Wednesday's scratchy throat became Thursday's barking wet cough, which became Friday's yucky, full-blown cold. I hardly ever get sick, but when I do I'm very methodical about preparing for a couple of days in bed. So this morning I got up and went out to get the essentials: lemons, ginger root, cayenne pepper, a bunch of fresh mint and honey for my magic tea; a slab of bittersweet Cote d'Or chocolate, which is all I ever want to eat when I'm sick; a pile of DVDs from The Third Ear (haOzen haShlishit) on Sheinkin; and a box of the softest tissues I could find.

To all the friends who offered to come over and nurse me, many thanks but really - no thanks. I'm the crankiest patient in the world, and I just want to be alone with my tea, chocolate and movies until I feel better.

On another note, I was fascinated by the responses to my previous post. For those who read it as such, I didn't actually intend to write about the journey from religiosity to secularism, although I suppose the entry could be read that way. It's true that I did travel that journey, but until now I've been reluctant to talk or write about it. It was a long and winding trail, with lots of thought, many experiences all over the world and a few epiphanies along the way, and there are still lots of issues I haven't resolved. Perhaps I'll write more about that some other time. I was mostly trying to say that I think the desire and search for community is one of the strongest human instincts there is, and that religious practice - all religious practice - is just one manifestation of that instinct. In Israel most people are secular, but still the sense of community is strong. And what I saw this past Yom Kippur in Tel Aviv was just one example of that fact. The question is, what holds this community together? I'll think about that a bit and perhaps when my head is less wooly I'll write more about the subject... Right now I can hardly string a coherent thought together. (Cough. Sneeze.)