Almost Independence Day

It is,in fact,already our 60th anniversary of independence [for the pedantic,among whom I am proud to number myself,it seems to me that it is in fact the 59th anniversary: independence having been declared in 1948,1949 would have been the first anniversary,so that 2009 will be the 60th...] but I like Van Morrison's song title,and we haven't yet lit the barbeque,which really signals the heart of the celebrations.
So what's with the porcelain?
Well it caught my eye this morning-two large lumps of the original Naaman porcelain that have been sitting in a corner since I started using the Coleman porcelain. Sydney and I bought 10 tons of the stuff when the factory closed down some 10 years ago,paying some ludicrously low price; now porcelain,you might think,is not a very local material,but- firstly- it was put together from imported raw materials by the factory in Haifa,which is already a step in the right direction: secondly,I learned from a conversation with the Naaman technicians that they used magnetically-de-ironed sand from the Negev in the batch- which does make it much more local.
What I'm getting at is that this is also my story -white,difficult to work with,and apparently foreign to this country- but when you dig a bit deeper,you find a strong connection.So it seemed appropriate to whack the 2 lumps with a large hammer,douse it in the last of last Winter's rainwater [having strained out the mosquito larvae] and start getting it ready for use.
Happy Independence Day!