Febtober Makes Sense

By Shimon Apisdorf

Four months ago.

On February 7th, I went to the cardiologist for an annual check-up.

While I was waiting, a general walked slowly into the office. His uniform was wrinkled and stained. His kippa was quite large and his long white beard was unkempt. Was I looking at a just-back-from-the-war-front general, or was I looking at the dean of a yeshiva? He looked very tired. I didn’t want to disturb him with my query, so I kept to myself knowing that tired old guys like him, would keep less tired old guys like me safe and secure.

My always pleasant, originally South African by way of a thousand years in Poland doctor, called me into his office. “So how are you?” he asked. “You know, considering it’s February 7th …” My voice trailed off. “Not really,” he said, “It’s still October 7th.”

The good doctor was saying what we all live. It’s as if time no longer exists. There are only two “times” left in the world. Before that cursed black sabbath, and after. A year ago, my appointment had been scheduled for 4:00 pm on February 7th. This year it took place at 4:05 p.m. on Febtober 7th.

The examination showed something odd. In four months, my heart had only beat four times.

Beat …

It’s called CBHD. Collective Broken Heart Disorder. Far more contagious than COVID, it infected everyone in Israel, instantly.

At a certain point, I mustered the courage to spit out a dangerously banal question. “How’s your family?”

The doctor’s answer: “So far, okay.”

That’s Israelspeak for “My grandfather’s not rotting away in a cage deep underground in the world’s first subterranean jihad city built for the express purpose of torturing and killing Jews.”

It’s Israelspeak for “My daughter who has been in a tank on the northern border for 120 days tells me I shouldn’t worry so much.” Because after all, those tens of thousands of larger-than-Hamas prepositioned Iranian-Hezbollah precision missiles aimed at Israel’s citizens and critical infrastructure will miraculously misfire the moment the Jihadi Nasrallahakbar gives the order to launch, right?

It’s Israelspeak for, “Do you think we’ll ever get that stolen baby back alive?”

All I did was go for a routine visit to the doctor. My G-d, you’d think I had done something crazy like going to a music festival, or taking a leisurely holiday stroll around my beautiful kibbutz.

The thing is, here, routine doesn’t exist anymore. Nothing about our moment-to-moment thoughts, emotions, conversations, and non-conversations make sense anymore. Until you realize that it’s Febtober.

Then everything makes sense.

In Febtober…

War against Jihad makes sense.

“Whatever it takes,” to thwart the carefully planned slaughter, burning, raping, and Gd forbid nuking of 7.2 million indigenous Jews in their one tiny little shared ancient home makes sense.

Suitcases stuffed with millions in cash found in Sunni Sin-War’s abandoned underground command center, happily supplied by Iran’s Super Duper Supreme Shia leader, Mr. “Death to Israel, Death to America” Seyyed Ali Hosseini Khameinei, makes sense. I guess.

Millions of marching Jihad supporters on Ivy League campuses and countless city streets across the globe makes sense. You know, that Febtober sort of sense.

The fact that in the land of the free and the home of the brave the #metoo mantra of “taking a woman at her word,” when entered into Google translate comes out in Jewishwomenspeak as, “I know there are blood stains, recordings of perpetrators openly celebrating their female body conquests, and numerous eyewitness reports of inhumane sexual torture,” “BUT.” But. But. “But we do need to fully investigate before drawing our conclusion.” That makes sense, right? Febtober sense.