Being Fruitful
A few weeks before I got married this past September, another, just-as-rare event occurred: My extended family visited from Haifa. Yaron and Edna were people I had met only once before, on a whirlwind...
View ArticleThe Bravery of Parenthood
The first time I met Leah Esquenazi, she was nestled beneath a tangle of tubes and wires in her hospital bed at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. Leah was nearly 3 months old, her tiny body inert...
View ArticleCamp Plants Seeds That Let Kids Bloom
In school growing up, I was “the shy one.” I was mute in groups, slow to make friends and prone to swinging alone on the playground during recess while the rest of my class played soccer. Confined to a...
View ArticleTeach, That They May Learn
This fall, Crenshaw High School valedictorian Christerbell Ahaiwe will start her freshman year at UCLA. What her new classmates might not realize is how hard she worked to get there. Growing up with...
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The write words
My father rarely wrote anything down. Take birthday cards, for example: While my mother would embellish the printed message with sweet, loving passages and hand-drawn hearts, my father’s heavy script...
View ArticleThe name game
“Actually, I might still be in your system under my old name,” I said to the perplexed receptionist at the veterinary office as he searched his computer screen for my account. I’ve been married for...
View ArticleDiscovering roots in Israel
Above: (L-R) The author’s great-grandmother Rose; grandfather Isaac; great-aunt Judy; great-aunt Pnina; and great-grandfather Philip in an undated photo. Photo courtesy of Rachel Heller Zaimont I’ve...
View ArticleNet gains for Alzheimer’s patients
Susan Levin sets her jaw in concentration as she tracks the tiny, orange ball sailing toward her over the net. Feet planted shoulders’-width apart, she shifts her weight and swats the ball back to her...
View ArticleInappropriate apologies
A few weeks ago, I conducted an experiment: I counted the number of times I apologized in one day. I said sorry to the mother in yoga pants at Starbucks when I reached past her to grab a straw. Sorry...
View ArticleBringing light to a dark place
In 1894, a young Jewish woman traveled alone from Russia to the United States to marry a man she’d never met and start a homesteader’s life on the stark plains of North Dakota. Just 18 when she...
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