Friday

I'm stealing time to write this.  Rabbi Norman Lamm (he should live and be well) used to like to say that being kovea itim leTtorah is translated by some to mean that you need to "steal" time from your busy life for Torah.

I never know what to write or not. I think blogs and facebook, etc. are often advertisements, not so real.  i value being real and try to be so.

Recently I saw a few cartoons about technology/loneleness.  In on of them a guy is sitting and looking very sad, alone with his cat in frame after frame. Then he takes a selfie with the cat in which he smiles. And he posts it with words that say something like- Dude 99- living the good life!

I saw another cartoon in which a person keeps telling everyone that approaches her to go jump in a lake (but not exactly in those words) and then sits alone bemoaning why she has no friends.

In another a person sits with today's ubiquitous "smart" phone, clicking it and complaining that he has no tweets or messages or emails or instagrams or facetime, etc.  then he says, it's better- I have to put this aside and do work anyway.  The he puts it down for a few seconds, doesn't do work, keeps looking and the phone, picks it up and clicks it, and says wistfully- "maybe now," hen sees no messages and sighs.

What seems to help us connect can sometimes actually disconnect us from each other and ourselves.

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Now it's later.  I don't feel as comfortable writing free form here as I used to.

I just want to wish everyone a Good Shabbos.

Peace.