Author: jedski

I’ve been trying to do nothing. Not as easy as it sounds. Just do nothing and not worry about it. Not feel that you have to have achieved something. Not feel that you have to have crossed something off the constant “To Do” list. Just do nothing. Just do nothing and feel no guilt about it.

“What did you do today?”
“Nothing really”

I’ve become a little obsessed with a bench in the local park. You know how benches in parks have little memorial plaques? My local park’s got loads and every morning when I take the dogs for a walk, I look at this particular bench and wonder.

Sometimes it’s OK to just sit and think. And sometimes you don’t even have to do that.

So off on another travel and there’s this feeling that I should “do something”. If you don’t do something, it’s just…  What? Just what? And if it is “Just what?” is there anything wrong with that?

I remember last year I felt a pressure. I wanted to go to Israel to find out The Truth – seemed a reasonable thing to do on a three week break – but would I take advantage of the time and the opportunity? Would I be brave enough? I remember the flight out being hammered by these ideas, yet they disappeared as soon as I got there. And, once there, I was definitely brave enough. Maybe on one occasion, a little too brave (going into the refugee camp with my Star of David earring wrapped up on a plaster… It was OK, but I know not everyone would have done that).

I’ve got the same thing this time. Will I have a good enough time? Will it be interesting enough? I could try to recreate last year’s trip with a “Trying to understand Trump’s America” theme. But you know, pah. The best part of three weeks, it feels such a ridiculous indulgence. But what’s wrong with indulgence? And what’s ridiculous about it? Who’s it hurting? What’s the downside?

I’m 61 now – yeah, I know – and who knows what could happen? The spectre of my old man never quite leaves. You work your life, you do the right thing, provide and create a life and then you retire expecting to maybe buy a Panama hat and go to the cricket or go on a cruise or do whatever it is you want to do and then…

My old man. He retired at 65 and at 66… There was a chest pain and, five days later, that was that. He bought a new car, something light metallic blue. I remember him buying it. And I remember it being delivered after he died. My mother couldn’t look at it. I think I gave it away, just get it gone. To be honest, I preferred the old one. Anyway. Take advantage while you can.

You know the old Jewish saying: Always sleep with a suitcase under the bed, because you never know when the knock’s going to come.

That was a joke. Probably still is.

Probably. That’s the bit that’s changed.

The summer of 2018. It’s the hottest summer since before the dawn of time. Football thought about coming home, but had a look at the state England was in and thought better of it. (That’s someone else’s gag, but we live in a sharing society).

The Tories are in disarray, biting lumps out of each other over Brexit, undermining Theresa May and maybe positioning themselves for a leadership battle. Anna Soubry has been on the radio saying that Jacob Rees-Mogg is actually running the country.

Her Majesty’s Opposition, the Labour Party, is taking them apart, setting out its stall for a post-Brexit world, coming up with ideas for how we, as a country, can move forward. Except, it’s not. The Labour leadership is not doing any of those things. It’s actually lost in a strangely hermetically-sealed world where, instead of giving the lame Tories a kicking, the only important thing to do is to, again and again, prove they’re not obsessed by Jews by being obsessed by Jews and redefining antisemitism so that it’s not antisemitic to be antisemitic.

How did the Labour Party – the party of my family, my father, my people – become such a hideous hotbed of hatred? How did it become the place where the really important thing is “redefining antisemitism” and a place where racists feel safe?

My idea of Judaism had always been somewhere between Phil Silvers and Woody Allen (the early, funny ones), a cultural badge born out of humour and smoked salmon. Throw in a bit of Philip Roth – in my teens, I used to suffer terribly from Portnoy’s complaint – and… you get the idea.

But now I’m a political Jew. Up for the argument. Somewhere along the line, something switched. There was a point, and I’m not sure where it was, where I had my Howard Beale moment. “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore”. Anyone makes a lazy assertion or assumption, and I’m there. “What do you mean by that? How can you say that?” I’m a keyboard warrior. Ready to take on anyone, especially during work time.

There are cleverer people than me on social media – they all seem to be called David something, I’m not sure why – who’ve published books and academic tomes, and that’s great. I’m not going to pretend to be an expert on Middle East history and politics, largely because I’m not. I’m not going to pretend to be an expert on the Labour Party and the history of left wing politics, again largely because I’m not.

This is much more a personal discovery thing. Why did I switch? Why did I go from someone whose last engagement with Judaism was my barmitzvah to someone who gets really angry? What made me suddenly notice that with so many people – especially “my” people, the liberal Left – just a little scratch and there it is, Jew-hatred. And it really is there.

I’m going to be 60 in September. (I know. Don’t even ask). I’ve started writing a book – “The Whole Mechula is Gescheft” which is brilliant and at current rate of writing will be finished at around the same time Charlton Heston discovers the Statue of Liberty on The Planet Of The Apes.

In the meantime, it’s time to do something else. I’m going to go to Israel, see what it’s really like. How can I defend the place as I do when the last time I was there was when I was 17?

Instinctively, I know a few things about Israel – and this isn’t about government policy or politics. The first is I’ll defend it. The second is anyone who attacks it, I’m instinctively suspicious of. Just thought I’d say.