Winter really is here!

Seasons in Israel are nothing like the seasons in New York. In New York, we knew it was winter, because we wore corduroy and wool, darker colors, too. In Israel, we know it's winter, because of the rain, but it takes more than a couple of drops of rain to really make it winter.

When I see these flowers come up, I know it's winter here. It's something I only learned living in Shiloh, where we're much more attuned to nature than we were in Jerusalem. Besides actual rain in winter only, we knew about the "shkaydiya," almond tree, since we lived by a big old one.

Every year during the month of Shvat (just before spring), all the nursery schools used to come by, so the "ganenet" would show the children the pink blossoms. They would sing "Hashkaydiya porachat," the almond tree is blossoming. During that last winter we were there, when we already knew that we were moving, building began in the lot where the tree was. The tree was ripped out. Adults stood and cried. It was a neighborhood landmark, and there's a Jewish Law forbidding the destruction of fruit trees, I was told.

The first time we came to Shiloh was on TU B'Shvat, the "New Year of the Trees." It's the Shiloh anniversary of the return to our holy city. I went with friends and my daughters to see the yishuv. We planted trees. I don't know how many survived, since water was very limited then. It was trucked in and couldn't be spared.

A few weeks later, we came as an entire family for a Shabbat and decided that Shiloh was the place for us! At that time all of the housing was in the area of the ancient Tel, and we expected to live there, too.

Then around Passover we got a call that there would be a new neighborhood, and we should come to see it.

We were part of a group and taken up a hill. There wasn't even a road; I don't know how the van made it safely. We got out, and all we saw were wild flowers, gorgeous flowers of all colors. It was obvious that nobody had been there for hundreds, probably thousands of years, since the delicate flowers don't come up when the land is cultivated or people walk on it.

Ariel Sharon had chosen our hill for us. He had visited Shiloh and asked why everyone was living and planning on building in such a small place when there was a magnificent hill just above. He was Minister of Housing and promised some concrete prefabricated homes for the new neighborhood. We've been here, now in a custom-built home of our own design, since that first year, 1981.

This plant is the hardiest of the wild flowers native to the region. It blooms after the first few rains.