ChiKat, I've no pictures. Here's Day One.
I took the day off from work on Wednesday to pick Nilly up at LAX. I checked the flight time, and she was getting in a half hour earlier than expected. PANIC. I scrawled her name on a sign, and hauled ass to LAX.
When I got there, I was so overwhelmed with fear that poor Nilly was sitting around thinking no one would be there for her. I called Kristen to say, "I CAN'T FIND EL AL."
Kristen, who loves me, despite me, calmly and without accusing me of complete stupidity, said, "Tom Bradley International, honey."
Of course.
I pulled into parking, ran to the terminal. Couldn't find Nilly. Maybe she was outside. Maybe she went home, thinking we had all played a cruel joke on her.
Outside on the glass wall, an enormous Star of David reflected on the glass. Nilly's plane was making a turn-around and the Israeli flag painted on the tail appeared larger than life. A sign from God. NILLY IS HERE, JACKASS.
Ran back into terminal, desperately trying to find someone I'd never met. Tiny Israeli sprite charges me, throwing her wee arms around my neck. I'm either under attack, or it's Nilly. She hadn't even seen my sign.
I start talking, very fast. Nilly wrinkles her brow, only getting every fourth word.
We get in the car and start traveling back to Los Feliz. It's a long ride, mid-day.
We went through West Hollywood, and Nilly excitedly read the signs on the shops, all in hebrew. She kept saying, "EVERYTHING IS SOOO BIIIG!"
I tried to speak slower. I said, "I have something to tell you. I know you must be exhausted, but, Tim is taking you to dinner, tonight."
Nilly glowed with a silent smile, ear to ear.
We got to my place, she pulled presents from her bag.
"I couldn't find clean sand from Israel, but I did find this..."
It was a tiny pot filled with soil, and a packet of seeds. So, flowers from Israel. Lovely. Also, a homewarming prayer etched on a silver plated hand.
Nilly kept reaching out to touch me, and smiled and smiled some more. She was so tired, and so overwhelmed that this thing was real.
We talked awhile and then got ready to leave for dinner.
She had a lovely dress, shiny black hair down her back, and a tiny backpack with a pot leaf stitched on the front. I later learned that it was the only bag she could find that fit both a bottle of water and her wallet, comfortably.
We got to the restaurant, Nilly embraced Tim. He's uncomfortable with thank yous for generosity, quickly talked about Something Anything Else. We ate, he talked to Nilly for a long time about Israel's history, a favorite subject of his, she was noticeably giddy that he even knew the name of the Israeli national newspaper, taught him how to correcvtly pronounce it. He picked up his phone and called John. "What's Joss doing?" "Nilly, can you visit the set with me next week?"
The visit never came to fruition, but we had to mop Nilly up off the floor when the offer came, she had melted.
We met at 7, left at 11. Got home, Nilly fell asleep in a tiny heap on the corner of the bed, in the middle of a sentence.
More later.