…and I went for over three months without updating my blog.  So, uh, howdy there, readers.  (Do I still have any readers?  It’s difficult to read what hasn’t been written.)  I continue to draw breath, and I find myself capable of putting fingers to keyboard, even if it has tended to be in 140-character spurts over in the Twitterverse of late.  I return from my unplanned blogging hiatus with hopes of more regularly filling this space with vignettes from this Navy wife’s daily attempts to make it from Point A to Point B without crashing into anything in between (although I’ll grant you that documenting close encounters of the obstacle kind would at least make for more interesting reading).

The current obstacles I’m trying to dodge have much to do with upcoming holiday leave — or rather, the leave we sincerely hope we will have.  Precise details as to start date, duration, and how it will be split are still up in the air, which aggravates me no end because we are unable to start hashing out how we’re going to see everyone we need to see when all of those people have busy schedules that will not necessarily clear themselves just because my husband and I will be bestowing the glory of our presence on the environs.  We are extremely lucky that our families live close enough together that we don’t have to make a decision as to our travel destination — I feel for those of you with families in far-flung locations — but it still isn’t ever easy to cram maximum togetherness into an all-too-finite number of days.  I want to have as much warning as possible to start working the logistics, but I’ll be happy if what we get is at least a day’s notice to let my folks know to ready the guest bed.

Tonight will be the fifth night of Chanukah, but this picture is from some past year's eighth night.

I’m getting exhausted just thinking about all of it.  I think I’m glad that Chanukah is so early this year.  Though my husband has been working full days (and then some, including this whole weekend), we are still able to light candles and enjoy a low-key, relaxing little bit of holiday glow.  We made my much clamored-after sweet potato latkes with goat cheese the other night, eating standing up in the kitchen with the sizzle of the oil a pleasant backdrop to laughter and conversation about life, the universe, and being Jewish in it.  I’m a little sad that we don’t get to light candles with family this year, but I truly treasure the little traditions we have made in nearly four years of marriage, just the two of us.

And then I think of the little traditions that will go unmarked next year, the holidays that will come and go while my husband is deployed in a part of the world where it’s not a great idea to advertise that one is Jewish.  It breaks my heart.  It reinforces how very lucky I am that in this country, in this time, I am able to identify myself as Jewish — to talk about our Chanukah celebrations with other squadron wives, to discuss plans for Passover, to explain that I don’t eat bacon because of my religion — largely without fear of negative repercussions for it.  Antisemitism does still slither in through the cracks even in this relatively enlightened age, as evidenced by vandalism against area synagogues in recent memory, so I am not wholly without concern.  But ninety-nine percent of the time?  If it comes up in conversation, I have no problem mentioning that I’m Jewish.  It’s not that way everywhere, and I’m thankful for the tolerance of the United States.

And if you made it through this meandering return-to-blogging post, I thank you for your tolerance.  😉