Sauci Bosner

Such a nice day

It was such a nice day. The squarely cut stones shone brightly after the short spring storm, a welcomed surprise.  The narrow grey and black pebbled roads unfolded before me as a heat mirage rising in the desert, running any which way . Yellowed achirotem hachoresh trees hung in full bloom over the steep stone walls of Jerusalem. Jerusalem in the spring time. My favourite city on the planet to get lost in.

Afraid of slipping  on the  road, I let my purple gel nails use the walls as my guide.  Spreading my right hand out as the lovely fan my first born daughter Anja brought me from Kyoto, my finger tops glided effortlessly along the irregular surfaces of this Jerusalem wall. These walls must  have been chiselled  by hand years ago, perhaps by a Yossi, Achmed, Tova, Yaakov or a Boaz  as the nails got caught in little niches along my way down the road. My right index finger got stuck in one of the dusty holes.I was startled when my finger bent backwards and the nail torn. I sucked on the dust and the blood, wondering which was older.

I made it safely to the worn wooden bench,where I have frequently stopped to have a break. I am a creature of habit as my daughters Anja and Jenna have come to know.  Always have been.  Finding the wooden bench after so many war and weathered years, is reassuring. Time and my memory have not failed me.  I remember sitting here thirty four years ago in 1972 when I was studying at Hebrew University, a slim youngster dressed in patched bell bottoms and a shirt concocted of old ties.  My hair was worn in a simple braid, lying loosely on my back. My back covered in sweaty spots. A time when I could sweat and not feel ashamed. A time of when I made my own rug sack out of colourful Beduin saddle bags, with red tassels and blue glass Hebron beads that were strung on strands of camel hairs I gathered in the souk. A time when I walked on my  well worn and time trusted Nimrod sandals, heels dry and cracking under the weight of my body.A time when Janis Joplin’s words: Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose echoed in my pre-walkman brain as I climbed up and down the dusty streets of Jerusalem.

Groping in my newly bought rug sack, bought in a hipster Amsterdam boutique  in the “Negen Straatjes “, located in the center of Amsterdam,two months earlier on a sunny Sunday afternoon . “Japanese cherry blossoms” fluttered as spring doves beween the stacked wooden crates  piled up haphazardly near the Herengracht.   Wood, old and new has always fascinated me. Bookshelves were made of wooden crates in the sixties.  Now they are sold for a fortune in designer shops. I feel my age when I stroll through the so called vintage shops  with my  daughters in the little shops of Amsterdam. Just to let you know walking through the aisles of Ikea evokes the same in me!

Settling on this wooden bench, a self-y moment seemed appropriate.  A moment in herstory, a middle aged woman sitting on a bench near a children’s playground.In Jerusalem of all places.  A place where kids played on roundabouts and kicked their chubby legs high into the sky while being pushed by their mothers wearing head scarfs and fathers with kippot slipping onto the ground. A place where rumpled trashed bags of Bisli , an Israeli delicacy snack lay  in piles underneath the garbage bin beside the sparsely grassed and dried park grounds. A place where freedom took on other dimensions. A place where I sat with my iPhone and searched for wifi instead .

The sound of a helicopter flying close by startled me.I looked up into the clear blue skies and saw three helicopters circling in close proximity.The mothers, the fathers and their kids  were rushing to leave the playground. The rustling of jackets, grabbing of picnic baskets and  skateboards together with the echoes of feet pounding the earth jumped up before me. A dark skinned girl of about 7 years ran to me screaming RUN Quickly. Now! I was frozen on this wooden bench, afraid I would not be quick enough. And of course: where would I run to?

I decided to stay put and wait for the thumping of my heartbeat to settle down. My rug sack had fallen on the ground.  I bent over to pick it up. iPhone check, wallet check.passport check. Keys, where are my keys? I looked around and saw that they were still in one of those  deep hipster rug sack pockets. check. The helicopters had disappeared from the blue skies. There was only  a trail of smoke traces above me. An unsettling stillness filled the playground. No more parents, no more kids, no more empty bags of peanut snacks being thrown on the ground. No more George-Pierre Seurat still life paintings in this Jerusalem park.

And there I was still sitting on a wooden bench in Jerusalem on a nice Sunday afternoon.  A  middle aged woman filing her chipped gel nail before she decided to get up and continue with her walk again.