Back from Hawaii

and my body's time zone is somewhere between here and there. I'll try to append some of my pictures of my time in Kauai.

Here are some dolphins we saw while touring the Na Pali coast in a zodiac boat, followed by the view from the lanai of our condo, a shot of me ziplining, and a view from Limahuli Garden.

Transbay Shabbos

Jan (in Pleasanton) and I (in San Francisco) were on the phone when I mentioned buying challah rolls for Shabbat (which I'd never done before but suddenly got the idea to do when buying a cinnamon loaf at Acme Bakery today), and she suggested that we light the candles together - me in person and her over the speaker phone. We had done the same thing with Chanukah candles, so I immediately agreed. I had a pair of homemade soapstone candlesticks already loaded with Shabbat candles, and a box of matches nearby, so it was a matter of seconds before we were ready to roll. I lit the candles and sang the blessing, and Jan said "Amein." Then I sang the motzi and bit into my challah roll. Then she sipped wine and I water after we sang 'borei p'ri hagafen' together.

So I'm writing this by the light of the candles, which are sitting on my coffee table. I'd been wondering how to celebrate Shabbat while living alone. There was an article on point in one of the online Jewish rags, but it mostly suggested finding a family you can join. Since sitting around a dinner table singing Shabbat songs doesn't really appeal to me, I hadn't been engaging in any Sabbath observance whatsoever. But, with the help of my Jewish-born but unbelieving girlfriend, I might just get something started.

So Here It Is

The first work day of 2011, the day on which I would be heading back to the office if I hadn't just retired. I didn't roll over and go back to sleep, for long, because I needed to be up and moving by 9am, to be ready for visits from my contractor and the writer/director of the play I'm preparing for. I visited the laundry to trade dirty sheets for clean, came home, and had lunch.

There was sunshine earlier this morning, but it's mostly hidden now, and I'm not as strongly motivated to get outdoors. But I need to get a walk nearly every day, so I'd do well to plan a walk with somthing pleasant at the end of it, bundle up, and get out there. So that's what I'm going to do.

The Countdown Concludes; I'm Retired!

I've left the office for the last time (leaving behind, it suddenly occurs to me, a set of earbuds that were plugged into my computer). Went immediately to have a massage, followed by a manicure, picked up some food and came home. I swept the sidewalk, had some phone conversations, and am watching the news much like any other weeknight.

Don't know when I'll start to really feel retired. Maybe not until the first workday of 2011 when I wake up at 7:30 am, roll over, and go back to sleep.

Counting the Weeks, Days, and Hours

Two weeks, eight days, or 56 hours to go. I've started clearing out my office of stuff to go home and have started passing on books, papers, and files to the editor who is taking over my publications.

Yesterday I paged through my archives of "Best of the West," the office newsletter, which I had kept going back to about 1985. I mostly looked at the pictures of so many people I used to know who had been laid off or had gone on to better things, and the few who had retired and/or died, and the very few who were still with the company. Each of them I gave an issue with their picture in it.

Now I'm starting to say to myself, "The next to last Monday I'll be buying milk on the way in to work." Only two more times I have to fill out that dreadful online timesheet.

I've already written on the paper calendar I use to keep track of my billable hours - the 23d is a half-holiday, the 24th is a full holiday, and as of the 27th, I'm retired!!!!!!

It's Official! I'm Retiring!

Finally, finally, all the pieces seem to have come together: Several years after the death of my co-tenant-in-common, I reached a deal with his estate and got a loan to buy the rest of the building, got moved downstairs, renovated the upstairs to a fare-thee-well, and have finally leased it. For months, I have been promising myself and warning my co-workers that I'd set my retirement date as soon as I signed a lease on the upstairs flat, and I'm a woman of my word.

I have officially informed my boss that my last day will be December 24 and have applied to have one of my pensions and my retiree health benefits start as of January 1 (1/1/11 - quite an auspicious date).

I've already started to fill in some of the blank places on my social calendar. I've acquired a leading role in a one-act musical comedy that is to be staged next March. I just bought a series of 20 yoga classes for $1 apiece, and signed up for a meditation retreat in two weeks. And, of course, I've got plenty of community organizing work to keep me out of mischief.

Look out, world-outside-of-work, here I come!

Community Forum on State Government

After months of planning and research, Congregation Sha'ar Zahav, SFOP, the Progressive Jewish Alliance, and PICO California finally held our public forum on the morass that is California's state government. Authors Peter Shrag and Mark Paul set out the various reasons why we can no longer govern ourselves: too small a legislature for the size of our population, supermajority requirements for passing budgets and raising taxes, limitations on reassessing corporate property for taxation, term limits, etc. Since the meeting was scheduled opposite the opening night of the World Series, and our own San Francisco Giants were playing, the turnout could have been dismal. However, concerned folks from Congregation Sha'ar Zahav, other SFOP congregations, and a few PICO affiliates around Northern California contributed to our total attendance of 101.

I felt moved to wax lyrical in our debrief afterwards. When asked to state how we were feeling, I said: "hopeful. It feels like we've lit the fuse on an explosion for good."

Then later I said: "I have been seeing the budget mess as a group of social justice activists scrambling for crumbs from a shrinking pie, when what we really need to do is get into the kitchen and stock it with fresh ingredients, new cooks, and good recipes, and turn out many luscious, big pies. But looking at the mess that is our governmental system, deadlocked because ballot initiatives amending the state constitution have tied legislators' hands yet voters blame them for being unable to act, I'm beginning to see it more as a huge Gordian knot, and we're starting to find some loose ends that we can use to untangle it, step by step."

In particular, IMHO, Californians should vote next week, yes on Prop. 25 and no on Prop. 26. The vote on 25 would start to peel away the supermajority requirements that are keeping the legislature from adopting a budget in a timely fashion, and the vote on 26 would refrain from instituting a supermajority requirement on other government functions.