[OPEN] observe the month of spring

[tehilim127_1]

Who: Zivia (tehilim127_1) & all comers (with prompt for Degas)
What: Settling in, and scrambling to prepare
When: April, prior to the event (backtagging welcome!)
Where: At home, at work (Town Hall), at the docks, at the Oak & Iron, at wits' end
Warning(s): To be added as relevant

At home
There's a lot of work that goes into making a house one's home, even when one receives it fully furnished. Zivia's resigned herself to doing it in stages, and moreover to those stages happening out of the order she would prefer, since according to the best-approximation calendar she's discussed with Lev-Lyubov and Anzu, Pesach is coming. Which means getting ready for that first.

She's put up a request on the community bulletin board; if it pans out, they'll be able to bake matzah, at least. Cleaning out the house she's been allotted is taking up a good chunk of the rest of her free time, though she might be willing to take a break to talk with a visitor.

At work (Town Hall)
The filing system isn't too hard to learn, it turns out. She takes notes during her brief training, writes up a couple of cheat sheets, and keeps one at her desk and one on her person. The chair and desk aren't particularly ergonomic, but they're sturdy and functional and won't completely ruin her wrists or spine, so she'll call it good.

It's been a while since Zivia's done any purely paper filing, but it's funny how it all comes back to you. Anyone else working there or visiting may overhear her humming to herself as she works.

At the docks (for Degas)
She hasn't forgotten the preacher's offer of help, so he's the one she calls on when she first comes across a task that needs an extra pair of hands. And, she's hoping, a cart or wheelbarrow or something to that effect, to help haul a bunch of items from her house down to the water's edge and back.

At the Oak & Iron
This city isn't the one she's always thought of as hers, but it's hers now, at least for now. She has to remember that. Has to learn that, internalize it until it feels like the truth. And that means, first and foremost, coming to know its people.

So even if she's a little tired most evenings now, Zivia makes a point of coming down to the pub after work at least twice a week, to meet her neighbors. Find her in the common room with a hot tea or a cold beer, looking for familiar faces or new ones.

At wits' end
Wildcard!

Comments

[tehilim127_1]

The cart is full of boxes and bags, and the boxes and bags are full of ... something that clinks, like metal and/or glass, as they move. Zivia's also got a deep wicker basket over one arm, that seems to be empty but for a few dishtowels.

"Oh, it will. But it's not about physical cleanness. In fact they've got to be completely clean before you dunk them. It's a ritual purification. You could think of it as spiritual or symbolic, or both."

[preacher_in_reticence]

"Mm. What are we symbolically washing away in this process? Sin? Bad vibes?"

He's aware he lacks context for Judaism, but he's trying to play the part of the wise son without even knowing the tole exists.

[tehilim127_1]

"Not sin," she says right away. "Not exactly bad vibes either, more like ... anything past, I guess. There are other times when you immerse and there's a specific impurity that's being cleansed, but this is more sort of ... restoring a state of being new."

A pause, and a rueful, half-apologetic look. "Or, full disclosure, if you asked some other authorities they might tell you it was to wash away any possible prior use in the service of other gods."

[preacher_in_reticence]

"He's rather possessive, your god." But there's a lightness behind those words, not really an admonishment or even a complaint. "But in the context of this island, it's actually a fair consideration. Whether someone might have left an offering to the goddesses on the plates or something."

[tehilim127_1]

Breezily: "Yeah, it's that kind of relationship. And yeah, for most of our history it was a serious consideration as well -- a little less so now, as that kind of offering isn't as common as it used to be, but still. We tend to hold on to old practices, some of us. Even when the obvious reasons for them seem like they might not be relevant anymore."

They're getting closer to the docks. Zivia shades her eyes against the sun and peers ahead, to look for a good place for what they're here to do.

[preacher_in_reticence]

Degas points out an area that slopes down to the water where children sometimes splash when summer weather is nice.

"Most of our 'old practices' are from the rest of the Emerald Isles. Anwyllic, like Jane or Braxton like Japhet, even though we're physically closest to Glassighe. But Japhet found this island, and his family populated it. So their traditions are significant here."

[tehilim127_1]

She smiles, and turns their steps toward that spot.

"One of these days I really need to do a little reading about this world. At least the nearby parts of it, the ones that influenced this place. Japhet ... I know I've seen that name."

[preacher_in_reticence]

"Japhet Leeds was the man who discovered the island. He and his wife Jane had thirteen children, only one of whom--Dahlia--is still alive today."

Degas knew them all very well; he still mourns Japhet, and is paternally fond of Dahlia.

[tehilim127_1]

"Leeds," she says, almost overlapping him, "of course -- I'm so sorry. The name struck me when I first saw it, it's ... very similar to one from my world."

They reach the water's edge, and she puts down the basket and starts taking out towels, tucking them into the crook of her arm for the moment.

[preacher_in_reticence]

Degas isn't sure how to help, but he does take off his shoes and roll up his pant legs so he can wade into the water and wiggle his toes in the sand and pebbles of the little beachlet.

"Which one struck you, Japhet or Leeds?"

[tehilim127_1]

"I've heard names like both of them, but Japhet's the one that struck me. It's a lot like a name in the Tanakh -- that's our holy book. Well, books. There's a story early on in the first part of it, about a time when the whole world was flooded and only one family was saved; the youngest son in that family was called Yaphet, or Japheth."

Zivia follows suit, taking off her own shoes and socks, and tucking up her skirt to just at her knees. She doesn't wade in yet though, instead spreading the towels on the beach above the watermark.

"All right, let's see ... flatware first, I think." And she starts transferring forks and spoons out of a box in the cart, into the wicker basket.