HUSSEIN HANGED!

I woke up yesterday morning and the headline read: HUSSEIN HANGED!

So weird.. Like Good Morning Baghdad! A blast from the past.

We like to say Justice is Swift there however he was after all hung for crimes he committed 25 years ago. Is that like a commuted sentence or something. Talk about a mercury retrograde ...

One less twisted, tortured soul on this planet and without a morning paper delivered to my doorstep I never would have know.

Is there a Lubavitcher on the face of this planet that did not immediately go back in time to the first Gulf War and or think of this like Haman being hung on the Gallows? I think my eyes initially read it as "Haman Hung" and I felt like I should find a grogger or something. But, I was groggy and I felt like I was in a time warp and could suddenly hear farbregens in my head where the Rebbe spoke about that time and place. How many years ago was that? Time does catch up with everyone, doesn't it?

The man was a bad man. Not much more you can say about him. He's gone now. About 26 years too late I suppose. If people can indeed sell their soul to the Devil for power and gold, than he was a prime example.

I had a beautiful Shabbos on my English birthday yesterday. Shul was nice, quiet. The Real Rabbi Wineberg was there though he didn't speak. No kiddush, no farbregen; just a lot of women with recent simchas wishing each other Mazel Tov after davening. It was nice to have so many engagements and babies being born in one week or so. Nice to hear details, makes me smile and feel like all will be well in the world. My brother and sister-in-law took me to Thai Treats where I had my favorite soup and we had fried bananas with ice cream and chocolate syrup for my birthday.

The kids are well... scattered somewhat around the world.

It's very windy outside. Somewhere, sometime in the middle of the night the winds picked up and started blowing strong out of the East. I keep wondering on what the weather is like in Iowa and Chicago in winter. I have a son who is going to move to Postville. So cool. So very, very cool. Probably meteorologically cool too... Well it works for me as I think it will work well for him and his soon to be wife. I'm so happy. Does a person really need to wear long underwear in Postville in the Winter? Who knows, we will see.

Somewhere between traffic jams and the noise and confusion of Miami I am going to take my daughter to the Mall today. It's a fast day and I hope it goes fast. Been promising Rivky a shopping trip for months now and am going to try to get this done before the calendar turns from 2006 to 2007!

People have been kind. I got a Victoria Secrets Gift card for my birthday and am hoping they have my shampoo and conditioner on sale for their big sale. And, I have a Target Gift card for me to go look for long underwear. Unless they have those leggins on a big clearance in VS.

So, what message do I want to impart here on my birthday?

Change is Good.

If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem.

Do Acts of Goodness and Kindness!

When in doubt of which path to take... go with your heart!

Home IS where the heart is and a heart alone always feels lonely... so may this be the year where everyone finds their beshert.

I love Miami, it shines in the dark on a tropical balmy night lit up like a picture postcard. Bathed in colors, basking in the balmy breeze it awaits tourists from all over the world. In the morning sun the buildings on Miami Beach sit quietly with their playful art deco flourishes as majestic Royal Palms flutter in the beach breeze. It is beautiful. So beautiful. The sights and scents of the city waking up are better than anything you see on TV.

But, the traffic is horrible and the noise level of people everywhere is beginning to make me feel like those people on that doomed planet in Star Trek. Pretty amazing image brought to mind for someone who is not the world's biggest Trekkie. Just... that's how you feel sometimes down here.

I love Key West because it's quiet, simple and poetically beautiful. It occurs to me that people must think I am a party girl when I say I love Key West. Nah, off the beaten track away from the beer drinkers on Duval Street... Key West is as close to the Garden of Eden as I have ever seen. Flowering vines run in and out of white picket fences race up Poincianna trees and then weave their way in and out Bougainvillea Bushes. The sky is clear at night, the breeze blows in from across the Straits bringing the flavor of Havana to the mainland. It's wonderful! It's one of the few places you can watch the sunrise out over the water and set over the water on the same day.

But, home is where the heart is and if there was a nice Lubavitch man in Alaska or New Mexico I would learn to love the sunset on the desert or to light the menorah in the dark night of Nordic Winter.

Jews it has been said, like to vote with their feet. We are all in Golus, does it really matter where we live or does it matter the life we lead?

I can close my eyes and I am on Kingston walking my way down to Montgomery (nice corner on this Planet Earth of ours) or... in Long Beach having coffee with Pesha in my smallest of kitchens on San Antonio Way. I am at the Rodeo Collection with Deena Holland having Tofutti or on the Santa Monica Pier with my babies and Shawn's babies on a Summer Afternoon enjoying the only cool breeze in town. I am on Lincoln Road enjoying a Cuban Coffee. My life has been a moving, mirage of fantasy coming to life, an ever-changing mosaic of people and magical moments.

Pretty Awesome if you think on it for a little girl who was raised in a 2 bedroom 1 bath house just off Bird Road whose whole world was a just a few ficus trees away from the Everglades. I grew up, moved to the big city (NY/Brooklyn) and lived in California and came back home to Miami. Maybe one day I will make it to Provence or Paris and maybe one day I will make it to Eretz Israel and daven at the Western Wall but for today.... sitting here waiting for the sun to rise as the breeze out of the East races across me listening to my son's dog snore seems the most perfect place to be this moment.

Someone said in Bais Menechem last week (it may have been Laz) that the biggest lesson Joseph taught us was that wherever you are there is a reason for you to be there. He didn't just sit in prison feeling badly for himself, he talked to his cellmates, his neighbors.. he had dreams and he had a reason for being where he was and he lived that moment of his life to it's fullest. You have to know where you are in life and if you stumble upon a place you never thought you'd be you have to see the reason and purpose in being there and if you can't see it.. Hashem will help guide you to the reason, there is always a reason for everything. Just sometimes we don't see it. Instead of complaining to Hashem we should thank him for putting us somewhere we needed to be.

Happy Birthday Bobbi indeed... Happy Birthday World!

As someone somewhere always says... May you have the weather you enjoy the most today.. and may I add may you have someone special to enjoy it with as well.

Love and Besos, Bobbi
Ps did you know the spellchecker read Postville and asked me if I meant Positive! Funny... was going to say earlier that should be the song for the day... but I couldn't remember the lyrics. Accentuate the Positive, Eliminate the Negative and get ready for 2007!