documentaries about the travails of living in that undeveloped land. We were also being taught Tzedakah, a Hebrew word literally meaning righteousness but commonly used to signify charity. To be sure, our donations were also used to aid indigent Jews in the United States, but most especially to help displaced persons get to Israel and to help build the land.

Y’know, the people who now call themselves Palestinians weren’t that interested in the land until the Jews began working it and actually producing good crops. Just sayin’.

In 1948 the British finally gave up. They partitioned the land between the Jews and the Arabs, and the tiny land of Israel declared itself an independent state. I still remember my Sunday School teacher, with tears in her eyes, telling us that as soon as the state was declared, it was officially recognized by President Harry Truman. Israel had had a national anthem for decades before it was independent, but now we had new lyrics to learn for Hatikvah. (In Hebrew, of course; I don’t think I have ever heard English lyrics.)

Ms. Diamant reminded me of a time long ago, when I was a different person — a young woman who thought about going to Israel and even entertained the idea of staying there. Of course, life intervenes whether you like it or not. But I did empathize with these girls.

I was telling a woman I know about this book and asked her whether she had read The Red Tent. She didn’t remember, and I said, “you didn’t read it, because you could not have forgotten it.” I didn’t bother to urge her to read Day After Night. What is that saying, about “pearls before swine”?