Jan '20 Excerpt
Beyond the garment storefronts along Derekh Yafo and the dilapidated and nearly crumbling buildings that stretched further into Florentine, I walked the block or so over to Rehov HaMashbir and found the doorway at number 18 slightly ajar. I could see the same darkened drapes still hanging over the second floor window, and directly across, two stained glass Magen Davids and a menorah, both somewhat rusted and fading in colour, also still atop the synagogue on the opposite side of the street. The newly pedestrianized stretch of Levinsky Street by Tony and Esther was a sea change, but around the corner everything here appeared almost as it was nearly ten years earlier when I had just settled back in Tel Aviv after finally marking the end of my army service.
Earlier that evening after returning from Jerusalem I managed to go through some tattered notes and photos that brought me back to that same time and refreshed some old memories. I contemplated stepping into the entrance to see if the staircase that I trekked up and down so many times had managed to be repaired. And also to quickly glimpse the ornamental tile floor at ground level that was so similar to the interior floor scheme of my old flat. I peeked inside and walked in a few steps, but didn't go much further. I saw from a distance that the stairwell had been moderately fixed and instead I went back into the street, where sounds from Levinsky fixedly echoed, and I decided to keep walking.
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