Yes, I Do Believe in an "After-Lift"

There indeed IS life after the Lift goes! I am a true believer...it is about 36 hours since our container left our property and I must say life remains pretty busy. Andy and I still feel "in the zone" and are still working on closing up loose ends. There are a few small items to buy to take with us; the house needs to be cleaned top to bottom (more on the house at a later date); financial issues to work on; documents to gather, and on and on.

And in the middle of all this, a funny thing has happened....B'ezrat Hashem and with thanks to modern technology, our current home phone number in Chicago will be our American/VoIP phone number in Israel as well. That means that someone in Chicago, for example, will be able to pick up the phone, dial our current, regular home number and it will ring in our home in Israel...all for the cost of a local call. Well, in order to accomplish THAT, the phone number needs to be ported over to Israel. In order to accomplish THAT, there has to be a period of time where our home phone will not work in Chicago during that switch over. During that time period (that limbo period), any calls to my home would ring on my cell phone. ALL of this was to occur the beginning of July just before we left. SURPRISE! It happened already!! Now, anyone calling my house (including the pesky telemarketers) will be calling my cell phone! Oh, well...just another page in the book of this great adventure.

Tonight, there is a dinner being held by the Shul and the community to wish us well, as we make Aliya. There are so many who worked on the dinner who deserve tremendous amounts of thanks. I will "save" those thank yous for my talk tonight and will post the text tomorrow to make sure that they get the public thank you that they deserve!

A final thought...this Shabbat will be my last "normal" speech in Shul! The following week, we have a Bar Mitzva and the one after that is my "good-bye" speech on my final Shabbat. (Actually, I will be in the Shul one more Shabbat, but it is the DAY before Aliya, and I will not be able--emotionally--to give a speech).

One more "final" thought...on a homiletical note...As I walk around our home, empty of most furniture and possessions, I hear echoes everywhere. It occurs to me that, in a sense, I am listening to the echoes of our "past" in this home. The three daughters we raised here...the good times...the sad times...the Shabbatot/Yamim Tovim meals and guests....I sit here and I can "hear" it all in my mind's eye. It is eerie and strange to deal with but life does go on and it will soon be time to write the next chapter in the story of the Shandalov family.

We now are at 24 days...42 minutes left...TICK....TICK...TICK...!