Author: Miriam Drori

Author, editor, attempter of this thing called life. Social anxiety warrior. Re-Connections, a collection of short stories, published with Ocelot Press, 15/10/2025.

Israel

Fifty-One Years is Over Half a Century

Post author By Miriam Drori
Post date Jul 27, 2017
10 Comments on Fifty-One Years is Over Half a Century

This post is about what happened to me this past weekend. It’s also about much more than that.

We were visited by a lovely Canadian couple. They stayed with us, ate and talked. We showed them some of the sites of Jerusalem: the Old City market, the Western Wall, Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum, Machane Yehuda market, the city centre and other neighbourhoods. The visit ended with an impressive light show projected onto the city walls. Then they left us to visit other parts of the country before returning home to Canada. The end?

With new/old friend on the Jerusalem's light railway — In the Light Railway

Not at all, because I left out the beginning of this story. Two eleven-year-old girls became friends at school out of convenience, and somehow that friendship grew to include visits outside school. One of those girls was considerably less popular than the other and so glad of the friendship that provided protection from the harsh treatment she’d endured from other girls.

That friendship ended without warning just a year after it began. The popular girl’s mother secretly took her daughter off to live in Canada. The other girl was left to flounder, suddenly vulnerable and exposed to bullying from all directions.

The girl who remained was me. The one who left was the woman who came to stay last weekend, over fifty-one years later. We met briefly four years ago, but this was the first chance we had to talk together.

‘Weird’ was a feeling we both agreed on. I could be talking to her as friends do, when I’d suddenly remember she was that twelve-year-old girl who deserted me. And while I knew that what happened back then was in no way her fault, I appreciated her apologies. Her leaving led to six difficult years that determined the person I was to become, and none of it was her fault.

I’m so glad we met up again. And I might even have a chance to visit Canada.

Tags friends, Jerusalem, light railway

Social anxiety

Slogan Competition

I need a slogan.

Update for clarification. The slogan is supposed to say: you need to know about social anxiety.

I tried using a free slogan maker. It asked for a word and I gave it social-anxiety. It came back with slogans – lots of them. Slogans like these:

Get more from life with social-anxiety.
Make someone happy with social-anxiety.
Social-anxiety – empowering people.
Social-anxiety makes dreams come true.
Social-anxiety, try it you’ll like it!

I thought about these. For a second or two. Then I decided…

The Competition

I still need a slogan. Something that says that social anxiety is the next big thing. That everyone needs to know about social anxiety. That you should be on the social anxiety bandwagon, because you don’t want to get left behind. That soon only ignorant people won’t know what social anxiety is. That sort of thing.

That’s the competition. The person who thinks up the best slogan will win a signed copy of my romance with a difference, Neither Here Nor There. If the winner has read that book, I’ll think of a different prize.

How to Enter

Where should you send your competition entries? Write them here in the comments or send them privately, if you prefer, using the Contact me button at the top. I’ll announce the winner here, unless they don’t want to be announced, and will use the winning slogan for marketing my forthcoming book: Social Anxiety Revealed.

Tags competition, prize, slogan, Social Anxiety Revealed, winner

Uncategorized

What’s Your Warning Label?

Post author By Miriam Drori
Post date Jul 9, 2017
4 Comments on What’s Your Warning Label?

This is such an interesting question: If we were all forced to wear a warning label, what would yours say?

I think in the past mine would have said:

Warning: BORING AND HESITANT

Now it would say:

Warning: APPEARS HESITANT AND BORING AT FIRST, BUT ASK THE RIGHT QUESTIONS AND YOU WILL BE SURPRISED

What’s your warning label?

Tags interesting question, warning label

Everyday life Israel

The Memorial Mountain

Har Herzl (Mount Herzl) has been Israel’s official national cemetery since 1951. It is the final resting place of presidents, prime ministers and other leaders. It is also a military cemetery for many soldiers who gave their lives for the country.

I’ve visited Har Herzl many times over the past forty years, but never on a guided tour, and there were many things I didn’t know about it. So when I saw a request by Tali Tarlow for “test drivers” of this chapter of the book she’s been writing, I jumped at the chance. Tali is well known for her fun and informative scavenger hunts. I’ve been on three of them, all in Jerusalem: the Old City, Nachlaot and Yemin Moshe.

“We know how to do memorials,” said Erika, who joined me on Friday for the visit. It’s true. Unfortunately, this small, young country has had plenty of experience. And designers have created some innovative symbols. As well as the graves I mentioned above, we saw the memorials for passengers and crews of sunken ships and submarines, and for Ethiopian Jews who died trying to reach the Land of Israel. In Tali’s chapter, we read sad and uplifting stories, knowing that without the people buried in this place, we wouldn’t be living here.

HarHerzlMemorialToEthiopianJews30 — Memorial to Ethiopian Jews

At the top of a hill, we saw the tomb of Benjamin Ze’ev (Theodor) Herzl, the visionary of the State of Israel, after whom the place is named.

Har Herzl is also a lovely park, well laid out with trees, flowers and grass.

Although we enjoyed our morning on the mountain, Erika and I decided that next time we meet, it will be at a happier location.

Tags cemetery, memorial, Mount Herzl

Books

Double Anniversary

Sorry about the recent quiet from within the walls. I’ve been editing and writing and thinking about a new cover and…

But I couldn’t let yesterday’s double anniversary go unnoticed.

Three years ago, my first novel, NEITHER HERE NOR THERE, was published by Crooked Cat. Seven years ago, my metastory, called NO MIDDLE, was published online. Here it is:

No Middle

His eyes lit up. “You’ve made soup. And strawberries. Mmm. What’s the main course?”

“Sorry, I didn’t get round to making a main course.”

“No main course? You wouldn’t write a story like that, with a beginning and an end but no middle.”

When they finally broke in, the smell drew them to the kitchen. On the table, beside two empty soup bowls, lay two dishes of rotting strawberries.

***

The novel is here.

Neither Here Nor There

Tags anniversary, Crooked Cat Books, Neither Here Nor There, No Middle, strawberries

Books Social anxiety

Positive Passion

Following on from the news that my book, Social Anxiety Revealed will be published by Crooked Cat later this year, hence giving a big boost to my passion: raising awareness of social anxiety, I looked up quotes about passion and found these:

Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.

~Oprah Winfrey

If passion drives you, let reason hold the reins.

~Benjamin Franklin

We must act out passion before we can feel it.

~Jean-Paul Sartre

It is obvious that we can no more explain a passion to a person who has never experienced it than we can explain light to the blind.

~T. S. Eliot

Nothing is as important as passion. No matter what you want to do with your life, be passionate.

~Jon Bon Jovi

I started posting one a day on Facebook. In fact I was ready to post the last one when tragedy struck in Manchester, UK, making me think again. Whatever you want to do, be passionate? I think the perpetrator of that horrendous crime was passionate, but he was passionate about the wrong thing. Considering the beliefs he held, I think it would have been better if he hadn’t been passionate about them.

So instead of posting that last quote, I wrote one of my own:

Your passion should stimulate you to help fellow humans – not harm them.

I added: “Over the last few days, I’ve been posting quotes about passion. This one is mine, inspired by Manchester and similar atrocities, perpetrated by people with the wrong sort of passion.”

Promote Positive Passion

Tags Benjamin Franklin, Crooked Cat, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jon Bon Jovi, Manchester, Oprah Winfrey, passion, T. S. Eliot

The Competition

How to Enter

No Middle

~~~

Promote Positive Passion