Stage Delight

So here I am, sitting admiring the view from my garden. The trees are weighed down with purple buds, some of them already flowering into pink blossom. The Israeli flag flying on a pole at the end of the garden is fluttering in the breeze. Beyond it, the Shomron Hills, dotted with trees and patches of rock, bask in the rays of the afternoon sun. The soundtrack is that of the leaves rustling and the birds chatting, aside from that… silence. I breathe in the clean air and exhale the stresses of the day. The view from my house is a true tonic.

I moved here a year and a half ago from the UK. We wanted to change our lives for the better; change gear, change priorities, take control. In that time we have lived in four houses (in three different towns). We have had a baby. I have written the first draft of a book. We have set up a new business. Well we wanted change….

When I decided to write a blog I wondered what I might write about. Now I am writing my first entry I am wondering which of the many topics on my mind I should select first.
This week has been busy. My husband just came back from his first business trip in the UK; my mum, who was visiting, just went back home; I had a birthday and I put the finishing touches to my website.

I could talk about any of these, plus more. However, the thing which made me swell with pride, that made me look back and consider our progress over the last year, was seeing my daughter perform in her first ever school show – talking and singing in Hebrew.

My just-turned eight year old is a bright child but a bit of a perfectionist. She has not spoken Hebrew for the 18 months we have been here, to much comment from her teachers. “By now she really should be speaking in Hebrew…” Her brother talks ten to the dozen and corrects my poor grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation. My husband and I both knew that she was slowly taking it all in, assembling the language in her mind and would speak in her own time. During the preceding few weeks she finally gained the confidence to play with a neighbour’s little girl who speaks no English and very fast Hebrew. I started to hear her chatting away to her friend and knew that she was finally on the way. So when I went to see her at the school show; when she got up on the stage and spoke her lines in clear Hebrew; sang her songs and performed her actions with such joy and gusto; I just knew that she had passed a very important landmark.

So my first blog is dedicated to my daughter. As we say in Israel, “kol hakavod” – well done, or quite literally “much respect”.