Question #4: How will I maintain relationships with family and friends I have cherished?

It is so much easier to be in touch with friends and family than when we were growing up and phone calls were prohibitively expensive for overseas calling.  We plan to maintain a Nebraska phone number while in Israel so our current US family and friends can reach us easily.  As in the past, whenever I have traveled to Israel while still serving Tifereth Israel members, I am always reachable via the internet and I love using FaceBook messenger to connect visually with my nearest and dearest.

There is one more piece that I'd like to add to these forms of keeping connected.  I want our door to be open to family and friends coming to Israel.  It is my understanding that at our age, we are required to have at least a 2nd bedroom (in case we need a care-taker to stay with us down the road), but for now that 2nd bedroom and hopefully 3rd bedroom will be designated for family and friends to stay in.  A long time ago, I thought about opening a bed and breakfast in our home on Hanson Ct.  It would be a place for kosher travelers to stop and have pleasant conversation and comforts on their way across the U.S.  I was discouraged when my kids said, "Mom, why would you do that?  Your home is already a bed and breakfast for Jews traveling and stopping in Lincoln...only now they know they don't have to pay anything!" So we're not opening a bed and breakfast, just establishing an open door policy once again.

Over the past decade or so, I have been the administrator of the FaceBook group, Friends of Tifereth Israel.  Obviously, I can still do that task from Israel, and hope to do so.  (Although I will also appoint another administrator to help with that task as well).   It is a wonderful way to stay in touch with friends who have once made a life in Lincoln.



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