Backtrack, Foretrack, and Presentrack

I am currently in Palm Springs. Sitting by the pool. My belly full from the kosher l'pesach lunch buffet we were treated to an hour or so ago. How I got here is the story of this blog post.

Yerida (Going Down) for the Regel (Holiday): A List
Our Kabbalat Shababt was done on the Mitzpe in the freezing wing, communal air, and confused veiw of the sunset.
I was on "Oneg Staff".
I gave a d'var torah about the word root "Kara" (it was Parashat Vayikra [the portion of the week]) at the Oneg.
I taught a song at the Oneg.
We sang the song in a round.
People really liked the song.
It was a really good song.
I was really happy that people really liked the song.
We spent Tuesday night "Doing Mishmar", which we usually do on Thursday night.
I say "Doing Mishmar" in quotation marks because we didn't "Learn" Mishmar. But it was a good (musical) time nevertheless.
Caught a ride to Tel Aviv the next day to meet with Zochrot, an organization that creates and sustains awareness around Palestinian villiages-that-were.
Zochrot was dissapointingly single-minded.
Hung out with friends.
Went to bookstores, drugstores, apartments, dorms, cafes, restaurants, bars.
Watched the Israeli superbowl. Rooted for Tel Aviv. Tel Aviv won.
The Israeli Army Chief of Staff was at the game. His son was the losing quarterback. Yikes.
Flew AirFrance through Paris to Boston.
Decided that AirFrance is a respectable airline with respectable food and respectable flight attendence and respectable movies. I fell asleep during the respectable French movie.
There were French-Moroccan Jews on my flight.
I learned my lesson and didn't bust out the Arabic. Successfully avoided a Shidduch.
I gave the last of my chametz (a Cliff Bar) to a woman in Boston. She was grateful.

Pesach: B List
Boston, family, scardydog, pouring rain.
"Ma Nishtana" in Yiddish.
Got to be the Water in "Chad Gad Ya".
Woke up at 4:30am.
Cancelled flight to LAX at 7:10am
Back into Boston and headed for the Jewish place of refuge: Hillel.
BU Hillel provided food, shelter, sleep, family, and made possible the observance of religoius ritual. Truly a refuge.
Flight out to Denver at 2pm. Turbulence was terrible.
Change planes in Denver.
As I booked it to Brookstone (new headphones!) apprecaited the West Coast chill: Bears, backpacks, hemp sweaters and ski-goggle tans.
Take off from Denver: Clouds like cotton, mountains like chocolate, snow like icing, sunset like straweberry-mango sorbet. For everything else, there's MasterCard.
Arrival in Palm Springs: The airport's outside. Every house has a pool. Our hotel is a mix of Chareidi (and some not-so-Chareidi) families from Brooklyn, Switzerland and Spain who spend their evenings listening to Sam Glaser and the Palm Springs regulars: women in bikinis and men in speedos. Torah U'Mada?


Musically - or, perhaps just emotionally - I'm confused. Which is why I leave you with this: Patrick Park's "Life is a Song".