Listen All Y'all, This is Sabotage

We had our last pre-aliyah meeting this past weekend. A middle-aged Orthodox woman from Nefesh B'nefesh came to meet us at the local Orthodox shul. We went through the last bit of paperwork and asked her the last of our questions.  I'm always wary of these meetings.  I feel because I'm not Jewish that I have to work extra hard to prove I'm commited to Israel and raising Jewish children.  I randomly pepper the conversation with useless tidbits of Jewish or Israeli knowledge just to prove my point. 

I guess I'm hoping they will try to understand me a little more. Accept us a little more. Feeling accepted is not an unusual need for anyone.  Although it is a need we all try to hide.  We don't like to think of ourselves as shallow, because we've been taught the need to be accepted sabotages ourselves.

In the end it's just human nature, another feeling we all have but don't admit.  From the time I first ran home crying from middle school because I was wearing the wrong shoes to today as I desperately try to find my place in this new world, I am constantly struggling to be true to my beliefs and finding a way to fit in.

Trust me, I'm usually a staunch defender of interfaith relationships, but that nagging feeling of trying to be accepted has a funny little way of making you sabotage even your most basic truths.  I don't care what this woman thinks of my marriage.  I'm not worried if she thinks I'm good enough to become Israeli and to raise Israeli children.  I don't hide my faith.  Usually. 

Fortunately, she was an angel.  She took my hand and tried to make me feel comfortable.  Just a nod in my direction made me feel a part of the process.  She said she hoped we would be blessed with healthy children in our future.  And, of course, in typical Israeli fashion invited us to Shabbat dinner no less than 10 minutes after meeting us.  We left feeling more energized than ever.  More accepted than ever.




In related news, Marilyn's pre-move sabotage has begun.  Ever since we moved empty packing boxes into the spare bedroom on Sunday, she has been giving us the side-eye.  Call me crazy, but I swear that dog knows. 

DH and I were getting ready for dinner on Wednesday when I absentmindedly left my prenatal vitamins on the coffee table.  I should really know better.  I've known this dog for 7 years and in those 7 years her penchant for stealing and eating said stolen goods has only increased.

30 minutes of panic, 45 minutes on the phone with Poison Control, the emergency vet clinic, and Animal Poison Control (how did we not know they exist?), 4 ounces of milk, $65, a hell of a lot of worrying and a whole lot of kicking myself later, we learn dogs can in fact eat prenatal vitamins and be perfectly fine. 

Let me rephrase that.  We learned Marilyn can in fact eat prenatal vitamins and be perfectly fine.  Add this to the ever growing list of items Marilyn has eaten and survived.  Including, but not limited to:

• A half pound bag of almonds
• A pound of chocolate chip cookies
• A pound of raw bacon
• An whole chicken carcass
• 2 roach traps (roaches not included)
• A large pot of frying oil
• The fluffy insides of 3 couches
• The outside coating of ibprofen (yes, just the coating)
• Suisse Mocha instant coffee
• My favorite shoes
• My favorite necklace

Now I realize that stealing/eating habit is quite possibly just in her nature as the worst dog ever to live on this planet.  But I cannot help to find a correlation between the moving boxes, her most recent adventures in digestive curiosity and the fact that this incident occured the night before we planned to take her to the vet to get her bloodwork and vaccines updated for Israel.  Plus I swear she was taunting me all night.

Coincidence or  Saboteur?


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