UH, ANYONE HAVE A MAP?

 Ever have a nightmare where you are lost in a world you do not recognize? Feel the fear as it takes over, no path to take, no aid available and you are up that proverbial creek without a paddle. In fact, you do not even have a canoe or raft or anything that floats. And then you wake up. Gasping, looking around, confused as to how you got here, wherever here is. In the minute or seconds or whatever time length it takes to correctly place you in actual time and space, the fear remains, the heart beating, beating. Next time you have this dream, you think, you had better have a map. 

However, what if the nightmare is representative of a true reality? What then? Can a map be found? Is there even one in existence? Yes and no, for while it is a certainty that others have had similar realities, no one ever had the exact same reality as yours. We each are individuals, the same, yet different. The question is, which is more powerful -the similarities or the differences?

So today, tomorrow, for months to come, my realities, personal and communal, or social, relating to the world at large, remain mired in a land which does not exist. should not exist. The first, the personal, is a land of fear, of hope, of prayers, of anger. How could this be? Even now, weeks after the initial shock, I scream into the air with anger and confusion. Sweet, golden little boys anticipating bar mitzvah do not get cancer. They don't! It is so unfair! 

And then I stop.  We can never understand the thinking of the One Above, the ordering of the universe according to different rules beyond our comprehension. We can pray, we can organize, we can marvel at the advances science has made -yet not nearly enough, nor soon enough. 

The doctors extend threads of good results, but the only thing that will satisfy me, the true paddle for that missing canoe on that creek, is a complete, total healing. And while we are at it, why not rid the world of this whole damned thing; eradicate it from the world, so no more little boys are forced to be braver than most adults. Furthermore, G-d, while on the topic, explain to me, if You can, why You would even allow such a scourge to exist on Your world. 

Why the hell indeed!!!!! 

The other reality - that of a political climate where abhorrent people such as Marjorie Taylor Greene are given audience, a platform, on which to speak and spew dangerous, vicious inanities, reeking of sulfur, from the hell she wishes upon us.

But I have no time for her today. At this point it is up to people to realize what she is, who she represents, what future she wishes to shatter. She is for another day, for today I have time for family, holiday preparations, thankfulness for a medical field which has persevered in a difficult search for a cure to all forms of this diabolical enemy - cancer. Today is a day to thank the dedicated and caring health professionals and volunteers who make this difficult world just a tad easier to live with. But yes, I confess, that anger remains - along with confusion - and hope - and gratitude to all who have joined us in this fight.

No complete map yet but we are working on one together.

And always, always, remember -

HEAL THE WORLD.

HEAL YITZY!

Yitzchak Elimelech ben Chana Sarah

May he be granted refuah shelaymah bimheyrah beyameinu. 

May he be granted a timely and complete healing.

May Hashem hear all our voices raised in prayer. 

Amen. Amen.