Ezekiel's Daughter

Last year, I designed my own cards to the bemusement of many of my friends and family. A few broached the subject when I asked if they had received a card from me. “What was that exactly?” they asked nervously. Oh well, I enjoyed the process. Given that Kodak allows one to create the photographic art for cards, I may well do it again.

I almost never send Christmas cards at all. I’ve gone from buying Christmas cards and Hanukkah cards, to buying only Hanukkah cards, to buying New Year’s cards and Hanukkah cards. My passive-aggressive side is no doubt trying to get relatives and friends to acknowledge “my” holiday of Hanukkah. Year after year, I get Christmas cards. There are the people who complain that they can’t be bothered to buy one different card. There are the people who forgot about Hanukkah. And, of course, there are the folks who think that Hanukkah is the Jewish Christmas. (After all, the nativity scene is a Jewish family.) And, there are the people who I forgive—because this is the only time that I hear from them at all. Ah well.

This year, Christian friends get Kwanza or New Year’s cards. (I didn’t even get all of the Hanukkah cards out.) I am just late this year—not passive aggressive at all. And the cards were all standard department store issue. People loved them.


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On a different note, your blogger here went to see Sweeney Todd with friends and loved it.   I went out to yahoo movies and gave it an excellent review.  I recommended it to SciFi Noir.  I’m a fan.  But I’ve always loved that musical.

It is always interesting finding story details in Sondheim’s lyrics that are not explicated.  I can always advance that story line myself.  I had earlier noticed Mrs. Lovett’s line about ‘legitimatizing her rumpled sheets’—implying that she and Todd were a couple.  One wonders how she lured him into her bedroom, but then he was a grieving husband and father.

This time, I noticed the difference between the Mrs. Lovett’s description of Lucy’s decline and the Beggar Woman’s description of Mrs. Lovett.  Mrs. Lovett describes Lucy’s decline as if she were there.  Did she try to take care of her stricken neighbor?  The Beggar Woman says that Mrs. Lovett is a devil woman with no pity.  I suspect that the truth is somewhere in between.  How far should a neighbor go?  (That’s an old question, I know.)  The Torah prescribes taking your neighbor’s cow home, taking care of it, and surrendering it when the neighbor returns.  But cows give milk.  They pay their fare.  What should we have expected of Mrs. Lovett?