Day 122: taking some time to be less serious

November is almost over, and I for one could not be more excited. This weekend I was reading back over old journal entries from the past year, and I think it's safe to say that in a year full of difficult months, this has been one of the toughest. One of my friends jokingly suggested that I celebrate the arrival of December with a secular Rosh Chodesh celebration, but I think I'm actually going to do it. I'll buy a fancy coffee and take a shower with some nice shower gel and enjoy the fact that in 31 days 2009 will be over and I will never have to live through this year again.

For all of the difficulty, this year has also brought with it a tremendous amount of growth on my part, as well as an amazing group of friends and my current life in Israel, so all things considered it's turned out fairly well. It's taught me how to celebrate the little victories, like successfully baking a Pumpkin Pumpkin Pie for Thanksgiving, or reading through an entire Rashi commentary on a verse without using a dictionary (both of these things happened last week and deserve to be commemorated!), or even just celebrating that it's still warm enough that I can sit outside and eat my lunch, as long as I'm wearing a sweatshirt and socks.

I celebrated Thanksgiving last week at the apartment of my friends Amy, Esther, and Jessica. Miriam was there, as well as nine other people, most of whom are Pardes students and all of whom are lovely. It was a wonderful, wonderful dinner - Esther organized the whole thing and orchestrated the production of a massive quantity of food (including chocolate pecan pie - and I know it might be a betrayal of my plain pecan pie upbringing to say this, but that pie was really good). I was supposed to go to a protest on Saturday night, but I sat it out because of a really bad headache that wound up being the precursor to a rather nasty cold. I stayed home from school yesterday, and went in today for my morning classes. Tomorrow is a half day (as Tuesdays always are) and hopefully by Wednesday I will have fully recovered!

On a different note, I've gotten this question a few times over the last few weeks, and hopefully my answer doesn't come too late. If you were planning to send me things from the States (not that you should or need to, but if you happen to be doing it and would like to be well informed about what I desire), here are a couple of things I would enjoy:

• Good tea - I can buy Wissotzky everywhere, and it's fine, but I wouldn't mind something special.
  
• Burt's Bees Lip Balm
• Lush Rub Rub Rub shower scrub
• Books. Books in English. Books in English that have nothing to do with Jews, Judaism, or the Torah. Or Israel.
  
• A pair of these. Cute and comfy.

If I think of anything else, I will let you know.

Lots of love,
Naomi