Backing out of an Israeli parking lot, like the December sunshine surrounding me as I write, like many other things about living in Israel, doesn\u2019t make sense. Only in Israel does a shopping center that includes a caf\u00e9, pharmacy and supermarket have a parking lot with only 10 parking spaces and only one narrow opening awkwardly angled onto a busy main street. There I was, trying not to back into the car trying to push its way into the parking space that I had not yet vacated, with that familiar feeling of claustrophobic desperation: I\u2019ll never get out of here.<\/p>\n
I had only ventured into the wilds of the Tel Aviv Shabbat traffic jungle\u00a0in order to get my daughter\u2019s medicine at the pharmacy \u2013 another only in Israel situation \u2013 she is not yet in the IDF, but is participating in a course and comes home only for Shabbat. Everything was fine until she fell sick, could not see a military doctor because she is a civilian, and the only appointment that could be arranged for her on Friday was two towns away in Bat Yam. It was the last appointment of the day, which left me to fill the prescription on a Saturday morning, and to contend with the congested caf\u00e9 traffic, muttering to myself: only in Israel.<\/p>\n
Suddenly, there he was, in my rear view mirror. Middle aged, with a dark beard and kippah, holding a blue velvet tallit bag in one hand and with the other, gesturing to me in universal car speak \u2013 it\u2019s all right, you have room, you can back out.<\/p>\n
I had been to the pharmacy, but my knight with the blue tallit bag had no way of knowing that. For all he knew, I could have just stopped by the caf\u00e9 for a cappuccino, on my way to a day replete with secular pleasures.<\/p>\n
This Saturday morning, in the warm December sunshine of Tel Aviv, a man in a kippah and a white shirt, holding a blue velvet tallit bag, stepped out into the middle of the street and stopped traffic for me so that I could back out of a parking lot. I think this is one of those moments Hillel had in mind when he said, \u201cLove your neighbor as you would yourself. The rest is commentary.\u201d Only in Israel.<\/p>\n