We're outtahere.

It’s Passover again.

And tonight we will read, for the umpteenth time, the story about Moses leading his people (my people) from slavery to freedom.

But the Haggadah also tells us another story. One that gets lost in the action and adventure of burning bushes and parting seas.

Of course, I’m referring to the courageous, astronomically resilient, ancient Egyptians.

In the face of an ornery G-d, these brave and stubborn people stood their ground and endured plagues and pestilence that would surely undo lesser men.

Fast-forward some 3000 years.

Let’s imagine a young Native American, wielding a stick that could turn into a snake, called for a return of all the lands from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

And let’s suppose he backed up that demand with the threat of a shore-to-shore infestation of locusts, followed by frogs, followed by flies.

And what if after the flies, the frogs and the locusts cleared, every man, woman and child found themselves covered head-to-toe in puss-filled boils. (I’ve seen the panic that ensues when one kid at school reports some head lice, and that’s not pretty.)

Those are only plagues 1 through 4.

I can only speak for myself when I say that my family and I would not be sticking around for the remaining six, including the still undefined mysterious “murrain.”

No, unlike those stout Egyptians, we would have tossed in the towel, packed up the Samsonite luggage and boarded the first plane to Eastern Poland, land of my Kossack-abused forefathers.

Goodbye Culver City.
Hello Grodzno.