Story: Baby Salo's Early Arrival, Berkley, CA July 22nd/2025

On the backdrop of the national and international heartbreaking events, which have been taking place in Israel, and around the globe, both our daughters and their families, sadly moved out of the country, after living in Tel-Aviv almost 20 years, and to our delight, moved into our township in California, next to us.

My oldest daughter Keren escaped Israel/ Iran war (more here) 3 days prior to Israel's surprised attack, as she luckily departed Israel on. a flight to CA on June 9th.

The fact that the airlines prohibit pregnant women to get on board beyond 32 pregnancy weeks, as to avoid unexpected on flight deliveries... shielded Keren from

the stressful horrors of this bloody war.

My second daughter Inbal,and her family, who unfortunately were subjected to hiding in their apartment's safe room, during the entire 12 days of the Iranian ballistic shelling, manged, eventually to fly out of Israel, .on their original booked flights. on July 20th,

By sheer luck they arrived to CA 2 days prior to Keren's unexpected 2 weeks earlier than the due date's .delivery.

Keren's husband, Elie, who was on a cross country drive from the East Coast to CA with Rugie the beloved dog ( here) received the news of the earlier delivery, when reaching Salt Lake City, Utah,

Fully aware that he would need assistance with driving the 740 km, straight from Salt lake City to reach San Francisco a.s.a.p . he asked his parents who planed also on arriving for the delivery, later in the beginning of August, to immediately fly out, and meet him in Utah.

Alternating in driving with his father, Elie and his parents made the distance from Salt Lake City in 12 hours record, straight to the hospital in Berkeley.

Oddly enough, a day prior to this early unexpected delivery, and following an intense hopping and puffing dance class, which keren took at the Gim, she also received an "Omen" alert from the universe, encountering an unusual "experience"

A prolonged distressed chirping sound was heard outside of Keren bathroom's window for quite a while.

Keren assumed that the crying fledgling she spotted, but couldn't reach, was calling out for its mama-bird to be rescued. Maybe the chick was chirping, Keren thought, because it being afraid of flying off the high altitude,

After David was summoned up to assist with the rescue operation, he realized that the frightened Baby Bird's tail, got trapped in between the bathroom's 2 sliding windows' . so David pulled the widows open apart.

The relieved chick upon being released, and free to fly out and away, through the open window, entered instead into the small bathroom space, where the three of us were huddled observing the action, and started hoovering frantically over our heads.

In retrospect it seemed as if the trapped chick messenger was signing an alert warning, as related to 'Keren's own "trapped" baby, who apparently was very ready to be expunged to the world much earlier, then his actually later due date..

It took us all three to persuade and chase the flighty fledgling out of the window,

back to mother nature, in hope it will reunite with his mama-bird.

On the evening of July 22nd, keren's water suddenly broke in the house, and her consecutive frequent contractions sent her and the hired amazing Dullah

to the delivery room at Alta Bates Hospital in Berkeley, located only 15 minutes drive away. from the house.

Keren's misguided hopes for a natural delivery, at the age of 45, unfortunately very soon evaporated, as an extreme sharp body pain, which even the enlarged epidural doses, (regional anesthesia that blocks pain signals in the lower body) didn't relive, had dictated the course of that long agonizing night.

A life-threatening complication, a relatively rear case of uterus eruption (only 10% of cases in delivering women) but a serious medical emergency that occurs when the uterus tears or breaks open, caused Keren much bleeding and horrible pain.

After 5 agonizing hours, when we also learnt that epidural may have no impact on 14% of women who consume it, Keren was rushed to the operation room and was relieved of that prolonged agony, by having a successful cesarean section.

Up to when the C-Section surgery was preformed, the amazing Dullah and I did our best to alleviate and assist keren through the prolonged misery she has been put through, cringing along with her, with every contraction pain wave, that sliced her body.

What a luck and luxury it is, I thought, to be living not in the 19th but 21th C, and benefit from amazing medical advances, which saved both Keren and the baby from a fatal fate.

Furthermore Alta Bates' Berkeley campus provides advanced maternity care and specialized care for high-risk births, so Keren lucked on delivering in the best place.

Baby Solomon ,"Salo" for short, made his grand debut entry to the world, on the early morning of July 22nd, just 3 minutes before 5:00 am, a 7.5 pounds healthy male.

After all positive tests were done on him, Salo was placed for "skin to skin" rub on Inbal's chest, while I set with exhausted Keren at the recovery room. When Keren finally was totally awake from this horrifying life threatening ordeal, she glowed with joy and pride once baby Salo was placed, finally into her loving hands.

Elie, the dog and his parents arrived late the following night after,the delivery, and stayed around, for an entire month, before returning back to the East coast..

The dedicated grand- parents assumed lovingly and admirably a "night nurse role" for the entire duration of their stay in the Bay area.

Kevin and Marcia , also in their mid 7oth, would arrived at our house, each night at 11:00pm doing nights' sifts, changing and feeding baby Salo until 5:00am, while bestowing on him much TLC.

Keren recuperated remarkably fast from the challenging delivery experience and snapped, immediately into the long coveted maternal role,

Her and the adorable good nature baby, , have been doing extremely well. with the loving support and caring of all our families' members

Also the Brit - the Jewish Circumcision Ceremony was timely preformed, 8 days after the delivery, at our home, with the witnessing participation. of dear family and friends

Elie's siblings flew especially, for this celebratory occasion from DC and LA

The Mohel was a much esteem local couple, from San Francisco, both doctors.

While she preformed the precision surgery he educated the public on the ritual's long meaningful tradition. Salo behaved like a true trooper, throughout the entire ordeal.

For few weeks our "mad" house accommodated, the entire" tribe"

Keren, Elie ,baby Salo, and the dog Rugie, along with Inbal and her 2 kids, and later also Inbal's husband who joined getting a belated entry visa to the US.

Joy, noise, laughter whimpering and tears consumed the house intermediately ...

as everyone's lives have convulsed so dramatically.

Following the loss of the "parental night nursing" and being dismayed by the fees charged by professional ones, I suggest Keren to pay a visit to the township's public parks and explore for potential babysitters, who frequents the parks with the small kids being looked after, during the day.

That was the best advise given, as Keren could observe how the "nannies " interact with the kids and then get recommendation from their employers . She got a list of 5 of them and for a much more reasonable fees, and these hired night nurses, saved the entire family, from many sleepless night.

The school year started at the beginning of Sept, and finally our grands- Inbal's kids, who were running loose, since they arrived in CA, throughout most of the summer, along with their best play mate - the dog, found themselves back in a structured Jewish school environment, facing new friends and academic challenges, in a different language

of this country

The house became much more quite and orderly during the day, however especially the dog, now deprived of their extra attentions, had missed them terribly,

during the morning hours.

Elie returned to CA, for a short visit on labor Day weekend, and then just a day before Rosh Hashana, (5786) the Jewish New Year, (Oct 22md)

He came to stay on a prolonged paternity leave, really enjoying being reunited. with his growing family.

Inbal and family moved out of the house and miraculously moved into a great rental dwelling, just around the corner from us. The grands can run safely between the 2 houses.

Rosh Hashana eve. on which Salo turned 2 months young, was celebrated with the joy of Elie's reunion with the baby and Keren at our home with also our dear friends Ina and Bruce. However we missed inbal and her family, who flew out to Mexico to spend the Holiday with the in -laws

An earthquake of 4.3 magnitude which rattled California's Bay Area and our home

welcomed Elie's return with a big shake.

It woke me up,  but not the rest of the family, at 3:00am, on the night between the 21st to the 22nd of Sept.,

The tremor sounded and felt like a familiar war blast.

The epicenter was located less than 2 miles east of Berkeley, and the quake was felt in San Francisco and San Jose.

It struck in the vicinity of the Hayward fault line, which runs through several densely populated areas including ours.

I was truly hoping that, as the New Year was limping in, this unexpected earthquake, be the last among so many maladies, which had inflicted the exiting turbulent past year,

so the born sweet babies of the world, can anticipate a sweeter and calmer future..

May Salo bring much joy and pride to his wonderful parents and all who knows him.

May this upcoming New Year bring many more Blessings, Harmony and Healing to the Israeli kidnapped and their families

May the bloody war curses, cease and vanish to the dustbins of history, 

May our hearts fill again with the joy of laughter, our minds with the sensical wisdom of pomegranate's many seeds, and may our palette overflow with the sweetness of honey,

Shana Tova and Gemar Chatima Tova