she got into a taxi...

she took off her gloves and laid them on the seat...
and as she did so, she caught the glimmer of something 'sparkling'
behind the seat....
not the glint of 'coin', mind you...
but a kind of ethereal sparkle...
violet in nature...
yet somehow translucent....
as she reached for it,
she had the odd feeling that her life was about to change...
it was an envelope...
not a regular, paper envelope...
but a kind of pouch made of sparkle and 'light'....
there was a zipper...
she tried to open it, but it was stuck..
the thing in her hands made her palms sweat...
it was HOT...
very hot...
and something was moving inside this sparkly pouch...
it looked and felt the way a baby looks while still inside the mother...
sort of 'undulating'...
perhaps she should say something to the driver...
after all, there was something very weird going on here...
WHY deal with this alone?
it could be terrorism or ....who knew?
she looked up...
the driver had a turban on...
odd... she hadn't noticed that before...
he was smoking a pipe...it smelled like clove and Cinnamon....
the taxi, in fact, was FILLED with the spicy smoke...
OH< MY GOD !!!
they didn't seem to be in New York any more !!!
what on earth was going on here ????
(stay tuned)...

from time to time...

as we reflect upon things done in past lives...
upon things that may have required a "do-over",
but could not hold up to our own heady scrutiny and deliberation...
we see......CLEARLY...
the ERROR of our transgressions...
the all encompassing umbrella
under which these mis-steps blossomed to
colossal and monumental mistakes...
all the while remaining dry under the cover of
PROTECTION from the elements...
AHHH...
Twiddle Dee Dee.....
we shall don our rubber, profilactic boots yet again....
and weather the storm......

in upper Manhattan there is a cemetery...

and one can feel the history and the presence of the spirits when walking by....
so the other day, i had occasion to pass this cemetery
en route to another destination....
when i saw a woman in a blue coat, sitting on the ground next
to what can only be described as a 'freshly dug grave'....
the blue struck me, as it was electric in its nature...
honestly, it was the bluest blue Ive ever seen...
and she had red hair....
not auburn or copper,
 but BRIGHT, ORANGE, RED HAIR...
and the contrast to the blue
 made it a kind of shocking vignette to behold...
i would've kept on walking, had i not heard the singing....
SHE was singing in Hebrew,
 so of course,
she got my total attention...
she was singing a song about Jerusalem...
and she was SOBBING....throughout the song...
i noticed that she wore a wedding ring...
there was no headstone yet for the grave....
it must've been too Early...
but i understood completely that this man had been her husband....
and that he had perished in service to Israel...
there was a Halal stand outside the cemetery....

they were sublimely crossing the street...

and she looked up for some strange reason....
and she saw a man on top of the roof of a building....
standing very, very close to the edge !
he was about to jump !!
her heart was racing !!
she had to act NOW...
what to do??
what to do ??
if she screamed, she feared he would FALL !!
there were policemen laughing and joking on the corner...
clearly, they'd been TOO BUSY to notice the man...
she had her son with her...
he would be SCARRED ...
he would be 'SCARED'...
oh, my GOD !!
she ran across the street with her boy...
she KICKED one of the cops in the ankle...
she told him to look up...
the fool...
too busy joking around to protect society....
the same dumb oaf who ticketed her car every other day.....
there was a laundry truck....
like in the movies...
it was filled with bags and bags of laundry...
her head was spinning....
her son had to pee....
Jeez....
SOMEBODY DO SOMETHING !!!!!
she raced into the building...left her boy with the cop....
and FLEW past the open-mouthed doorman....
she pressed the top floor in the elevator....
ran up a flight of stairs....
walked out onto the roof....
there was a BLOW-UP figure of a man, tied to the rafter of the building...
posed to look like a suicidal figure.....
what the F**K ???

and Winter was upon them...

and there were colored lights and sleds and Big Macs..
and the children were running against traffic...
and Central Park was filled with vagabonds and dirty water hot dogs
 and black fumes and cigarette butts....
OH !!
and there were orange peels thrown all over the place...
i mean, after all...
they were BIODEGRADABLE, right ??
(in like 2000 YEARS !!)  lolol
however, the oranges were delectable in winter...
and there was ice on the ground...
and an old woman slipped and broke her hip...
while chasing the mugger who had stolen her Louis Vuitton bag..
EVERYONE WAS WEARING SENSIBLE BLACK...
.....what a town......

The family was walking, as always....

and it was so cold and wet and miserable outside...
she saw them often....
the mother and father with the two, small children...
bundled up in their tattered, old coats and hats...
the parents carried big , dirty blankets on their backs, in order to
keep the children warm...
and they wore garbage bags to keep themselves dry....
she cried bitterly whenever they passed by...
many times wanting to offer them a meal...
but they were not beggars, this family ...
they had a certain pride about them...
and they were wholly unapproachable ...
no question about that....
they had a broken shopping cart...
it was lined with the garbage bags...
her heart felt such pain as she gazed at the troubled family....
oddly, they had a dog....
they pulled the old, grungy dog with them always...
the world was a hard place, filled with inequity and broken promises...
she watched as this homeless, forlorn family pulled out a menorah
from the shopping cart, lit candles,
and sang 'maoz tzur', en famille....

After all...What did they expect ??

that she would cow tow to their every whim ??
that she would NEVER break the seal of 'confinement' ?
that somehow THEY would INHERIT THE EARTH ??
although their meek ways were enshrined in a pseudo-
golden pavilion of STUPIDITY?
that she would need to don her SPACE accoutrement in order to breath
through A STRAW ??
WHAT WERE THEY THINKING ???
seriously....
couldn't they see how ridiculous their demands were ?
and how UTTERLY foolish these demands made them look ??
did they care ??
Why were people SO LAME ???
was it the fact that CHANUKAH was upon them ?
did they fear their gifts would not be up to snuff ??
or that their oil wouldn't last for the full, 8 days ??
oyyy veyyy
people...people....
wake up !!!The Gift