I still have to hitch hike

As most of you know, I "tremp" hitch hike to and from work. I also use that mode of transportation when no bus is easily available. It's pretty standard and accepted here. My neck of the woods isn't Manhattan,which has fantastic public transportation. In some ways it's better than Great Neck, which at least when I was a teen had just the Long Island Railroad, LIRR, which could take me, after walking a mile to the station, either to Port Washington, which I never needed or west to Bayside, Flushing or Penn Station. When the World's Fair was happening, it took me there, too.

But I'm not hitching to have fun. I have to go to work or get home, rain or shine. Once I'm on the main road, most of the cars are Arab, even if they have Israeli license plates. So I stay on the shoulder, behind cement barricades, when available, and patiently wait. The new barricades outside of Ofra were destroyed when the houses in Amona were destroyed. I don't know by whom.

Recently, there were announcements that the Arab terrorists plan to kidnap Israeli soldiers. True, I don't look like a soldier, and I never was one, but still, that means that all of us are in danger, especially since their aim is to use the, G-d forbid, kidnapped Israelis for "trading."

I have no other reasonable alternative way of traveling. As it is, the twenty minute direct drive takes me an average of an hour or more. And that's on a good day. On very rare occasions, I make it home in about 45 minutes, which is double what it could be if I had door-to-door non-stop transportation. Of course, I don't get into a car unless I've taken a good look at the driver. Frequently I know him or her. When I'm waiting outside of Ofra, I don't hail passing vehicles.

I also don't "tremp" on routes and roads I'm unfamiliar with. When I visit my cousin in the other direction, Neve Ne'eman (a suburb of Hod Hasharon), I first got to know the route by bus, even though it made the trip longer. It's extremely important to know exactly where I need to go. People endanger themselves by not knowing their routes. And that includes soldiers who sometimes haven't the vaguest idea where they are. That is how people really put themselves in trouble.

There's no guarantee, and traffic accidents are also a danger, just like any place else in the world.

Shabbat's approaching, and I have a lot to do.

So, if I don't' have any more time later,

Shabbat Shalom