business first, then Shalom, Tel Aviv!

Okay, so let start out by promising that within a week, the frequency of these posts will almost certainly decrease. That settled...

The flight. due to a series of lucky circumstances, I flew first class, or business first as continental calls it.
good things about first class: three bags checked allowed, even though I only brought two. bags can be 70 lbs. i could nearly fully extend MY legs while seated. the seat moves into a lying down position. my tray table was given a linen table cloth. no one sat next to me on this flight. i had a dinner menu. and ordered steak. with a glass of red wine. then a cheese plate. then ice cream and baileys. borded the plane first.

bad things about first class: it is not like in the wedding singer. there is no red carpet, and passengers cannot actually serenade the plane. shucks.

currently, i am sitting outside a coffee bar in tel aviv (still in Ben Gurion airport). collecting my luggage, going through customs, all relatively painless. probably because its nearly 2 am. I am soon going to leave the airport and attempt to get into my apartment in Jerusalem. we'll see how that goes.

on a slightly more thoughtful note, as the plane started to get lower, preparing to land, i looked out the window as we flew over the mediterranean sea. I instinctively said a whispered schehechiyanu (a blessing for a new thing, a first time, or a first time of the year) as I saw the sea meet a sea of lights, the twinkling, hundred year old Tel Aviv. In the middle of my prayer, a moment of 'WTF' swept my mind, and for a second, I had no idea what I was doing, why I was here, what had possessed me to want to take this trip. That thought hasnt really vanished...perhaps been calmed, but it is still there. Here's to seeing what comes!

Shalom!