Now we tell each other what we watch.
I keep talking about Shtisel wondering if I can
describe my new book as Shtisel of Upstate New York
wondering what it is about the show which has so many
of us ekeing out our Shtisel nights though my friend
Mark said today He Binge Watched Three Seasons
so did so many
we have two to go and every night
it’s a decision: do we want to find out what happens
with Akiva and Racheli with two Shiras with the Rebbetzin
and the brothers I’m reminded of why a million years ago
when I was in a volunteer program in Israel one of my most
interesting years a country full
of problems and problems and problems still I’d never
been as happy and some of the reason then (I wonder
if this is still true now) was how human people could
be and how funny (I am not talking about politics or anything
more significant than everyday life) and I’d
ride an Egged bus some of the world’s worst drivers
on Egged buses from south to north three or four hours
to Qiryat Shmoneh where I lived and nearly always
the person sitting next to me a stranger in a thousand ways
from Yemen or Kurdistan or Ethiopia or Iraq would start
talking and I would too we’d speak broken Hebrew to each other
and they would tell me about their relatives,
one by one by one and I never wanted
to get off at my stop.
Public transportation: a new universe in every seat.