L'Shana Tova

I have to confess, in my family I am the most secular Jew. They might not know it, but it is how I feel. I do not actively seek out my Judaism on a regular basis, nor do I participate in being Jewish. We do not light the Shabbat candles every Friday night. We do not attend services. We are not members of a congregation or the JCC. I am Jewish, it is just part of me. Like saying I have brown hair. It is just factual information.

As I was sitting in temple last month for Rosh Hashanah services I was struck by the amount of community I am missing by not being more involved. I was sitting in services, by myself, when a couple sat down next to me. She introduced herself and started talking to me about the synagogue. She engaged me in her community. She could have left me alone, but she didn't. Then, the president spoke about how the synagogue as a community needs to be looking out for the new people and the people who are not yet involved in their community. And I felt like she was talking to me. She said L'Shana Tova means Happy New Year, and I knew that, we say it every year. Then she said that L'Shana comes from the same root as  L'Shanot, change. Let Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur serve as a moment of decisive change in your life. 

It resonated with me. 

It happened again at Kol Nidrei services. Kol Nidrei is a prayer for those who cannot pray. It is the community asking forgiveness for those who cannot ask for themselves. A different couple sat down next to me and we began to talk about the Rabbis and Cantors. A former student sat down with her family behind me and engaged me for fifteen minutes before the service and again afterwards. They asked if I was a member, and when I said I wasn't, they asked if I had enjoyed myself. No pressure to join. Just make sure you still get involved in the yearly programs. 

It resonated with me again. Like listening to the shofar sound. The universe is talking to me. I miss prayer. I miss being involved in the temple. I miss being an active participant in my Judaism.

And in the last month, I have thought about it a lot. And I have started looking into the Temple. I have started doing the research. I have started making plans for us and for our household. My hope for this New Year is that the "little" change Eliana has been (little in size, not the change) will continue until we can fill the void. Let me take these feelings seriously and act on them. Let me make changes that last. May this year be a Happy New Year and a Year filled with Happy Changes.


On a similar and different note. My goal this year is to forgive those who hurt me. I want to not take offense as quickly or as deeply. I want to learn how to let it go better and faster. There was a prayer in the Kol Nidrei service that really stuck with me - even now a month later.

Give us the grace to show forbearance to those who offend against us. When the wrongs and injustices of others wound us, may our hearts not despair of human good. May no trial, however severe, embitter our souls and destroy our trust. When beset by trouble and sorrow, our mothers and fathers put on the armor of faith and fortitude. May we too find strength to meet adversity with quiet courage and unshaken will. Help us to understand that injustice and hate will not forever afflict the human race; that righteousness and mercy with triumph in the end. 

There are people we live with, work with, are friends by association with, who drive us up the wall. In a high school, I work with bullies on a regular basis, whether student or adult. I am tired of it. I am looking for my armor of faith and fortitude as well as the quiet courage and unshaken will to stand up for what I believe is right. More importantly, I want to stop focusing on the wrongs done to me. I want to be able to focus on all the positive things that happen during the day. I want to change my focus. I want to focus on the change. 

Happy Holidays

I have struggled with this time of the year my whole life. Being Jewish means you feel left out of the whole magic of Christmas experience. I have celebrated Christmas dozens of times with friends, and now family, but it doesn't change the whole feeling.

So let's start with Chanukah. We celebrated every night. But it is such a minor holiday in Judaism...

For the last few months Matt and I have been taking an Introduction to Judaism class every week. And while it has not been the most fun class (the instruction method is a little dry), there have been some real gems of moments. Most of the class are young couples who are getting married or recently married. So when we started taking about Chanukah and Christmas it was very interesting for me.

I love holiday cards. Especially ones with pictures. Not so much the letter telling what everyone was up to this year. Those seem to glaze over the troubles and only focus on the positive, and that's not how the year really went. I digress.

So I was really worried that I hated Christmas. Not the holiday, but the actuality. I mean, how could you hate a holiday?

I read an article for class that... struck a chord. And then we talked about it in class and I learned a lot more about my relationship with Christmas. It wasn't Christmas I hated, but parts of it. I was finally able to compartmentalize Christmas.

I hate most of the Christmas music on the radio. And during our conversation at class I figured it out. I hate the commercialism of Christmas. All the ads on TV. The secular music that gets played over and over again on the radio. It drives me nuts and makes me feel excluded.

I love the religious aspects of it. I loved going to midnight mass with friends in high school. It was a beautiful service and a wonderful way to celebrate with family. I love sitting at my mother-in-law's house for a family meal, decorating the tree as a family, and being together. I love going to church with her and listening to her lead the congregation. I love her sermons. I love the candles.

But I LOVE the lights. Christmas lights feel like the marriage between Chanukah (and the festival of lights) and Christmas. They are a beautiful way of lighting up the darkest time of the year ands making the home feel inviting, whether for Santa Claus or visiting family. One of my favorite  holiday memories growing up was driving around Dallas to see the lights with my grandparents.

So Baby Girl, realize how lucky you are. You get to experience all of the wonderful parts of the holiday season. You have two excuses to be with family. You will get to experience all of the lights, both Chanukah and Christmas. Because we are going to celebrate a-la-carte. We are going to celebrate Chanukah with our family. And we are going to put up lights. And then we will celebrate Christmas with our family.



Marriage is a blending of two families and two sets of traditions. That means we each get a say in what we include. And I am excited that I will be included in some of the magic next year through our Baby Girl.

Shabbat Shalom & the Floors

This post is going to have a lot to say. So keep reading. There are at least 3 different stories about to happen.

Let's start with the floors. Every day when I come home I am surprised by how much of the floors are done! So much has been going on with them. Matt is a flooring-MACHINE!

Recently, the living room was finished. You saw that. And put back together! YAY!!!!! Then it was on to get the dining room and kitchen ready. While Matt was installing a new sub-floor and fixing the squeaks, he discovered that one of the beams supporting the kitchen had a huge crack in it. So he fixed it. Like, duh. He bought a new beam and supported it. I got to help.

Then we opened up the boxes of knotty (I thought it was naughty, just kidding!!) wood that we got on clearance. In the store it looked really good. They had a little 3x3 area sample on the floor, and we liked the variations a lot. Then we opened up the boxes. They were all 12 inch pieces with 1 or 2 2 foot planks thrown in. No wonder they were clearance priced! Garbage. So we returned them and bought more of the beautiful wood from the living room.

Then it was Memorial Day weekend! I thought I would give Matt the house to himself to be able to keep installing the floors to his content. But the wood had to acclimate to the house, and it was delivered on Friday. So by Sunday, he was happily back to work. And by Tuesday night, the dining room was done!

And now it is Friday. And Matt was hard at work all afternoon. He finished half of the kitchen, then installed molding in the dining room and one side of the kitchen. I hope that this is the last weekend of floors! HOPE HOPE HOPE!!! He told me we could put the dining room and island back tonight! Oh wouldn't that be a Friday miracle!

Which leads me to Story #2. Recently, we had a disturbance in the force. The disturbance is not important. The outcome is very important. We are at that point in our lives where things that haven't really mattered are becoming more important. We are deciding what rituals are important and how we want to deal with them. 

Tonight I brought home dinner. And dessert. But most importantly Challah. Tonight we celebrated our "First" Shabbat. We are going to be more observant. This was important (wow how many times have I just used that word) enough to me to stage a small war between us before we got married. We will be raising Jewish children. It was important to both of us to raise children in one faith not both.   




Both is too confusing and makes children choose between their parents. We are not okay with that for our children.

Before I tangent too far off, we had a picnic tonight. On the new floors between the kitchen and the dining room. We ate burritos. And Challah. And Mondal bread. And B&W cookies. I lit the candles (first duh) and said the blessings. We didn't bless the wine (or beer) because Matt would be using more power tools after we ate, and that just didn't seem safe. And we sat on the floor and talked about the day.

The weirdest part? After dinner, and after we welcomed Shabbat, I was able to sit down and relax. It felt natural. It felt right. It felt like coming home.

Good Shabbos. May your life be blessed with joy, love, and happiness.

Passover 2012

Passover has a weird reputation. Did you know that? Well it does. The story is one that everyone knows. But the food? Oy. The food. For those who know and eat this every year, it is not the best - although that is self-imposed, because I can cook like a champ. And Passover only gets rid of the carbs. Not the end of the world - but everyone still complains about it. Jews hate matzoh and non-Jews think it is delicious. But then they go home and eat chicken nuggets and tater tots... But I digress.

Passover is one of the most well known stories in Jewish traditions. It is the retelling of the exodus from Egypt. From slavery to freedom. From oppression to redemption.

So my family. Let me tell you about our traditions. Growing up we did the whole traditional Passover. We sat around the table and read the Haggadah (the book). We did the whole traditional boring Passover complete with kids who misbehave. Then we moved to Connecticut. And it continued for another few years.

Then my mother completed her course in GENIUS. I am pretty sure she has a Doctorate in it. But I was a kid and I didn't pay attention.

Focus. Again. Passover. Genius. She decided that we should use more imagination and move the Seder from the dining room table to the living room, under the "tent." We hung canopies from the ceiling (years ago) and we feel like we are in the desert coming from Egypt and towards our redemption and freedom. We began using the Haggadah more like a program and stopped reading the whole book.

We do so many things that are not the norm. We play games to help us better understand the message. We play BINGO, Scattergories, ask the 4 Questions in every "language" we speak. We have to put the actual story back in order - all 60 lines.

Originally we did these things to keep us kids on task and paying attention. We designed the Seder in our family to cater to the younger generations.

Just as we grew up. Our Seder has been growing up. Over the years, we have played fewer games. We have been asking more challenging and pertinent questions. We have been learning to be Jewish adults. This year we had a 95% adult Seder. We didn't play any games officially (we played the ghost version - you know as if we were still playing, but we weren't) and this year we had a theme.

REDEMPTION. Mom said there are three themes to the Torah. Creation, redemption, and revelation. Of the three themes, two of them happen to us without our consent. God makes that decision and it happens. God creates us and God gives us the Torah whether or not we are interested in it. However, she pointed out that we have to work for redemption. We have to take ourselves out of Egypt. We have to ask for help and work to complete it. So this year we talked about our personal redemptions.  Matt explained that his was helping students. He works in a low SES school and he helps them achieve in high school to help them towards higher education. I understand that. Another person explained that her redemption was asking for help and being strong enough to ask for help. That is hard to do.

My personal redemption is similar. My redemption comes not from asking for help, but in being receptive to it once I have asked for it. I am not very good at taking advice. Ever. I don't like to be told what to do. I like to think for myself and make my own mistakes. My personal redemption comes from asking for advice and then LISTENING to it and really taking it in without getting on the defensive.

It was a lot to think about. And even though I knew the question ahead of time (and others did not) I could not come up with a response that quickly. I wanted to process it and make it meaningful for me.

Throughout the evening we also talked about, explained, and debated some of the details of the Seder. The Seder always ends with "Next year in Jerusalem" and we discussed the meaning. Did it mean physically? Spiritually? Is is a metaphor? Does it discredit Jews living in the diaspora? Or is it about survival? It could be any of these or something entirely different.

Next year may we be in Jerusalem. And may we work all year to redeem ourselves in our own eyes.

Happy New Year!

One of my favorite holidays just came and went.  And it feels weird to talk about Yom Kippur as being a favorite, or even positive holiday, but it is true.  For those who don't know (because maybe you live under a rock... sorry that was harsh because I am Jewish and therefore know these holidays, but I digress). For those who don't know there are two major Jewish holidays that take place in September/October (because they use a lunar calendar so the date changes slightly every year).  The first is Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.  We welcome in the New Year and wish everyone a sweet new year, by eating apples & honey. 

Then there are 10 days.  10 days of atonement.  10 days of saying you are sorry.  For asking for forgiveness for the things we have done wrong, thought badly, and for hurting others whether intentionally or unintentionally.  And this is the part I enjoy.  There is something about this part of the holiday which is freeing and uplifting (not the wrong words at all).  So it is just a matter of calling the people who mean something to you and apologizing for anything you might have done in the last year that hurt them.  (DISCLAIMER - this year I failed at this and didn't make the phone calls, and for that I am sorry.)

Yom Kippur is on day 10.  This is the day when after having asked forgiveness from the people we care about, we ask God for forgiveness as well.  One of my favorite parts of the service says:

"For transgressions against God, the Day of Atonement atones; but for transgressions of one human being against another, the Day of Atonement does not atone until they have made peace with one another."

The more well known part of this holiday is the fact that we fast on this holiday.  We refrain from engaging in activities that give us pleasure so that we can focus on asking for forgiveness and forgiving others.  We refrain from eating, bathing, and sex.  In doing so, we can focus on the task at hand and not be distracted from all the day-to-day nonsense. 

There was something about this Yom Kippur that was very different for me.  It felt more profound.  Which is strange because I was away from home and looking for a local synagogue (which I might have found after a non-holiday visit) and I did not truly fast (because of a medication I am taking - no worries, nothing serious). I missed my family.  I missed being with the community I know.  But I enjoyed not having the distractions of those same people.  I was able to focus on my apologies and hopes for the New Year. 

So after all this there are just two things I want to say.
If I have done anything to offend you, I am sorry.  Whether it was by my actions or by my words, I did not mean to harm you or hurt you in any way.  I know words can feel harmless and change after they sit awhile.  I am sorry for any misunderstandings. 
Also, have a wonderful and happy New Year.  May it be a sweet and wonderful New Year. 

---PS--- and no that apology does not count for the people I still need to call, but I dropped my phone in the toilet and I am waiting for the replacement to arrive in the mail.  True story.

Love you, D