Apologies for the slow posting this week; it’s one of those times when my duties as a Jewish wife and mother mean more than combing down my kids’ cowlicks and kvetching about towels on the floor (not that tending to severe bedhead isn’t a full-time job in itself.)

Besides teaching my son’s kindergarten class the token Chanukah song for the year (20 years in early childhood education and the teacher can’t be bothered to learn one freakin’ song about dreidels? Shanda!), I need to get my heinie in the kitchen and start cooking up a big pot of Matzoh Ball Medicine, heavy on the schmaltz:

My dear husband (let’s call him El Yenta Man; he’ll like that) is scheduled for reconstructive surgery of his anterior cruciate ligament early tomorrow morning. That’s fancy doctor-speak for El Yenta Man is gettin’ his messed-up knee fixed.

I depend on El Yenta Man to have strong legs; they come in useful for carrying groceries, and should we ever need to be evacuated from one side of a river to the other, he’ll need them for swimming. Not to mention that they’re very fine to look at. So I’m taking the rest of the week off to drive him to the hospital and sit in the waiting room while the orthopedic surgeon replaces his old, stretchy ACL with a new, strong one (well, new to him, anyway. God bless the cadaver from whom it was culled.)

That’s all I’m going to be doing: sitting. Maybe finish reading “The Modern Jewish Girls Guide to Guilt,” but mostly sitting. And praying, for sure. I mean, it’s not open heart surgery or anything, but when a loved one goes under general anesthesia, it can’t hurt to keep a spiritual line open, just in case. So I’m shutting down the computer, ’cause I can’t hold that kind of open, nurturing space in my mind if I’m distracted by my favorite celebrity fashion disaster blog or the latest Chanukah doll.

Besides, the hospital doesn’t have WiFi.