בֹּקֶרִי! בֹּקֶרִי!

 

I had no sooner opened my eyes this morning and thanked HaShem for my life today, pre-Modah Ani, that I sensed there was something a little different about this day. How right I was!

    I forced myself not to look at my phone before I had washed my hands and said the bathroom blessing while opening the curtains, windows and doors, as I had lazily seen a notification out of the corner of my eye that a payment I had been waiting for had come through during the night. I was eager to give my tithe.

    I then went into the bedroom, gathering my laptop and all its paraphernalia, transporting it all to the lounge and plugged it in. For a minute or two I couldn't figure out what was going on. Then the awful truth dawned: My laptop cable was dysfunctional and was not charging my laptop, my entire connection to the outside world and only source of income. Said laptop was losing battery power amazingly quickly!

    Not one of my neighbours were home, so at 7.50am I phoned my son and explained my dire situation to him. Within minutes he had another cable on the way to me, but it would only get here in a few hours, and I had a class in less than an hour. I SMSed the student, but who looks at SMSs anymore? So I phoned her and explained why we would have to cancel the lesson. Did I mention that there was also no internet? 

    OK, so I had done as much damage control as I could right now. I suddenly decided to check if I could get the charging cable to work on another plug. Nope. Not one would work. I wondered how I had damaged the cable....

    Then I decided to check if any of the other electrical gadgets were working. I switched on the kettle and the mosquito machine on two different plugs. Nothing. I stood looking at this for a minute or two - yes, it took that long! - and decided to call the landlord and tell him none of my plugs were working. In my defence, this never happens. If here is a power failure, we have a big solar system that kicks in and nothing stops working for a second. My electrical board is in the garage, which I don't have access to, and my plugs do sometimes trip, at which time I have to alert the landlord so he can check the board.

    But this morning the solar system failed to initiate when loadshedding started. How was I to know?

    I thought: "I'd better phone Yehonathan and tell him to stop the sending of the charging cable." 

    Which I did.

His response?

    Even though it was only a voice call, I could see him slap his forehead and say "Nooo!"

    "I was going to ask you if you've checked that there's power, but then I thought: No, I won't insult her intelligence like that!" he said.

    We laughed and thereafter I decided HaShem must want me to go and finish my fermenting project in the kitchen, which I did. I am now the very satisfied owner of 6 bottles of green bean, tomato, garlic and origanum ferment. Pic below.

This is my South African version of the recipe. If you want the original one, here is the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bs2Vvi-kPzk

    When I came to my laptop after that, I could not for the life of me get the key on my keyboard to produce letters on the screen! What is going on! I shouted in my head.

    Before phoning my son again, I took a moment and tried to make sense of what was happening. It is fortunate that I did. Because I discovered that I was trying to change the text inside an already sent email. So the problem was solved by using the good old copy-paste!

    When I phoned him and told him, my handsome 28-year-old son gave me, his 61-year-old mother a discourse in common sense. And rightly so!

    When I sat down with my cup of coffee to pray Shacharit, I told my friend what had happened to me earlier. It was so good to be able to come to HaShem in prayer; All the stress of the previous hours just melted away.

    I had four classes to teach today. I had to cancel the first one, the second and third one cancelled for different reasons and the fourth one was a no-show.

    OK, I thought, I never gave that little piece of paper that HaShem sends after the Modah Ani concerning the days activities that He has planned so much as a cursory glance this morning! He must want me to do some much needed work at home. So I went back into the kitchen and baked two Tomato Loaves. They are cooling now and smell delicious.

    Thank You for this very interesting day, HaShem. You never cease to amaze and surprise me! 

    It is Yom HaShoah tonight. We remember the six million Jews and other minority groups that died in the death camps in Poland, where my own Jewish ancestors were from.

    There are not many Holocaust survivors left alive today, but there are some. How awful beyond description that some were further tortured in the October 7th massacre last year. We remember. We will never forget. May the enemies of God receive their just reward.

    I am blessed to have a grandson who loves me very much and takes the time every evening to spend 10 or 15 minutes with me on the phone, and who loves to pray the prayer before sleeping. I am so grateful that he makes time for me in his life every day.

    I still have two things to look forward to this evening: The study of the Book of Romans and afterwards the reading of the Jerusalem Talmud with a friend. Pirkei Avot encourages us to get ourselves a study partner - things just go into the head and heart better that way.

    Tomorrow is another day I am trusting HaShem for life on, and I have made my plans. But if today is anything to go by, I had better be prepared and ready for Him to shuffle everything about!

    Every breath and every heartbeat belongs to Him, so that's OK!

May you have sweet sleep tonight and rest in the loving arms of our Saviour, Messiah Yeshua.

 Layla Tov!